Persian Poetry

Historiography of Persian Poetry

Of all the literary and artistic accomplishments of the Persian civilization in its long history, by far the most significant and outstanding is Persian poetry. The jewels in the crown of Persian cultural achievements are the great classical Persian poets Ferdowsi, Omar Khayyam, Nezami, Rumi, Sa’di and Hafez.

Accordingly, much has been written on these and other great Persian poets, both in Iran and elsewhere. Sir William Jones (1746-1794) and Joseph von Hammer-Purgstall (1774-1856) were among the first scholars in the West to introduce the public to extensive specimens of Persian poetry through their translations and commentaries. The first systematic survey of Persian poetry, however, appeared in 1904 by the German scholar Hermann Ethé in Grundriss der iranischen Philologie II.

Another milestone was A Literary History of Persia, published in four volumes between 1902 and 1924 by the erudite scholar E.G. Browne, Cambridge professor of Arabic and Persian. In 1956, the Czech Iranist Jan Rypka and his colleagues published the comprehensive History of Iranian Literature.

Also worthy of mention in this context is the 1960 joint venture by Alessandro Bausani and Antonino Pagliaro, Storia della letteratura persiana, a highly suggestive study benefiting from the authors’ familiarity with world literature in general.

A number of pioneering works also appeared in Iran itself in the course of the 20th century. These include Badi’-al-Zaman Foruzanfar’s Sokhan va sokhanvaran (On Poetry and Poets, 1929-1933), Mohammad-Taqi Bahar’s Sabk-shenasi (Varieties of Style in Persian Prose) in three volumes (1942) and a number of monographs on individual poets and writers.

The most detailed treatment of the subject in Persian is Dhabih-Allah Safa’s Tarikh-e adabiyyat dar Iran (Literary History of Iran) in five volumes and eight parts (1953-1979). It studies Persian poetry and prose in the context of their political, social, religious, and cultural background, from the rise of Islam to the 18th century.

An Opportunity for Scholarship

Nevertheless, it cannot be said that Persian literature has received the attention it deserves, and the works of the multitude of poets who have written in Persian in Iran, Afghanistan, Tajikistan and, in particular, in the Indian subcontinent and Anatolia, have remained understudied.

A History of Persian Literature contributes to the broadening of the literary, artistic, and intellectual horizons of its readership and brings to the fore the account of an extremely rich literature with a longstanding tradition that differs from Western literature in important ways.