The Awakening of the Soul – Ibn Tufail – from the translation of Paul Bronnle -1907

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The Awakening of the Soul – Ibn Tufail – from the translation of Paul Bronnle -1907

Short Description

A scarce translation of Hayy ibn Yaqzan a 12th Century work by Moorish philosopher Ibn Tufail. The first philosophical novel ever written.

Small octavo, 87 pages, missing blank free end paper, clean inside, good green cloth covered boards with title and design to front, titles similarly on spine. Very scarce.

Published by the Orient Press, London as part of the Wisdom of the East Series. We believe this publisher was part of the John Murray enterprise.

The work not only had an influence or later Arabic work but also, over time, a significant influence in Europe, especially during the period of European Enlightenment.

An allegorical novel which recounts the story of a feral child who is brought up by a gazelle alone in the desert. Without any human contact the child discovers ultimate truth through a process of reasoned enquiry. The child, Hayy, meets a castaway Absal through whom he understands the human desires for material goods … Hayy concludes that such things are distractions and should be abandoned to maintain ultimate truth.

As an aside the author had a varied career including physician to the Almohad King and was a supporter of dissection and autopsy .. expressed in the novel.

Small but powerful first philosophical novel – scarce in this form.

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