About

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Email: contact@hawramani.com | Twitter

Languages: English, Arabic, Persian / Farsi, Southern Kurdish

I am a US-based Islamic studies researcher, software engineer and writer. I am currently working on completing Al-Azhar University’s curriculum for ʿālims (PhD Islamic scholars) on my own.

I consider the Quran the unchanged Word of God and I derive my worldview from it. I am not a Westernizer in the popular sense but I love Western civilization and its classical literature as an insider. I’m equally happy reading Jane Austen’s novels, and C. S. Lewis’s works of literary criticism (such as his Poetry and Prose in the Sixteenth Century) as I am when reading classical Islamic scholarly works in Arabic.

I love the Islamic scholarly tradition and consider all scholars, past and present, from all schools of thought, to be my beloved colleagues working on the same task. I am not dedicated to following any madhhab or scholar. I’m not Sufi but I consider Islamic spirituality very important. The scholars I most admire include Imam al-Bukhārī, al-Ghazāli, al-Āmidī, Ibn al-Jawzī, and Ibn Taymiyya among the classical ones, and M. A. Drāz (al-Azhar scholar), Muhammad al-Ghazāli (al-Azhar scholar), Yusuf al-Qaraḍāwī (al-Azhar scholar) and Yasir Qadhi among the modern ones. Iʾm often closest to the Mālīkī school in my legal thinking.

Most scholars and researchers today specialize in Islamic law and have no ability to judge hadiths independently, thus leaving most important Islamic questions to the judgment of hadith scholars. My approach is to unite Islamic law and hadith criticism. Rather than following the mostly black-and-white thinking of the science of hadith where a hadith can only be ṣaḥīḥ (authentic) or not, I use a method that produces a percentage likelihood of authenticity, such as 60%. The hadiths that are found in famous collections such as al-Bukhārī can range in their authenticity from 90% all the way down to 5%. This means that the vast majority of the world’s Muslims have no idea that two hadiths traditionally judged to be authentic can be extremely different in their likelihood of authenticity (see my essay on the method).

I am the creator of the Arabic Lexicon and the Hadith Transmitters Encyclopedia.

Self-Education

As I am self-educated in Islamic studies, below is a usually up-to-date list of books I’ve read as a dubious alternative to academic degrees.

Islamic Studies

Arabic Books

630’s

  • The Quran

870’s

  • Abū ʿAbdallāh al-Bukhārī, Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī (9 vols.) (d. 870)
  • Muslim b. al-Ḥajjāj, Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim (7 vols.) (d. 875)

1060’s

  • Abū Bakr al-Bayhaqī, The Book of Predestination (Kitāb al-Qaḍāʾ wa-l-Qadar) (the narrations alone) (d. 1066)

1200’s

  • Ibn al-Jawzī, Quarry of the Mind (Ṣayd al-Khāṭir) (d. 1201)
  • Ibn al-Jawzī, The Manners of al-Ḥasan al-Baṣrī (Ādāb al-Ḥasan al-Baṣrī) (d. 1201)
  • Ibn al-Jawzī, An Introduction to the Study of the Quran (Funūn al-Afnān fī ʿUyūn ʿUlūm al-Qurʾān) (d. 1201)

1400’s

  • Muḥammad b. Yūsuf al-Sanūsī and Muḥammad b. ʿUmar al-Tilmisānī, The Mother of Demonstrations and Commentary on the Mother of Demonstrations (Umm al-Barāhīn wa Sharḥ Umm al-Barāhīn) (1490’s)

1700’s

  • Aḥmad b. Muḥammad al-ʿAdawī al-Dardīr, Commentary on the delicate pearl in the science of monotheism (Sharḥ al-Kharīda al-bahīya fī ʿilm al-tawḥīd) (d. 1786-1787 CE)

1940’s

  • ʿAbd al-Ḥamīd Jawdat al-Saḥḥar, Abu Dhar: Ascetic Communist (Abū Dhar al-Ghaffārī: Al-Ishtirākī al-Zāhid) (1943)

1950’s

  • ʿAlī al-Wardī, The Spiritual Advice-peddlers of the Rulers (Wuʿʿāẓ al-Salāṭīn)  (1954)
  • ʿAlī al-Wardī,The Comedy of the Human Intellect (Mahzala al-ʿAql al-Basharī) (1955)
  • ʿAlī al-Wardī, Morality: That Which is Lacking in Moral Resources (al-Akhlāq: al-Ẓāʾiʿ min al-Mawārid al-Khalqīya) (1958)

1960’s

  • Sayyid Qutb, Milestones (Maʿālim fī l-Ṭarīq) (1960)
  • ʿAlī al-Wardī, Logic of Ibn Khaldun (Manṭiq Ibn Khaldūn) (1962)
  • Muhammad Qutb, Man between Materialism and Islam (al-Insān bayn al-Māddīya w-al-Islām) (1962)
  • ʿAlī al-Ṭanṭāwī, A General Introduction to the Religion of Islam (Taʿrīf ʿām bi-Dīn al-Islām) (1969)
  • Saʿīd Hawwā, God, Glory to Him (Allāh Jalla Jalāluh) (1969)

1970’s

  • Yusuf al-Qaradawī, The Existence of God (Wūjūd Allāh) (1970)

1980’s

  • Ṣalāḥ ʿAbd al-Fattāḥ al-Khālidī, Sayyid Qutb from Birth to Martyrdom (Sayyid Quṭb min al-Mīlād ilā al-Istishhād) (1983)
  • Bulqāsim al-Ghāli, Abū Manṣūr al-Māturīdī and His Theological Views (Abū Manṣūr al-Māturīdī wa-Āraʾuhu al-ʿAqdīya) (1989)
  • Mohammed al-Ghazali, Prophetic Tradition between the People of Fiqh and the People of Hadith (Al-Sunnah al-Nabawīya bayn Ahl al-Fiqh wa Ahl al-Ḥadīth) (1989)
  • Muhammad Qutb, The Issue of Women’s Liberation (Qaẓīya Taḥrir al-Marʾa) (1989)
  • Nāṣir al-Dīn al-Albānī, Ṣaḥīḥ Jāmiʿ al-Ṣaghīr wa-Ziyādatuh (Al-Fatḥ al-Kabīr) (2 vols.) (1989)

1990’s

  • Yusuf al-Qaradawi, The Fiqh of Priorities (Fiqh al-Awlawīyāt) (1995)

2000’s

  • Aḥmad Muṣtafā Faḍlīya, Muhammad Abdullah Draz: Studies by His Students and Contemporaries (Muḥammad ʿAbd Allāh Drāz: Dirāsāt wa-Buḥūth bi-Aqlām Talāmidhatih wa-Muʿāṣirīh) (2007)
  • ʿAlī ʿAbd al-Fattāḥ al-Maghribī, Abū Manṣūr al-Māturīdī and His Kalām Opinions (Abū Manṣūr al-Māturīdī wa-Āraʾuhu al-Kalāmīya) (2009)

2010’s

  • Muḥammad ibn al-Mukhtār al-Shanqīṭī, The Philosopher of the Quran, Muhammad Abdullah Draz: His Life and Works (Faylasūf al-Qurʾān al-Karīm Muḥammad ʿAbd Allāh Drāz: Ḥayātuh wa-Āthāruh) (2017)

English Books

1910’s

  • Adam Mez, The Renaissance of Islam (in English, written 1917, translated 1937)

1960’s

  • W. Montgomery Watt, Muslim Intellectual: A Study of al-Ghazali (1963)
  • J. J. Saunders (ed.), The Muslim World on the Eve of Europe’s Expansion (1966)

1970’s

  • J. J. Saunders, Muslims & Mongols (d. 1972, published 1977)

1980’s

  • Robin Wright, In the Name of God: The Khomeini Decade (1989)

1990’s

  • George Makdisi, The Rise of Humanism in Classical Islam and the Christian West (1990)
  • Nicholas Heer (ed.), Islamic Law and Jurisprudence: Studies in Honor of Farhat J. Ziadeh (1990)
  • Albert Hourani, A History of the Arab Peoples (1992)
  • Tariq Khalidi, Arabic Historical Thought in the Classical Period (1994)
  • Josef Van Ess, Theology and Society in the Second and Third Century of the Hijra (1991-1997) (4 vols.) (John O’Kane and Gwendolin Goldbloom translation 2017-2018)
  • Yasin Dutton, The Origins of Islamic Law: The Qur’an, the Muwatta and Madinan Amal (PhD dissertation) (1999)
  • Murteza Bedir, The Early Development of Hanafi Usul al-Fiqh (PhD dissertation) (1999)

2000’s

  • Harald Motzki, The Biography of Muhammad: The Issue of the Sources (2000)
  • Forough Jahanbakhsh, Islam, Democracy and Religious Modernism in Iran (1953-2000): From Bazargan to Soroush (2001)
  • Valerie Gonzalez, Beauty and Islam: Aesthetics in Islamic Art and Architecture (2001)
  • Tariq Ramadan, Western Muslims and the Future of Islam (2003)
  • Ziauddin Sardar, Desperately Seeking Paradise: Journeys of a Sceptical Muslim (2004)
  • Annabel Keeler, Sufi Hermeneutics: The Qur’an Commentary of Rashīd al-Dīn Maybudī (2006)
  • Karen Armstrong, Muhammad: A Prophet for Our Time (2006)
  • Jon Hoover, Ibn Taymiyya’s Theodicy of Perpetual Optimism (2007)
  • Tariq Ramadan, In the Footsteps of the Prophet (2007)
  • Jonathan A. C. Brown, The Canonization of al-Bukhari and Muslim  (2007)
  • Tim Winter (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Classical Islamic Theology (2008)
  • M. A. Draz, The Moral World of the Qur’an (published in French in 1951, English in 2008)
  • Frank Griffel, Al-Ghazālı̄’s Philosophical Theology (2009)

2010’s

  • Yossef Rapoport and Shahab Ahmed (eds.), Ibn Taymiyya and His Times (2010)
  • John Walbridge, God and Logic in Islam: The Caliphate of Reason (2011)
  • Nidhal Guessoum, Islam’s Quantum Question: Reconciling Muslim Tradition and Modern Science (2011)
  • Ahmed El-Shamsy, The Canonization of Islamic Law: A Social and Intellectual History (2013)
  • Umar F. Abd-Allah Wymann-Landgraf, Mālik and Medina: Islamic Legal Reasoning in the Formative Period (2013)
  • Jonathan A. C. Brown, Misquoting Muhammad (2014)
  • Kenneth Garden, The First Islamic Reviver: Abu Hamid al-Ghazali and His Revival of the Religious Sciences (2014)
  • A.S. Amin, Conflicts of Fitness: Islam, America, and Evolutionary Psychology (2015)
  • Bassam Saeh, The Miraculous Language Of The Qur’an: Evidence Of Divine Origin (2015)
  • Karen Bauer, Gender Hierarchy in the Qurʾān (2015)
  • Ulrich Rudolph, Al-Maturidi and the Development of Sunni Theology in Samarqand (2015)
  • Ali Ezzatyar, The Last Mufti of Iranian Kurdistan (2016)
  • Henri Lauzière, The Making of Salafism: Islamic Reform in the Twentieth Century (2016)
  • Sabine Schmidtke (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Islamic Theology (2016)
  • Shahab Ahmed, What is Islam: The Importance of Being Islamic (2016)
  • Christopher de Bellaigue, The Islamic Enlightenment The Struggle Between Faith and Reason (2017)
  • G. W. Bowersock, The Crucible of Islam (2017)
  • Shahab Ahmed, Before Orthodoxy: The Satanic Verses in Early Islam (2017)
  • M. A. Draz and Basma Abdelgafar, Morality in the Qur’an: The Greater Good of Humanity (2018)
  • Carl Sharif El-Tobgui, Ibn Taymiyya on Reason and Revelation: A Study of Darʾ taʿāruḍ al-ʿaql wa-l-naql (2019)
  • Omar Farahat, The Foundation of Norms in Islamic Jurisprudence and Theology (2019)
  • Hatem al-Haj, Between the God of the Prophets and the God of the Philosophers: Reflections of an Athari on the Divine Attributes (2020)

Kurdish Books

  • Said Nursi, Message to the Ill (Payāmī Bīmārān) (d. 1960)
  • Said Nursi, Message of “I” (Payāmī Min) (d. 1960)
  • Said Nursi, Message to the Elderly (Payāmī Pīrān) (d. 1960)
  • Barham, Brother Naser Sobhani: Martyr of Freedom of Speech (Shahīdī Āzādī Bīrūřā kāka Nāṣirī Subḥānī) (2006)
  • Taḥsīn Ḥama Gharīb, The Last Ones: The Last Mystic, the Last Philosopher, the Last Jurist. Reading the Thought of Said Nursi, Ahmad Moftizadeh and Naser Subhani (Dwāyīnakān: Dwāyīn ʿĀrif, Dwāyīn Faylasūf, Dwāyīn Faqīh. Khwendnaway Fīkrī Saʿīd Nūrsī w Aḥmadī Muftīzāda w Nāṣirī Subḥānī.
  • Sarwat Abdullah, Ahmad Moftizadeh: A Gateway to an Unknown Struggle (Māmostā Aḥmadī Muftīzāda: Darwāzayak bo Khabātekī Nanāsrāw) (2010)
  • Sarwat Abdullah, A Collection of Ahmad Moftizadeh Quotes (Kharmanek la wta Zeřīnakānī kāk Aḥmadī Muftīzāda) (2014)

Farsi Books

  • Ibn Rajab al-Ḥanbalī, The Proper Etiquette of the Formal Prayer (Khushuʿ wa Niyāyish dar Namāz) (d. 1393)
  • Yusuf al-Qaradawi, Worship in Islam (ʿIbādat dar Islām) (1961)
  • Mustafa Khorramdel, The Nūr Commentary on the Quran (Tafsīr-i Nūr) (1992)
  • Ahmad Moftizadeh, Islamic Government (Ḥukūmat-i Islāmī) (1980)
  • Naser Sobhani, Custodianship and Leadership (Wilāyat wa Imāmat) (c. 1989)
  • Naser Sobhani, Proof of God’s Existence (Ithbāt-i Wujūd-i Khudā) (c. 1989)

The Arabic Language

2010’s

  • Muḥammad b. Ṣāliḥ al-ʿUthaymīn, Commentary on Ibn Mālik’s Alfiyya (Sharḥ Alfiyyat Ibn Mālik) (2012)
  • El Said Badawi, ‎Michael Carter and ‎Adrian Gully, Modern Written Arabic: A Comprehensive Grammar (2013)
  • Mohammad T. Alhawary, Arabic Grammar in Context (2016)
  • Faruk Abu-Chacra, Arabic: An Essential Grammar (2018)
  • Peter John Glanville, The Lexical Semantics of the Arabic Verb (2018)

Sociology, Human Ethology and the Life Sciences

1850’s

  • Charles Darwin, On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection (1859)

1960’s

  • James Watson, The Double Helix: A Personal Account of the Discovery of the Structure of DNA (1968)

1980’s

  • Thomas Sowell, Ethnic America: A History (1981)

1990’s

  • Kay Redfield Jamison, Touched with Fire: Manic-Depressive Illness and the Artistic Temperament (1993)
  • David Stove, Darwinian Fairytales: Selfish Genes, Errors of Heredity, and Other Fables of Evolution (d. 1994)
  • Thomas Sowell, Race and Culture: A World View (1995)
  • Thomas Sowell, Migrations and Cultures: A World View (1996)
  • Matt Ridley, Genome: The Autobiography of a Species In 23 Chapters (1999)

2000’s

  • Joan Roughguarden, Evolution’s Rainbow (2004)
  • Karen Armstrong, A Short History of Myth (2004)
  • Catherine Johnson and Temple Grandin, Animals in Translation (2005)
  • Peter Richerson and Richard Boyd, Not by Genes Alone: How Culture Transformed Human Evolution (2005)
  • Thomas Sowell, Black Rednecks and White Liberals (2015)
  • James Watson, Avoid Boring People: Lessons from a Life in Science (2007)
  • Nicholas Wade, The Faith Instinct: How Religion Evolved and Why It Endures (2009)

2010’s

  • David W. Deamer, First Life: Discovering the Connections Between Stars, Cells, and How Life Began (2011)
  • Addy Pross, What is Life? How Chemistry Becomes Biology (2012)
  • Maryanne L. Fisher, Justin R. Garcia and Rosemarie Sokol Chang (eds.), Evolution’s Empress: Darwinian Perspectives on the Nature of Women (2013)
  • Virginia Morell, Animal Wise: The Thoughts and Emotions of Our Fellow Creatures (2013)
  • Bessel van der Kolk, The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind and Body in the Healing of Trauma (2014)
  • Richard C. Francis, Domesticated: Evolution in a Man-Made World (2015)
  • Alister E. McGrath, Dawkins’ God: From The Selfish Gene to The God Delusion (2015)
  • Kevin N. Laland, Darwin’s Unfinished Symphony: How Culture Made the Human Mind (2017)

Western Philosophy and Ideas (Books)

340’s BC

  • Plato, Euthyphro (d. 347 BC)
  • Plato, The Apology (d. 347 BC)
  • Plato, Crito (d. 347 BC)
  • Plato, Phaedo (d. 347 BC)
  • Plato, Symposium (d. 347 BC)
  • Plato, Republic (d. 347 BC)

1530’s

  • Niccolò Machiavelli, The Prince (1532)

1610’s

  • The King James Version of the Bible (1611) (Old Testament and Gospels only)

1690’s

  • Brother Lawrence, The Practice of the Presence of God (1692)

1860’s

  • John Ruskin, Unto This Last and Other Essays on Political Economy (1861)

1870’s

  • Jakob Burckhardt, Reflections on History (1870-1871)
  • Friedrich Nietzsche, Preface to The Greek State (1871)
  • Friedrich Nietzsche, On Truth and Lies in a Nonmoral Sense (1873)
  • Friedrich Nietzsche, Human, All Too Human (1878)

1880’s

  • Friedrich Nietzsche, On the Genealogy of Morality (1887)

1900’s

  • Otto Weininger, Sex and Character (1903)

1930’s

  • Eric Gill, An Essay on Typography (1931)
  • Albert Jay Nock, The Theory of Education in the United States (1932)
  • Albert Jay Nock, Isaiah’s Job (1936)
  • George Orwell, The Road to Wigan Pier (1937)
  • C. S. Lewis, Rehabilitations and Other Essays (1939)

1940’s

  • C. S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain (1940)
  • C. S. Lewis, The Abolition of Man (1943)
  • T. S. Eliot, Notes toward the Definition of Culture (1948)
  • C. S. Lewis, Transposition and Other Addresses (1949)
  • Robert Maynard Hutchins, St. Thomas and the World State (Aquinas Lecture) (1949)

1950’s

  • Karen Horney, Neurosis and Human Growth (1950)

1960’s

  • C. S. Lewis, The Four Loves (1960)
  • C. S. Lewis, A Grief Observed (1961)
  • Thomas Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (1962)
  • Susanne K. Langer, An Introduction to Symbolic Logic (1967)
  • John Nef (ed.), Towards World Community (1968)

1980’s

  • Mortimer J. Adler, How to Think About God (1980)
  • Roger Scruton, The Meaning of Conservatism (1980)
  • Jonathan Barnes, Aristotle (1982)
  • John A. Hall, Powers and Liberties: The Causes and Consequences of the Rise of the West (1985)
  • Roger Scruton, Sexual Desire: A Philosophical Investigation (1986)
  • William Hasker, God, Time and Knowledge (1989)

1990’s

  • Daniel Amneus, The Garbage Generation (1990)
  • Paul Woodruff, On Justice, Power, and Human Nature: Selections from The History of the Peloponnesian War (1993)
  • W. Norris Clarke, Person and Being (Aquinas Lecture) (1993)
  • David Stove, What’s Wrong with Benevolence: Happiness, Private Property, and the Limits of Enlightenment (d. 1994)
  • Roger Scruton, A Short History of Modern Philosophy (1995)
  • Roger Scruton, An Intelligent Person’s Guide to Philosophy (1996)
  • J. J. Clarke, Oriental Enlightenment: The Encounter Between Asian and Western Thought (1997)
  • Neil Howe and William Strauss, The Fourth Turning: An American Prophecy (1997)
  • Tzvetan Todorov, Imperfect Garden: The Legacy of Humanism (1998)
  • William Hasker, The Emergent Self (1999)

2000’s

  • Tom Sorell, Descartes: A Very Short Introduction (2000)
  • Christopher Butler, Postmodernism: A Very Short Introduction (2002)
  • Samir Okasha, Philosophy of Science: A Very Short Introduction (2002)
  • Christopher Shields, The Blackwell Guide to Ancient Philosophy (2003)
  • John Piper, Justin Taylor, and Paul Kjoss Helseth, Beyond the Bounds: Open Theism and the Undermining of Biblical Christianity (2003)
  • Raymond Tallis, Why the Mind Is Not a Computer: A Pocket Lexicon of Neuromythology (2004)
  • Edward Craig, Philosophy: A Very Short Introduction (2005)
  • Shadia Drury, The Political Ideas of Leo Strauss (Updated Edition) (2005)
  • Roger Scruton, Beauty (2008)

2010’s

  • Fritz Allhoff (ed.), Philosophies of the Sciences: A Guide (2010)
  • David Wengrow, What Makes Civilization? The Ancient Near East and the Future of the West (2010)
  • Christopher Butler, Modernism: A Very Short Introduction (2010)
  • Judith Brown and Anthony Parel (eds.), The Cambridge Companion to Gandhi (2011)
  • Babette Babich, Alfred Denker & Holger Zaborowski (eds.), Nietzsche & Heidegger (2012) (English-language chapters alone)
  • Ricardo Duchesne, The Uniqueness of Western Civilization (2012)
  • Roger Scruton, The Face of God: The Gifford Lectures (2012)
  • Thomas Sowell, Intellectuals and Society (2012)
  • Roger Scruton, Fools, Frauds and Firebrands: Thinkers of the New Left (2015)
  • William Lane Craig, God Over All Divine Aseity and the Challenge of Platonism (2016)
  • Jacobus Erasmus, The Kalām Cosmological Argument: A Reassessment (2018)
  • Benjamin H. Arbour (ed.), Philosophical Essays Against Open Theism (2019)

Theology and Metaphysics

1990’s

  • Clark H. Pinnock, Richard Rice, John Sanders, William Hasker, David Basinger, The Openness of God A Biblical Challenge to the Traditional Understanding of God (1994)

Christianity

2000’s

  • Don Richardson, Eternity in Their Hearts (2005)

Literature (Excluding Novels)

2100 BC

  • Epic of Gilgamesh (c. 2100 BC)

750 BC

  • Homer, The Iliad (c. 750 BC)
  • Homer, The Odyssey (c. 750 BC)

550’s

  • Procopius, Anekdota: The Secret History of the Court of Justinian (d. c. 554)

1020’s

  • Beowulf (c. 975-1025) (prose translation)

1400’s

  • Geoffrey Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales (c. 1400)

1790’s

  • Benjamin Franklin, The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin (c. 1791)
  • Giacomo Casanova, Memoirs of Casanova (12 vols.) (d. 1798)

1850’s

  • Nalî, The Collected Poems of Nalî (d. 1856) (Kurdish)

1890’s

  • Alice James, The Diary of Alice James (d. 1892)

1910’s

  • C. S. Lewis, Spirits in Bondage (1919)

1920’s

  • Edwin Arlington Robinson, Poems: Selected and Edited by Scott Donaldson (1897-1923)
  • Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet (1923)
  • C. S. Lewis, Dymer (1926)
  • E. M. Forster, Aspects of the Novel (1927)

1930’s

  • C. S. Lewis, The Pilgrim’s Regress (1933)
  • C. S. Lewis, The Allegory of Love (1936)
  • Cleanth Brooks, Jr. and Robert Penn Warren, Understanding Poetry: An Anthology for College Students (1939)
  • E. M. W. Tillyard and C. S. Lewis, The Personal Heresy: A Controversy (1939)

1940’s

  • C. S. Lewis, A Preface to Paradise Lost (1942)
  • C. S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters (1942)
  • C. S. Lewis, The Great Divorce (1945)
  • C. S. Lewis, George MacDonald: An Anthology (1946)

1950’s

  • C. S. Lewis, Surprised by Joy (1955)
  • Elizabeth Drew, Poetry: A Modern Guide to Its Understanding and Enjoyment (1959)

1960’s

  • Arthur Crew Inman, The Inman Diary (2 vols, ed. Daniel Aaron) (d. 1963)
  • C. S. Lewis, The Collected Letters of C. S. Lewis (1905-1963) (3 vols.)
  • C. S. Lewis, Poems (1964)
  • C. S. Lewis, On Stories (1966)

1970’s

  • Benedicta Ward, The Sayings of the Desert Fathers (1975)

1980’s

  • Sylvia Plath, The Collected Poems (1981)

1990’s

  • Dinah Livingstone, The Poetry Handbook: For Readers and Writers (1993)
  • Timothy Steele, Sapphics and Uncertainties (1995)
  • Sarah Gorham, The Tension Zone (1996)
  • Kim Addonizio and Dorianne Laux, The Poet’s Companion: A Guide to the Pleasures of Writing Poetry (1997)
  • Annie Finch, A Formal Feeling Comes: Poems in Form by Contemporary Women (1999)

2000’s

  • Rita Dove, Collected Poems: 1974-2004 (2004)
  • David Lehman, The Oxford Book of American Poetry (2006)
  • Richard S. Kennedy and Donald S. Hair, The Dramatic Imagination of Robert Browning: A Literary Life by (2007)

2010’s

  • Huda al-Marashi, First Comes Marriage: My Not-So-Typical American Love Story (2018)

Novels and Stories

Below is an incomplete listing of fiction I have read, for those interested to know about my non-scholarly reading habits. I read many best-selling contemporary novels when I was a teenager since I did not know better, those books are not listed. The list only contains the books that I think were worth the effort, books I am not ashamed to admit to having read or that I am still fond of.

1750’s

  • Voltaire, Candide (1759)

1770’s

  • Frances Burney, Evelina, Or, The History of a Young Lady’s Entrance Into the World (1778)

1790’s

  • Jane Austen, Lady Susan (1794)

1800’s

  • François-René de Chateaubriand, Atala (1801)

1810’s

  • Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice (1813)
  • Jane Austen, Emma (1815)
  • Jane Austen, Persuasion (1817)

1840’s

  • Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol (1843)
  • Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Double (1846)
  • Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre (1847)
  • Anne Brontë, Agnes Grey (1847)
  • Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights (1847)

1850’s

  • Charles Dickens, David Copperfield (1850)
  • Herman Melville, Moby Dick (1851)
  • Charles Dickens, Hard Times (1854) (In Arabic and English, abridged)
  • George MacDonald, Phantastes (1854)
  • Thomas Hughes, Tom Brown’s School Days (1857) (abridged)
  • George Eliot, Adam Bede (1859)

1860’s

  • George Eliot, The Mill On The Floss (1860)
  • Charles Dickens, Great Expectations (1861) (In Farsi, Arabic and English, abridged)
  • Fyodor Dostoevsky, Notes from Underground (1864)
  • Fyodor Dostoevsky, Crime and Punishment (1866)
  • Louisa May Alcott, Little Women (1869) (abridged)

1870’s

  • George Eliot, Middlemarch (1871)
  • Henry James, Watch and Ward (1873)
  • Henry James, Roderick Hudson (1875)
  • Mark Twain, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876) (abridged)
  • Henry James, The American (1877)
  • Henry James, The Europeans (1878)

1880’s

  • Lewis Wallace, Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ (1880)
  • Mark Twain, The Prince and the Pauper (1881) (In Farsi and English, abridged)
  • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, A Study In Scarlet (1887)

1890’s

  • Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray (1890) (abridged)
  • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes (1893)

1900’s

  • Henry James, The Ambassadors (1903)
  • Edith Wharton, The House of Mirth (1905)

1910’s

  • Maxim Gorky, My Childhood (1913)
  • Edith Wharton, The Custom of the Country (1913)
  • James Joyce, Dubliners (1914)
  • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, The Valley of Fear (1915)
  • W. Somerset Maugham, Of Human Bondage (1915)
  • Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, His Last Bow (1917)
  • W. Somerset Maugham, The Moon and Sixpence (1919)

1920’s

  • Edith Wharton, The Age of Innocence (1920)
  • F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby (1925)
  • Evelyn Waugh, Decline and Fall (1928)
  • Erich Maria Remarque, All Quiet on the Western Front (1929)

1930’s

  • Evelyn Waugh, Vile Bodies (1930)
  • Stella Gibbons, Cold Comfort Farm (1932)
  • Aldous Huxley, Brave New World (1932)
  • J. R. R. Tolkien, The Hobbit (1937)
  • C. S. Lewis, Out of the Silent Planet (1938)

1940’s

  • C. S. Lewis, Perelandra (1943)
  • C. S. Lewis, That Hideous Strength (1945)
  • George Orwell, Animal Farm (1945)
  • Evelyn Waugh, Brideshead Revisited (1945)
  • George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949)

1950’s

  • Robert R. Heinlein, Farmer in the Sky (1950)
  • C. S. Lewis, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (1950)
  • C. S. Lewis, Prince Caspian (1951)
  • C. S. Lewis, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (1952)
  • C. S. Lewis, The Silver Chair (1953)
  • Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451 (1953)
  • C. S. Lewis, The Horse and His Boy (1954)
  • J. R. R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring (1954)
  • J. R. R. Tolkien, The Two Towers (1954)
  • William Golding, Lord of the Flies (1954)
  • C. S. Lewis, The Magician’s Nephew (1955)
  • J. R. R. Tolkien, The Return of the King (1955)
  • C. S. Lewis, The Last Battle (1956)
  • C. S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces (1956)
  • C. S. Lewis, Short Stories (-1958)

1960’s

  • Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird (1960)
  • Evelyn Waugh, The Complete Stories of Evelyn Waugh (covers stories from 1925-1962)
  • Frank Herbert, Dune (1965)
  • Gabriel García Márquez, One Hundred Years of Solitude (1967)
  • Frank Herbert, Dune Messiah (1969)
  • Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse Five (1969)

1970’s

  • J. R. R. Tolkien, The Silmarillion  (d. 1973, published 1977)
  • Terry Pratchett, The Dark Side of the Sun (1976)
  • Frank Herbert, Children of Dune (1976)
  • Stephen King, The Stand (1978)
  • Aziz Nesin, The Idiot (1970’s?) (in Kurdish translation)

1980’s

  • Frank Herbert, God-Emperor of Dune (1981)
  • Stephen King, Different Seasons (1982)
  • Terry Pratchett, The Colour of Magic (1983)
  • Frank Herbert, Heretics of Dune (1984)
  • Frank Herbert, Chapterhouse: Dune (1985)
  • Paul Amir, The Lord of Alamut (1985) (in Farsi translation)
  • Terry Pratchett, The Light Fantastic (1986)
  • Terry Pratchett, Equal Rites (1987)
  • Terry Pratchett, Mort (1987)
  • Terry Pratchett, Sourcery (1988)
  • Terry Pratchett, Wyrd Sisters (1988)
  • Terry Pratchett, Pyramids (1989)
  • Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards! (1989)

1990’s

  • Terry Pratchett, Eric (1990)
  • Terry Pratchett, Moving Pictures (1990)
  • Terry Pratchett, Witches Abroad (1991)
  • Terry Pratchett, Reaper Man (1991)
  • Terry Pratchett, Small Gods (1992)
  • Terry Pratchett, Lords and Ladies (1992)
  • Terry Pratchett, Men at Arms (1993)
  • Terry Pratchett, Soul Music (1994)
  • Terry Pratchett, Interesting Times (1994)
  • David Gutterson, Snow Falling on Cedars (1994)
  • Terry Pratchett, Maskerade (1995)
  • Terry Pratchett, Feet of Clay (1996)
  • Terry Pratchett, Hogfather (1996)
  • Chuck Palahniuk, Fight Club (1996)
  • Terry Pratchett, Jingo (1997)
  • J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (1997)
  • Terry Pratchett, The Last Continent (1998)
  • Terry Pratchett, Carpe Jugulum (1998)
  • J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (1998)
  • Roberto Bolaño, The Savage Detectives (1998)
  • Jhumpa Lahiri, Interpreter of Maladies (1999)
  • Terry Pratchett, The Fifth Elephant (1999)
  • Chuck Palahniuk, Survivor (1999)
  • J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (1999)

2000’s

  • Terry Pratchett, The Truth (2000)
  • J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the the Goblet of Fire (2000)
  • Terry Pratchett, The Last Hero (2001)
  • Terry Pratchett, Thief of Time (2001)
  • Terry Pratchett, The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodents (2001)
  • Terry Pratchett, Night Watch (2002)
  • Mitch Albom, The Five People You Meet in Heaven (2003)
  • Terry Pratchett, Monstrous Regiment (2003)
  • Terry Pratchett, The Wee Free Men (2003)
  • Mark Haddon, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time (2003)
  • J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (2003)
  • Terry Pratchett, Going Postal (2004)
  • Terry Pratchett, A Hat Full of Sky (2004)
  • Roberto Bolaño, 2666 (2004)
  • Terry Pratchett, Thud! (2005)
  • J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (2005)
  • Terry Pratchett, Wintersmith (2006)
  • Terry Pratchett, Making Money (2007)
  • J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (2007)
  • Terry Pratchett, Unseen Academicals (2009)

2010’s

  • Terry Pratchett, I Shall Wear Midnight (2010)
  • Terry Pratchett, Snuff (2011)
  • Sardar Abdallah, Attila, the Last of the Lovers  (Ātilā, Ākhir al-ʿUshshāq) (2018) (Arabic)
  • Uzma Jalaluddin, Ayesha, At Last (2018)

Popular Science Books and Other Non-Fiction

1990’s

  • Christina Hoff Sommers, Who Stole Feminism? (1994)
  • Simon Singh, The Code Book (1999)

2000’s

  • Roy Fielding, Architectural Styles and the Design of Network-based Software Architectures (PhD dissertation) (2000)
  • Thomas Sowell, A Personal Odyssey (2001)
  • Timothy Gowers, Mathematics: A Very Short Introduction (2002)
  • John Polkinghorne, Quantum Theory: A Very Short Introduction (2002)
  • Stephen Hawking, The Theory of Everything (2002)
  • Anil Ananthaswamy, The Edge of Physics: A Journey to Earth’s Extremes to Unlock the Secrets of the Universe (2003)
  • Atul Gawande, Complications: A Surgeon’s Notes on an Imperfect Science (2003)
  • James Gleick, Isaac Newton (2003)
  • Amy Stewart, The Earth Moved (2004)
  • Steve McConnell, Code Complete 2nd edition (2004)
  • Stephen Hawking, A Briefer History of Time (2005)
  • George Musser, The Complete Idiot’s Guide to String Theory (2008)

2010’s

  • Clifford Nass and Corina Yen, The Man who Lied to His Laptop: What Machines Teach Us about Human Relationships (2010)
  • Jay-Z, Decoded (2010)
  • Oliver Sacks, The Mind’s Eye (2010)
  • Siddhartha Mukherjee, The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer (2010)
  • Donald J. Trump and Robert T. Kiyosaki, The Midas Touch (2011)
  • Kelly McGonigal, The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do to Get More of It (2011)
  • Robert T. Kiyosaki, Rich Dad Poor Dad (2011)
  • Yuval Noah Harari, Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind (2011)
  • Brian Alexander and Larry Young, The Chemistry Between Us: Love, Sex, and the Science of Attraction (2012)
  • Rebecca Stott, Darwin’s Ghosts: The Secret History of Evolution (2012)
  • Caleb Scharf, Gravity’s Engines: How Bubble-Blowing Black Holes Rule Galaxies, Stars, and Life in the Cosmos (2012)
  • Amy Stewart, The Drunken Botanist: The Plants That Create the World’s Great Drinks (2013)
  • Aziz Ansari, Modern Romance (2013)
  • Jonah Berger, Contagious: Why Things Catch On (2013)
  • Andreas Wagner, Arrival of the Fittest: Solving Evolution’s Greatest Puzzle (2014)
  • Elizabeth Kolbert, The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History (2014)
  • Ja Rule, Unruly: The Highs and Lows of Becoming a Man (2014)
  • Joe Dispenza, You Are the Placebo: Making Your Mind Matter (2014)
  • Sandeep Jauhar, Doctored: The Disillusionment of an American Physician (2014)
  • Michael Brooks, At the Edge of Uncertainty: 11 Discoveries Taking Science by Surprise (2014)
  • Rebecca Mead, My Life in Middlemarch (2014)
  • Atul Gawande, Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End (2014)
  • Mark Schatzker, The Dorito Effect (2015)
  • Michael Tennesen, The Next Species: The Future of Evolution in the Aftermath of Man (2015)

Economics (Books)

  • Michael Hudson, E. Peshine Smith: A Study in Protectionist Growth Theory and American Sectionalism (1968)
  • Charles Wheelan, Naked Economics: Undressing the Dismal Science (2002)
  • Thomas Sowell, Basic Economics: A Common Sense Guide to the Economy (2007)
  • Thomas Sowell, Applied Economics: Thinking Beyond Stage One (2008)
  • Thomas Sowell, Economic Facts and Fallacies (2011)
  • Ha-Joon Chang, Economics: The User’s Guide (2014)

History (Books)

1980’s

  • Gale E. Christiansen, In the Presence of the Creator: Isaac Newton and His Times (1984)

2000’s

  • Anne Applebaum, Gulag: A History (2003)
  • H.W. Brands, Benjamin Franklin: The Original American (Portable Professor Series) (2004)
  • David McCullough, 1776 (2005)
  • Jonathan Clements, A Brief History of the Vikings: The Last Pagans Or the First Modern Europeans? (2005)
  • Andrés Reséndez, A Land So Strange: The Epic Journey of Cabeza de Vaca (2007)
  • Thomas Keneally, The Commonwealth of Thieves: The Story of the Founding of Australia (2007)
  • James Reston Jr., Defenders of the Faith: Christianity and Islam Battle for the Soul of Europe, 1520-1536 (2009)

2010’s

  • Reza Aslan, Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth (2013)
  • Eric H. Cline, 1177 B.C.: The Year Civilization Collapsed (2014)
  • Philip Line, The Vikings and Their Enemies: Warfare in Northern Europe, 750-1100 (2014)
  • S. Frederick Starr , Lost Enlightenment: Central Asia’s Golden Age from the Arab Conquest to Tamerlane (2015)

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