The Thought That Counts: Gift Exchange Poetry by Kushājim, al-Ṣanawbarī and al-Sarī al-Raffā’

Abstract

This article explores the intersection of material experience and social values in poetry about gift exchange by Kushājim, al-Ṣanawbarī, and al-Sarī al-Raffā’ al-MawṢilī. Gift exchange poetry by these poets transforms ordinary gifts into social events. This poetry is part of an increasing interest in material experience in Arabic literary culture beginning in the late ninth and 10th centuries. It complements other literary approaches to material wealth and social values that have received more attention in research, such as avarice, party-crashing, patronage, the figure of the anonymous Bedouin, and the maqāma. The discussion places this poetry in the context of prose sources on gift exchange, as well as poetry by other poets. It proposes that new kinds of links between material experience and social values in descriptive poetry are a feature of an expanding cultural sphere that is related to, yet distinct from, politics, religion, and panegyric poetry.