Shawkat M. Toorawa, associate professor of Arabic literature in the Department of Near Eastern Studies, has received a Mellon New Directions Post-Fellowship Award of $50,000 from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

The grant will allow him to complete work begun during his Mellon New Directions Fellowship, including an article on the "Nuzhat al-khawāṭir," a multivolume biographical compendium of Arabophone scholars of the Indian subcontinent; and a critical edition of the 18th-century Āzād Bilgrāmī's "Shifā' al-'alīl," one of the most important and interesting Arabic literary works from outside the world of traditional Arabic scholarship, according to Toorawa. He also plans to make progress on a book on the history of Indian engagement with Arabic, focusing on the 10th-century Syrian poet, al-Mutanabbī.

"I am delighted and truly grateful for this opportunity," says Toorawa. "Arabic belles-lettres in the so-called periphery benefits from very little scholarly attention. This funding will allow me to travel to Hyderabad to consult manuscripts and to devote time to further research in this understudied area."

Toorawa is the author or editor of several volumes, including "Ibn Abi Tahir Tayfur and Arabic Writerly Culture: A Ninth-Century Bookman in Baghdad"; "Interpreting the Self: Autobiography in the Arabic Literary Tradition;" "The Western Indian Ocean: Essays on Islands and Islanders"; and "Arabic Literary Culture, 500-925."

Linda B. Glaser is staff writer for the College of Arts and Sciences.