Monday, July 4, 2022

Pierre Larcher

Pierre Larcher is a philologist in early Arabic. He collected one series of such essays, written over 1983-1997, in Linguistique arabe et pragmatique. For this, book-reviews exist in English - of which I am presently aware of Ovidiu Pietrăreanu's (and I am grateful this is not in Romanian). Lately Dr. Larcher has published a second collection, for this millennium. I do not find English-language reviews of this one; but... Paul Neuenkirchen has reviewed this in French in an open journal. I have taken upon myself to translate this review into English.

Larcher's work can be had in his own Academia site. Most of it is in French, but Prometheus Books has translated and published some of it into English. I am aware of three English renditions of his work: one in Inara's Hidden Origins and two in Ibn Warraq's Which Koran?.

As to what I think of Larcher's work... well, Neuenkirchen is at his most critical when looking at Larcher's take on salam / islâm (and aslama, silm &c.). I must admit, myself, not quite following Larcher(?)'s arguments in the other two English articles - and I reviewed Hidden Origins ambiguously and Which Koran? poorly.

These might not be Larcher at his best, however. This is why we need Neuenkirchen's summaries, to direct us to a wider range.

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