This volume studies how the literary elements in the Qur’an function in conveying its religious message effectively. It is divided into three parts. Part one includes studies of the whole Qur’an or large segments of it belonging to one historical period of its revelation; these studies concentrate on the analysis of its language, its style, its structural composition, its aesthetic characteristics, its rhetorical devices, its imagery, and the impact of these elements and their significance. Part two includes studies on individual suras of the Qur’an, each of which focuses on the sura’s literary elements and how they produce meaning; each also explores the structure of this meaning and the coherence of its effect. Part three includes studies on Muslim appreciations of the literary aspects of the Qur’an in past generations and shows how modern linguistic, semantic, semiotic, and literary scholarship can add to their contributions.
Editorial Reviews
Review
‘A good attempt to develop a new approach towards a contemporary understanding for the Qur’an. The various essays provide a different flavour of scholarship, which add to the value of the book’ – The Expository Times
‘The volume represents a valuable contribution to quranic studies.’ – Bulletin of SOAS
A stunning visual history of sculpture from prehistory through modernity
This book presents an aesthetic of sculptural art, which has too often submitted to the rule of architecture and painting. Herbert Read emphasizes the essential and autonomous nature of sculpture―“Form in its full spatial completeness,” in the words of British sculptor Henry Moore. The Art of Sculpture provides historical support and theoretical rigor to this conception. Along the way, this incisive and wide-ranging book takes readers on a breathtaking tour of great works of sculpture from prehistoric times to the modern era.
Editorial Reviews
Review
“Concerned with the qualities which exist in uniquely sculptural objects, the author wends his way, without chronological restrictions, through the history of sculpture, bringing to bear considerable documentation from the writings of artists and philosophers in support of his views.” ― Yale Review
“Thoroughly erudite and thoroughly convincing. . . . A book which should lead to a thorough reappraisal of the role of sculpture in the trinity of the major arts.” ―
Virginia Quarterly
“Few critics write history at all, but this book is very good history. Within its field it is a systematic and almost invariably exact record. As a history, it will surely remain more useful to more people than anything else on the subject.”
—Lawrence Gowing, New Statesman
About the Author
Sir Herbert Read (1893–1968) was renowned as a poet and a writer on the visual arts, literature, and education. His many books include A Concise History of Modern Painting, Art Now, Art and Society, and Icon and Idea.
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