Examines the thought of Abu alAla alMaarri 9731057 CE within the broader context of the major trends in Arab Islamic political and intellectual history by the time of his flourishing.Freethinking poet grammarian social critic and satirist Abu alAla alMaarri 9731057 CE remains one of the more celebrated and intriguing personalities in the history of Arab Islamic civilization. Although the controversies surrounding his skepticism cynicism and anticlericalism have never been completely resolved his more disquieting writings are commonly available in the Arab world cited in standard histories of Arabic literature and the subject of scholarly studies.AlMaarri is universally recognized as a giant among the litterateurs of Islam deservedly famous for the role that he played in the development of Arabic verse as a more serious vehicle of religiouspolitical thought and social criticism. The centrality attributed to alMaarri as innovator has been linked to a strain of inquiry that has been particularly paramount to Westerners To what extent did alMaarri and other unconventional thinkers stray from the course of mainstream Islamic thoughtIn this book R.