Acknowledgements
Translation is, at one and the same time, a solitary undertaking and one that combines a multitude of voices, including earlier publications, discussions with other scholars, readers and commentators, editors and editorial committee members, students and colleagues. This work is no exception, and the number of individuals who have assisted me with everything from a single thorny passage to a reading of the complete manuscript is enormous.
I first began work on the biography of Ibrāhīm al-Mawṣilī in a seminar on medieval Arabic literature that I taught in 2014, in which we translated the first section of that text. All of the students in that seminar contributed to my understanding of both the text and the difficulties of rendering the differing linguistic registers in translation: Munther alSabagh, Silvia Ferreira, Ibrahim Mansour, Eric Massie, Alexandra Schultz, John Thibdeau, Nesrin Unlu, and Kalina Yamboliev. That same section of the text was later greatly improved with comments from the members of the editorial board of the Library of Arabic Literature, but special thanks are due to Michael Cooperson and Shawkat Toorawa for their patience in improving my often rather stilted early drafts.
I also benefited from the unpublished German translation of a portion of the text that was generously lent to me by Eckhard Neubauer, who has patiently answered an untold number of questions I have posed about various aspects of these texts and about medieval Arab music over the years. He remains truly a model scholar and mentor in every way.
My entire concept of translation, and my strategies for dealing with countless textual difficulties, were later shaped by the wonderful experience I had while a visiting researcher at New York University, Abu Dhabi, in winter 2018, and the weekly meetings of the ‘translation group.’ Philip Kennedy, Maurice Pomerantz, Marcel Kurpershoek, Walid Salih, and Humphrey Davies all made suggestions that have found their way into this volume. To Philip Kennedy I have a deep sense of gratitude for hosting me so graciously during that stay.
Many, many others, knowingly or unknowingly, have helped me with various aspects of these three translations, among them: Glaire Anderson, Julia Bray, Federico Corriente, Carl Davila, Maribel Fierro, Jonathan Glasser, Hilary Kilpatrick, Scott Marcus, Luis Molina, Christian Poché, Everett Rowson, George Sawa, Jonathan Shannon, and Owen Wright. I wish also to thank the anonymous readers who have reviewed the manuscript, whose comments were very helpful.
Finally, I wish to thank Gregor Schoeler for his comments, and most particularly, Alan Jones, who proofed multiple drafts of my introduction to, and translation of, Ibn Sanāʾ al-Mulk’s Dār al-Ṭirāz. Our discussions about that text have been some of the most enjoyable and productive intellectual exchanges I have had in many years.
All mistakes, inaccuracies, and infelicitous renderings that remain, are of course my own. Perhaps a new generation of scholars will come along and improve these translations in coming years, but in the meantime, I hope they stand as satisfactory portrayals of three of the most important texts on medieval Arabic music and musicians.
Dwight F. Reynolds
Santa Barbara, California