Tony K. Stewart, "Witness to Marvels: Sufism and Literary Imagination" (U California Press, 2019)

Beyond the Margins: The University of California Press Podcast · Dec 11, 2020 · 1h 7m

In Tony K. Stewart’s book, Witness to Marvels: Sufism and Literary Imagination (University of California Press, 2019), we are taken into the imaginal realms of ogres, fairies, Sufi pirs and piranis and Hindu gods and goddess. The study focuses on pir katha, the fictional stories and hagiographies that features Sufi saints and complex cosmologies and highlights the generative capacity of literary cultural productions, as they provide fascinating insights into religious ideals of the Bangla-speaking world but also broadly South Asia. These stories, some which continue to live on through…