The Racecourse of Literature - An-Nawāǧī and His Contemporaries
Shams ad-Dīn an-Nawāǧī (ca. 1386–1455), a native of Cairo or an-Nawāǧ, a town north-east of Ṭanṭa, has been famous for his literary anthologies of love poetry (e.g. Marātiʿ al-ġizlān - “The Gazelle‘s Pastures”) and wine poetry (Ḥalbat al-kumayt - “The Racecourse of the Bay”). Apart from his work as an anthologist he was also a renowned poet and academic teacher who taught adab and ḥadīṯ in the madrasahs of Cairo.
The poetry of an-Nawāǧī did not disappear from history. To the contrary, some of his poems, especially his laudatory poems for the prophet Muḥammad, have been appreciated throughout history even until our days
The conference aimed to shed some light on hitherto understudied writings of an-Nawāǧī but also on those of some of his contemporaries like Ibn Ḥiǧǧa and Ibn Ḥaǧar al-ʿAsqalānī as they all vied with each other on the racecourse of literature of their age. It was organized by the Leibnizpreis-Research-Unit "Arabische Literatur und Rhetorik Elfhundert bis Achtzehnhundert" (ALEA) and took place on the 4th and 5th of May at the Institut für Arabistik und Islamwissenschaft in Münster.
The results of the conference are published in vol. 8 of the book series of ALEA.