Chapter 1 addresses the debate about the stylistics of the new (muḥdath) Abbasid poets, with a particular focus on rhetorical figures (badīʿ). It establishes that there was a shift in paradigm from an old school of criticism (ninth–eleventh century), which based its evaluation of poetry on its truthfulness and naturalness (qualities associated with the idealized “classical style” of the pre-Islamic poets), to a new school of criticism (eleventh century onwards) based on an aesthetic of wonder. This new school, represented first and foremost by ʿAbd al-Qāhir al-Jurjānī (d. 1078), articulated the beauty of the kinds of rhetorical figures (badīʿ) that the muḥdath poets relished, especially hyperbolic and fantastic make-believe imagery, by adducing their ability to evoke wonder in the listener. By doing so, they shifted their judgment of poetry from a truth-based scale, to one that is based on an experience of wonder, which results from novelty, strangeness, and the unexpected that can exist in the poetic form regardless of the truth or falsehood of its content. The chapter argues that an aesthetic of wonder is inherent in the very structure of many of the rhetorical figures, including those identified by critics beyond al-Jurjānī, namely, al-Sakkākī, and al-Khaṭīb al-Qazwīnī.

This brief Epilogue maps out the implications of the findings of this book on the various branches of the “science of eloquence” (ʿilm al-balāgha) and their role in poetic beauty. While faṣāḥa comes to refer to the correct, clear, and articulate way of conveying ideas, balāgha comes to refer to the conveying of ideas in a beautiful way after securing its faṣāḥa. Nevertheless, clarity often remains part of the definition of balāgha in Arabic criticism. The Epilogue concludes that this call for clarity is included in classical sources not as a determining feature of eloquence, but as a limit to the obscuring aspects of indirectness, implicitness, and unexpectedness necessary for rendering language beautiful.

Chapter 4 focuses on discussions of metaphor (istiʿāra), figurative speech (majāz), and metonymy (kināya). It demonstrates how theories about the beauty of these figures were also driven by an underlying aesthetic of wonder. The process that leads to wonder in these figures, which come to form the pillars of the “science of elucidation” (ʿilm al-bayān), differs from simile and other rhetorical figures. Their beauty lies in the very fact that the word employed figuratively (in metaphor) or implicitly (in metonymy) distances its intended meaning by signifying it indirectly. This is inherently more poetic than explicit expressions, according to our medieval authors, because the listener must go through a process of determining the secondary meaning to which a word’s primary signification points. Metaphor, like simile, therefore, requires the listener to go through an experience of “discovery.” The experience in this case, however, takes place through signification. The chapter thus unveils a medieval Arabic aesthetic theory of signs and signification.

Chapter 2 demonstrates that a similar shift took place in the reception of Aristotle’s Poetics in Arabic. Arabic philosophy was faced with the problem of making sense of the poetic as a type of syllogism, since it inherited a classification of Aristotle’s treatise as part of his books on logic (the Organon). While initial attempts in late antiquity distinguished the poetic from other types of syllogism based on its falsehood, Arabic philosophy, especially with Avicenna (d. 1037), decoupled the poetic from truth and falsehood and distinguished the kind of conclusion that one attains through the poetic syllogism as “make-believe” (takhyīl). This new solution shifted the assessment of the poetic from a statement’s truth and falsehood to its ability to conjure a make-believe image. This process was also expected to allow for an experience of discovery and wonder in the listener according to the philosophers. While Aristotle discussed wonder as resulting from manipulations of a tragic plot, Arabic philosophy developed a theory of wonder resulting from the verbal arts, especially simile and metaphor. The chapter follows the development of these ideas in the works of Averroes (d. 1198), al-Qarṭājannī (d. 1285), and al-Sijilmāsi (d. c. 1330).

The Preface briefly discusses and qualifies basic vocabulary central to the topic of the book, including the terms “medieval,” “classical,” “Arabic,” “literary,” “poetic,” “eloquent,” “literature,” “poetics,” “rhetoric,” “theory,” and “criticism.”

Chapter 5 focuses on the poetics of sentence construction (naẓm), as developed by al-Jurjānī and systematized in the “science of meanings” (ʿilm al-maʿānī) by al-Sakkākī and al-Khaṭīb al-Qazwīnī. Sentence construction is where medieval authors primarily located the inimitability and hence miraculousness (iʿjāz) of the Quran. The syntactical structure of a sentence can also be manipulated in such a way as to allow for an experience of discovery to take place in the listener by implicitly conveying additional meanings about the context or the state of the addressee’s knowledge (muqtaḍā al-ḥāl). This can take place through such techniques as omission, changing the standard order of words, shifting the grammatical person, the use of definite or indefinite nouns, among many others. In addition, constructing phrases in ways that go contrary to the apparent expectations of the context (ʿalā khilāf muqtaḍā al-ẓāhir) further enhances their eloquence. Here again, while the specific path to discovering the meaning is different from metaphor and simile, the effect is consistent with an aesthetic of wonder. This suggests a comprehensive aesthetic outlook that underlies the beauty of poetry and the Quran alike.

The Conclusion speculates as to why this wonder-based aesthetic appeared in the eleventh century and briefly situates it in some broader discussions of beauty in the medieval Islamicate world. It discusses what is at stake with wonder as an experience beyond mere aesthetic pleasure, as well as the limits of this kind of aesthetic appreciation. Finally, it points to the implications of this aesthetic theory beyond Arabic literature and suggests some parallels with modern literary theory.

The Introduction presents the argument that aesthetic judgment in classical Arabic literary theory came to depend on the ability of poetry or eloquent speech to produce an experience of wonder in the listener. This experience of wonder is not merely a reaction of amazement and bedazzlement, but it also entails a process of discovery. After presenting an account of the nature of classical Arabic literary theory, its various approaches to literary assessment, its topics and historical development, the Introduction highlights that the main aspects of literary expression Arabic criticism was concerned with lay in rhetorical figures (badīʿ), simile (tashbīh), figurative speech (majāz), metaphor (istiʿāra), metonymy (kināya), and sentence construction (naẓm). It is in these aspects of linguistic expression that an aesthetic theory of wonder can be uncovered in the classical Arabic critical tradition, including in discussions of poetry proper, engagements with Aristotelian Poetics, and works on eloquence and the miraculousness (iʿjāz) of the Quran, culminating by the thirteenth century in the formalized study of eloquence in ʿilm al-balāgha (the science of eloquence).

Chapter 3 focuses on discussions of simile (tashbīh) in the nonphilosophical critical tradition, namely, in al-Jurjānī’s Asrār al-balāgha (The Secrets of Eloquence), which forms the site of the most elaborate articulation of an aesthetic theory of wonder. The chapter argues that the pleasure that arises from simile is attributed to its ability to elucidate (bayān), which in turn allows the listener to go through an experience of discovery and wonder. The more effort is required to grasp a simile and the stranger it is, the more beautiful it is. The chapter goes on to show how the principles that enhance the strangeness and farfetchedness of simile put forth by al-Jurjānī are later systematized and organized in the science of eloquence as formalized by al-Sakkākī and al-Khaṭīb al-Qazwīnī. While the specific elements that allow for an experience of discovery in simile are unique to that figure, the general discovery-based theory of aesthetic experience forms the foundation for the aesthetics of metaphor and sentence construction, as well, which are tackled in Chapters 4 and 5.