Ziad Elmarsafy
CONTACT
- Tel 44 1904 433342
- Email ze500@york.ac.uk
- Fax 44 1904 433372
Ziad Elmarsafy was born in Egypt, raised in Kuwait and schooled in the USA. He took a degree in Physics at Cornell before seeing the light and completing degrees in French literature at Johns Hopkins (MA) and Emory University (PhD). Since then he has taught at the University of California, Wellesley College and New York University.
RESEARCH INTERESTS
The literatures of the Middle East and North Africa (Arabic, French, English), post-colonial literature writ large, literature and religion, the Enlightenment.
PROJECTS UNDER WAY
Current projects include The Sufi Novel: Fiction, Islam and Modernity in the Middle East and North Africa - a book-length study of the use of Sufi themes and ideas in the modern and contemporary (20th-21st century) literatures of the Middle East, North Africa and Europe.
PUBLICATIONS
Books
The Histrionic Sensibility: Theatricality and Identity
from Corneille to Rousseau. "Biblio 17" 124. Tübingen:
G. Narr Verlag, 2001.
Freedom, Slavery,
and Absolutism: Corneille, Pascal, Racine. Bucknell Studies in Eighteenth-Century
Literature and Culture. Lewisburg and London: Bucknell University Press,
2003.
The
Enlightenment Qur'an: The Politics of Translation
and the Construction of Islam Oxford: Oneworld,
2009.
Articles and Contributions to Edited Volumes
"Ceci est mon nom, ceci est mon idiome." Catalogue essay in Adonis, un
poète dans le monde d'aujourd'hui (1950-2000). Paris: Institut
du Monde Arabe, 2000. 123.
"O homines ad servitutem paratos! Bajazet and the Scandal of Slave
Rule." Romanic Review 91.4 (November, 2000): 417-431.
"Submission, Seduction and State Propaganda in Favart's Soliman II, ou
Les trois sultanes." French Forum 26.3 (September, 2001): 13-26.
"Thalassophobia and Geolatry: Bernardin de Saint-Pierre and the Geography
of Virtue." Eighteenth-Century Fiction 15.1 (October, 2002): 35-52.
"Identitaire et universel chez Gamal Ghitany." In Mohamed Mestiri and Daniel
Rivet, eds., Identitaire et Universel dans l’Islam Contemporain.
Paris : International Institute of Islamic Thought (IIIT) France and
Institut d’Études de l’Islam et des Sociétés
du Monde Musulman (IISMM), 2007. 65-74.
"Se méfier de prononcer le moindre mot intelligent : Albert Cossery
et les pouvoirs de l’individu." In Randa Sabry et al., eds., Discours
et Relations de Pouvoir. Cairo: Faculté de Lettres, Université du
Caire, 2007. 425-434.
“Hassan Teleb ou le symbolisme engagé.” In
Marc Kober, ed., Poésies des Suds
et des Orients. Special issue of Itinéraires
et Contacts de Cultures 42 (2008) : 137-149.
“Adapting Sufism to Video Art: Bill Viola and the Sacred.” Alif 28
(2008): 127-149.
“Philosophy Self-Taught: Reason, Mysticism and the Uses of Islam in
the Early Enlightenment.” In Mercedes García-Arenal, Benard
Heyberger, Emanuele Colombo and Paola Vismara, eds., L’Islam visto
da Occidente: Cultura e religione del Seicento europeo di fronte all’Islam.
Genoa and Milan: Marietti, 2009. 135-155.