Abū Ḥayyān al-Tawḥīdī (Author) Abū Ḥayyān al-Tawḥīdī (d. 414/1023) was a prominent litterateur and philosopher in Baghdad.Abū ʿAlī Miskawayh (Author) Abū ʿAlī Miskawayh (ca. 320-421/932-1030) was a philosopher and historian born in Rayy.Jonathan Rée (Foreword by) Jonathan Rée is a freelance philosopher and historian living in Oxford and London. His books include Proletarian Philosophers, Philosophical Tales, I See a Voice, Witcraft, and A Schoolmaster's War.Sophia Vasalou (Translator) Sophia Vasalou is Senior Lecturer and Birmingham Fellow in Philosophical Theology at the University of Birmingham. Her books include Moral Agents and their Deserts: The Character of Mu'tazilite Ethics, Wonder: A Grammar, and Ibn Taymiyya's Theological Ethics.James E. Montgomery (Translator) James E. Montgomery is Sir Thomas Adams's Professor of Arabic at the University of Cambridge and Fellow of Trinity Hall. His latest publications are In Deadly Embrace: Arabic Hunting Poems, Fate the Hunter: Early Arabic Hunting Poems, and Kalīlah and Dimnah: Fables of Virtue and Vice, with Michael Fishbein. In 2024 he was elected Fellow of the British Academy.

"Tawhidi's questions are often epigrammatic essays; they assert the limits of human reason and dwell on man's 'deficiencies,' while evincing a Johnsonian keenness towards observing the contradictions of the human character, the fortunes of life and the spirit of the age. . . . There was no better recorder of his distempered century than Tawhidi; but there was also no other thinker of his time whose disillusioned and restless spirit is more modern, or whose character comes across more strongly in his writings." (Times Literary Supplement) "A fascinating read, particularly for the aspiring scholar of classical Arabic texts, who will benefit from a solid English translation alongside the original Arabic." (Al Jadid) "...Through an elegant and fluent English translation, makes this unique work accessible to an audience of non-specialists." (Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies) "A marvel of literary finesse, of an English style seemingly able to match the often ornate prose of the Arabic... A pleasure to read throughout." (Journal of Near Eastern Studies)