The fantastic in literature is not a modern European invention; it is present in Arabic narrative dating from the ninth century.
The Imagination Unbound contains an Arabic and English study of al-Adab al-'Aja'ibi, with the original Arabic text of Kitab al-Azama (The Book of Greatness) and commentary by the author.
Kamel Abu-Deeb holds the chair in Arabic at the University of London. A poet and essayist, he has published many books and papers in both Arabic and English and has been co-editor of the avant-garde journal Mawaqif.