Ross Brann The Compunctious Poet: Cultural Ambiguity and Hebrew Poetry in Muslim Spain. The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1990. Johns Hopkins Jewish Studies. 0801840732 xiii/228 pages. Volume, measuring approximately 6.5" x 9.5", is bound in brown cloth, with stamped gilt lettering to spine. Book is in excellent condition. Binding is firm, with clean, bright pages. Bookplate is affixed to front pastedown. Dust jacket displays very light shelfwear. "...the first book in English to examine one of medieval Hebrew poetry's major themes -- the unease of poets writing in secular verse at odds with what they held to be sacred. Brann examines the unease both as a key to the literary history of the period and as an emblem of the particular form of cultural ambiguity unique to Andalusian Jewish society. At times a mere poetic convention, at other times an expression of a genuine and deeply felt ambivalence, the "compunctious poet" is a presence in the poetry of both rabbis and troubadours."