8vo. 536 pp., Arabic text, modern blue cloth, few pencil annotations on title page, otherwise copy clean and in very good condition, Maktabat Mustafa Al-Babi Al-Halabi, Cairo, 1940.

Synopsis

Abu Othman Amru bin Bahr Al-Jahiz, commonly known as al-Jahiz (776-868/ 869), was an Arab prose writer and author of works of literature, Mu’tazili theology, and politico-religious polemics.
Ibn al-Nadim lists nearly 140 titles attributed to Al-Jahiz, of which 75 are extant. His best known works are: Kitab al-Hayawan (The book of living), a seven-part compendium on an array of subjects with animals as their point of departure; Kitab al-Bayan wa-l-tabyin (The book of eloquence and exposition), a wide-ranging work on human communication; and Kitāb al-Bukhala (The book of misers), a collection of anecdotes on stinginess.