Iraj, the Poet of Love and Humor

Abstract

Iraj was a leading poet of the late Qajar era, a major poet in the whole history of Persian poetry, and by far the greatest of the poets who descended from Fath'ali Shah. Two things in particular distinguish Iraj's poetry: eloquence and humor. It is difficult to describe him as a satirist in the strict sense of this term since satire in his works is normally incidental and a natural result of his unique humor when writing about most subjects. His best works are Aref-Nameh, Enqelab-e Adabi and Zohreh o Manuchehr, although there is hardly any piece by him which is less than delightful, especially those which he wrote during the Constitutional era.