The Poetics of Devotion in ʿĀʾisha al‐Bāʿūniyya's Praise of God and Muḥammad. (4th July 2016) - Friedman, Rachel Anne
Abstract: Recently, there has been an effort within Islamic Studies to reassess the common belief that the so‐called 'post‐classical' era of Islamic history was characterized by intellectual stagnation and decline. The Mamluk era is one such period that has suffered from a dearth of scholarly attention resulting from outdated stereotypes. This article contributes to scholarship on this era through examining some poems by a late Mamluk poet, ʿĀʾisha al‐Bāʿūniyya (d. 1517). While much scholarship on al‐Bāʿūniyya focuses on her lyrical mystical verse, the poems studied here incorporate selective allusions to key Islamic sources in order to narrate a history of divine favor as the speaker imagines it. This innovative history expresses a poetics of devotion that focalizes Muḥammad and the poet's own peers. The poems intertextually anchor this narrative in key Islamic sources, reflecting al‐Bāʿūniyya's extensive scholarly training. They constitute an unusual example of a female poet writing beyond the genres with which women's premodern poetry is conventionally associated. This poetry also represents a post‐classical contribution to Islamic literary and religious history. However, the criterion of originality should ultimately be reconsidered in evaluations of scholarly merit, and scholarship should pay more attention to continuities and intertextuality in texts.