Der Perlentaucher unter den Buchläden Eichendorff21

**Yusuf al-Shirbini (Author)** **Yusuf al-Shirbini** was a well-educated Egyptian from the eleventh/seventeenth century, thought to originate from the town of Shirbin, then a significant rural center in the eastern part of Delta. Little is known about him--including his social standing and profession--beyond _Brains Confounded_ and two other extant texts: _The Pearls_(_Al-Läali¿ wa-l-durar_) and _The Casting Aside of the Clods for the Unstringing of the Pearls_(_¿ar¿ al-madar li-¿all al-läali¿ wa-l-durar_). **Muhammad ibn Mahfuz al-Sanhuri (Author)** **Mu¿ammad ibn Mäfu¿ al-Sanhuri** is an eleventh/seventeenth-century author who likely hailed from Egypt's Fayyum region, although nothing else is known about him. **Humphrey Davies (Translator)** **Humphrey Davies** is an award-winning translator of some twenty-five works of modern Arabic literature, among them Alaa Al-Aswany's _The Yacoubian Building_ , five novels by Elias Khoury, including _Gate of the Sun_ , and A¿mad Faris al-Shidyaq's _Leg over Leg_. He has also made a critical edition, translation, and lexicon of the Ottoman-period _Brains Confounded by the Ode of Abu Shaduf Expounded_ by Yusuf al-Shirbini, as well as editions and translations of al-Tunisi's _In Darfur_ and al-Sanhuri's _Risible Rhymes_ from the same era. In addition, he has __ compiled with Madiha Doss an anthology in Arabic entitled _Al-¿ammiyyah al-mi¿riyyah al-maktubah: mukhtarat min 1400 ila 2009_ (_Egyptian Colloquial Writing: selections from 1400 to 2009_) and co- authored, with Lesley Lababidi, _A Field Guide to the Street Names of Central Cairo_. He read Arabic at the University of Cambridge, received his Ph. D. from the University of California at Berkeley, and previous to undertaking his first translation in 2003, worked for social development and research organizations in Egypt, Tunisia, Palestine, and Sudan. He is affiliated with the American University in Cairo.