Demonizing the Queen of Sheba : Boundaries of Gender and Culture in Postbiblical Judaism and Medieval Islam (Chicago Studies in the History of Judaism)

Rating:
Summary: Quintessential chaos
Review: It seems that Dr. Lassner pulled out a dictionary and said, "I will use the words 'quintessential,' 'albeit,' and 'polemic' at least 50 timews in this book." Highly repetitive and chaotically disorganized, this book is written in a style that is meant to show off Lassner's vocabulary and "scholarship," while putting the reader at a disadvantage.

Rating:
Summary: a waste of paper.
Review: This book has the thinnest analysis I have ever seen. Although Lassner makes several promising overtures to explain the relation of Jewish and Medieval Muslim texts, he gets bogged down in presenting the same material over and over again, making only the slightest movements toward an argument. The "argument" consists mostly of repeated paraphrase. Gender should not even be in the title, as he has obviously not bothered to absorb a rich body of gender theory. The sole redeeming factor of this book is the translations in the appendix. I can not believe the University of Chicago Press would publish such drivel.