Persian Poet Research Articles

Poets of Mysticism: Jalal ud-Din Rumi & William Blake: A Comparative and Contrastive Analysis

The purpose of this paper is to examine the similarities and differences between the mystical poetry of Jalal ud-Din Rumi, a Persian poet who lived in the 13th century, and William Blake, an English poet who lived in the 18th century. The focus will be on their respective approaches to mysticism and spirituality, as well as their common themes of divine love, human transformation, and the connection between the material and spiritual realms. Their poetic expressions of mysticism reflect a profound engagement with the transcendent, and they encourage readers to seek higher truths beyond the confines of the physical world. Despite the fact that both poets come from different cultures, their mysticism is in their poetry. The purpose of this comparative study is to highlight the similarities between them in terms of their themes and styles, as well as the differences that stem from their distinct philosophical and theological backgrounds.

ردِ پای حکمتِ یونانی در اشعار عبدالواسع جبلی غرجستانی

Philosophy is the co-born of humankind and philosophizing is also a manifestation of human thinking. It must be said with certainty that no historical period has been without philosophy. There is no doubt that Western philosophy has reached us in written form from Greece and then to the whole world. At the beginning of Islam, many Greek ruling sources were translated by Islamic thinkers, and caused the emergence of various scholars in the field of Islamic philosophy and the spread of philosophical propositions among the Persian poets and writers. Abdul-Wase Jabali Gharjistani, is one of the poets of the 6th century of Hijri, while he was fully familiar with his contemporary sciences, he had a remarkable knowledge of Greek wisdom and reflected it in his poetry. In the present article, with the aim of showing the subtleties of the poet's philosophical vision, the writer is more interested in answering the question of whether it is possible to consider Jabali as a follower of Greek philosophical thought. Because as appearing from his poems, The Jabali's way of thinking in addition to Epicureanism is thinking of happiness; In general, it is similar to the ideas of Hellenism. In order to provide an answer to the above question according to the indicators and components of Greek philosophy, in an inductive way using a descriptive-analytical method, among all the poems of Divan Jabali, there are poems with a way of thinking Greek that is classified, adapted and analyzed. The result of the research shows that Jebeli's thought is in the components of the materials of existence; Epicurean philosophy or honoring the soul, seizing the opportunity, paying attention to worldly pleasures and the influence of the stars and the heavens on humans is consistent with the Greek philosophy

THOUGHTS OF MAMED AMIN RASULZADE ABOUT THE ATTITUDE OF THE NİZAMİ GANJAVİ TO LIFE, PEOPLE AND WOMEN

Nizami Ganjavi wrote his works in Persian. For this reason, Iran claims that he is a Persian poet. However, Nizami was born in Ganja and was buried in Ganja. Mammad Amin Rasulzade proved that Nizami Ganjavi is an Azerbaijani and an Azerbaijani poet by writing the work ―The Great Azerbaijani Poet Nizami‖ in the 40s of the 20th century. This article focuses on the opinion of Mammad Amin Rasulzadeh about Nizami Ganjavi’s attitude to life, man and woman.

Eco-Poetics of a Persian Poet: Contemplation of Rock, Tree, and Water

Eco-Poetics of a Persian Poet: Contemplation of Rock, Tree, and Water

Псевдо-Хафиз В.С. Соловьева и влияние переводческой традиции Г.Ф. Даумера и А.А. Фета

The essay analyses the Russian translations of Ḥāfeẓ by V.S. Solov’ev in 1885 (24 poems in the first journal edition, reduced to 11 in all subsequent volume editions). The Russian philosopher’s interest in the Persian poet is part of European, and specifically German, Orientalism, which became popular since the publication of J.W. Goethe’s “West-Eastern Divan” (1819). This interest has a direct connection with the translations of Hafiz published by A.A. Fet in 1860. As has been shown, Fet translated Ḥāfeẓ not directly, but through the poetic imitations of him by the German poet G.F. Daumer (“Hafis. Eine Sammlung persischer Gedichte”, 1846; in particular, he used the second edition of these poems, published in 1856). Solov’ev’s lyrics have hitherto been thought to be translations of Hafezian imitations by the German poet F. Bodenstädt (1877). The essay shows how actually Solov’ev used the same imitations by Daumer as Fet, probably taking them from the same volume used by the older poet. This enables to relate the two Hafezian poetic cycles more directly and to draw some general considerations on the different intentions that drove the two poets in translating the Persian mystic: for both, Ḥāfeẓ was functional in conveying their own artistic form and philosophical meaning, although each of them had a different understanding of him. The analysis shows that Solov’ev was much closer to Ḥāfeẓ than Fet. In the Persian poet Fet saw a singer of beauty and regarded the aesthetic phenomenon as self-valuable; for Solov’ev, beauty was a conduit of the divine, as it was for Ḥāfeẓ. In his poems, the young beautiful cupbearers (replaced in Daumer by the beloved woman) are always the personification of God. It was these themes (the power of love; its dual nature, both mystical and earthly; the immanence of the divine in the world) that Solov’ev would develop in the following years and would be reflected in a series of articles key to understanding his worldview and which became the object of attention of Symbolist poets: “Beauty in Nature” (1889), “The General Meaning of Art” (1890), “The Meaning of Love” (1892), “The Life Drama of Plato” (1898), and others.

Appropriating Hafez’s ghazals for Shiite rites and rituals in the Islamic Republic of Iran

ABSTRACT The poetry of the Iran-Iraq War (1980–1988) is commonly grafted to classical Persian topoi, imagery, metaphors. Several war poets use classical poetry to communicate with their audiences as this poetry is familiar and they can effortlessly convey their political and ideological message. This article investigates how modern amateur poets use classical poetry to create their own poems for political and religious use. I shall specifically analyse a few instances in which the poetry of the classical Persian poet Hafez of Shiraz (1315–1390) is integrated in various ideologically Shiite contexts. Some scholars have argued that Hafez’s ghazals have little cohesion, characterizing the poem’s couplets as ‘pearls at random strung’, but as we shall see these ghazals enjoy thematic coherence, even their ambiguity creates spaces for a modern appropriation and interpolation of couplets in his poetry, allowing the use of a poem as a commentary on religious and political events. While I shall give attention to Hafez’s art of poetry, my main focus will be upon the modern application of his poetry by professional Shiite singers (maddāḥs) who perform such poems to whet the emotions of their audiences, placing the poem in a purely Shiite or ideologically Islamist propaganda.

“Şütür-Gürbe” as a Criticism Term in Turkish and Persian Poet Tezkeres

Şair tezkirelerinde, şairlerin edebî yönleri ve şiirleri değerlendirilirken tezkire yazarlarının kullandıkları bazı ortak kelimeler ve kalıp ifadeler bulunmaktadır. Bu kelimeler ve kalıp ifadeler tezkire yazarlarının öznel değerlendirmeleri ve niteleme ifadeleri dışında şair tezkireleri bağlamında terim anlamı da kazanırlar. Alana özgü nesnel bir anlam ifade eden bu kelimeler, farklı biyografilerde belli bir kelime/kavram ağı etrafında kullanılırlar. Bu makale, Farsça ve Türkçe tezkirelerde yer alan şütür-gürbe tabirinin şair tezkirelerinde kullanılan bir şiir eleştirisi terimi olduğu iddiasını taşımaktadır. Bu bağlamda, Arapça bir meselden hareketle Farsça biyografik metinlere geçen ve özellikle Herat ekolü tezkireleri aracılığıyla da Türkçe tezkirelerde kullanılan şütür-gürbe tabirinin terimleşme süreci sorgulanacaktır. Bunun için sözlükler ve şerhler başta olmak üzere Türkçe şair tezkirelerine model olan Farsça tezkirelerde terimin yer aldığı pasajlardan tanık cümleler ve bunların diliçi aktarımları verilmiş, sonrasında şütür-gürbenin hangi tür şiirlerin eleştirisinde kullanıldığı değerlendirilmiştir. Şair tezkirelerinde bir şiir eleştirisi terimi olarak kullanıldığı tespit edilen şütür-gürbenin çok sayıda şiir yazan ancak iyi şiirleriyle kötü şiirleri birbirine karışan şairlerin biyografilerinde kullanıldığı görülmüştür.

Romanticism Reflections in the Poetry of Mahsati Ganjavi

The poetry of Mahsati Ganjavi, a Persian poet of the 6th century, has unique features based on the principles of Romanticism. Therefore, the ground is prepared to investigate his collected poems based on the components of Romanticism. This study aims to analyze and describe the collected poems of Mahsati Ganjavi using documentary and descriptive methods, and to answer the question of how much the components of Romanticism are reflected in his poetry. The results of this analysis show that many characteristics of Romanticism, such as the return to nature, attention to human nature, escape and travel, individuality and uniqueness, freedom, non-conformity to ethics, emotion and sentiment, romantic melancholy, love, illness, imagination, romantic imagery, the pole of figurative language, and the magic of words are present in the poetry of Mahsati Ganjavi, making it one of the romantic works of Persian literature.

WHEN PERSIA MEETS THE CAUCUSES THROUGH POETRY”: ASHRAF OF GILAN’S ALLUSION TO MIRZA ALAKBAR SABIR DURING THE IRANIAN CONSTITUTIONAL ERA

Mirza Alakbar Sabir was one of the pivotal literary figures during the Iranian Constitutional revolution in 1907 and the unsuccessful revolution of 1905 in Russian, which affected the Caucuses. He was a role model of many poets of his time including some great Persian poets. In this article, T.S. Eliot’s famous stance towards borrowing from other poets “Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal” has been adopted as the basis of our survey of some of the borrowings of one of the Persian political poets during the Iranian Constitutional revolution namely Ashraf to see if he has allusions to Mirza Alakbar Sabir. The results of the paper show that Ashraf’s poem is a pastiche of Sabir’s style. He is the translator of Sabir, but he makes some alternations of detail, arrangement, and number of lines tending to play down the presence of Sabir in his work remaining “auditory imagination”.

The reception and critique of literature in translation: Ahmad Shāmlū, the Poet-Translator and the case of Margot Bickel

Abstract Ahmad Shāmlū (1925–2000), modern Persian poet, is among those creative writers who showcase their mastery of language in translation as well. Among his translated works, which encompass both verse and prose, his translation of Margot Bickel’s Pflücke den Tag (1982) and Geh deinen Weg! (1989) is specifically noteworthy for tremendous success and high reception in the TL context, which is arguably beyond that of the original from a literary and critical perspective. As the analysis of sample poems from the two collections reveals, Shāmlū’s skilful rendition has actually produced poetry in the TL. Away from marginalizing the pivotal role of translation in cross-cultural literary exchanges, this study reflects on the critique of literature in translation and literary reception as prone to downplaying or magnifying the significance of SL text in TL critical and receptive evaluations. The paper initiates with an overview of the status of literary translation and its interface with comparative literature, and then briefly reviews two world-famous works of poetry translation and their reception in host cultures to set them as the background for the argument to be made about Shāmlū’s translation of Bickel’s works.

A ‘Polyphonic Score’: Basil Bunting’s Persian Condensations

Abstract In 1932, Basil Bunting was lodging with the Pounds in Genoa when he first encountered a French manuscript translation of Abul-Qasem Firdausi’s classical Persian epic the Shahnameh (1010). Upon realizing that the manuscript was incomplete, Bunting decided there was ‘nothing to do but learn Persian and read Firdausi, so I undertook that’. By 1942 his knowledge of Persian was good enough for the Ministry of Information to send him to Iran with the Royal Airforce, at which point he toured the Middle East, Central Asia, and parts of Africa. Through these travels, and in particular his time in Iran, he discovered renewed possibilities for his personal and poetic life. His engagement with classical Persian literature over the 1940s was extensive and allowed him to eventually compose masterful translations of canonical classical Persian poets. I argue that his later translations, especially those written from 1947, demonstrate how translating Persian poetry refined Bunting’s Poundian poetics of condensation. I show that this synthesis produced formally and generically pluralistic poems that straddle multiple cultures, such as Odes 35 (1947) and 36 (1948). Through an analysis of The Spoils (1951), I explore the way in which Bunting’s own poetry was inflected by the Arabo-Persian ‘bait’ such that its literary traditions were made resonant with Anglophone ones. I then conclude by illustrating how the translations, the later odes, and The Spoils enabled him to write his irreducibly multiple magnum opus Briggflatts (1965).

Metaphorical Disclosure in Jalal Al-Din Rumi's Fihi Ma Fihi

The aim of this research is to elaborate Rumi's metaphorical disclosure in one of his works, entitled Fihi Ma Fihi. The complexity of diction in his literary work can characterize as imagery, specifically as metaphor. Jalal Al-Din Rumi was distinguished by his works containing exquisite language, the unlikeness of his figurative language and imagery, placing him as Persian Poet Top Seller in America in 1997. Therefore, this research utilize the theoretical criticism method in elaborating language and disclosure of Rumi's dialectics in Fihi Ma Fihi. As supporting to approach the analysis, this research also requires library technical and comparative literature methods. The results of this research managed to describe several metaphors that Rumi used as a religious disclosure based on his lectures. Hence, the advantage of this research will be useful for literary devotee in understanding and studying Rumi's writing tactics in influencing the world society for over centuries. This research is also expected to be a basis for further analysis of electing language in literary works production.

The Idea of Peace in Great Poets of Persian Literature

Today’s world is full of conflicts, enmities, and riots turning lack of peace to a great concern throughout the world. Why is peace being threatened? What are the backgrounds for lack of peace? What are the likely solutions for the present situation? Before everything, human beings need to acknowledge the necessity of reconciliation, peace, and tolerance more than ever. Since ancient times, intellectuals have written about inviting people to peace and tolerance in society. Persian poets, as the spokesmen of the emotions and thoughts of society, have called to peace and throughout history advising people to humanity, love, affection and forgiveness. Following its great poets, Persian folklore has always praised peace and decried violence. The present article studies the concept of peace in the poems of Ferdowsi, Rumi, Sa’di, Hafez, and Iqbal Lahori. According to these poets, the basic causes of war and violence are: resentment and jealousy, differences of opinion, aggression and oppression, popular dissatisfaction, authoritarianism, and extremist patriotism. To prevent violence and war, they call for the avoidance of unwarranted strife, tolerance for the enemy, legitimate defense against aggression, and the tolerance of the rude and the ignorant. These poets invite people to kindness, polite speech, love and affection, the satisfaction of the people through justice, and developing brotherhood.

Influence Of English Poet’s On Iqbal’s Poetry

Allama Iqbal is the great artist of the east. He established himself as prominent poet across the world. His uniqueness, amongst the Urdu and Persian poets, is his vast study. Allama got various ideas and thoughts along with artistic sense from every important literary figure. At Iqbal’s time English Language was one of the main source of acquiring modern know ledges. Allama strengthen his thoughts and artistic technique by English poets too. In this article efforts have been made to point out the impact of British poets on Iqbal poetry.

Реминисценции из произведений Саади в публицистике и эпистолярии И.А. Бунина: источниковедческий аспект проблемы

The article examines the problem of reminiscences from the works of the medieval Persian poet Saadi in the non-fiction texts of Ivan Bunin in the source studies aspect, using the principle of historicism and the method of comparative analysis. The objects of consideration were the letters and journalistic texts of the writer relating to 1910–1935, the subject was the images, sayings, maxims of Saadi reflected in them. The purpose of the study is to identify and analyze the sources of reminiscences from Saadi’s works, specifically their translated editions in Russian and the main European languages. The study found that, firstly, Bunin used as sources of Saadi’s texts not only the “classical” translations of books “Bustan” (1257) and “Gulistan” (1258), which appeared by the end of the 19th – beginning of the 20th centuries, but also related to one degree or another scientific, popular science and fiction literature by the poet’s creative work. Secondly, in Bunin’s epistolary and journalism, borrowings from Saadi’s works were subjected to quite significant creative processing.

Poetic Expression of the Image of “Rind” in Eastern Literature

Oriental poetry is often devoted to romantic, mystical, religious, social, political themes, and is written in extremely beautiful and soul-shaking tones. Persian poet Shamsiddin Muhammad Ḥāfeẓ-e Shīrāzī (1325-1390) is considered the father of Near Eastern and Middle Eastern lyrics. He connects the mystical ghazals of Mawlana Rumi and the romantic ghazals of Saadi, gives freedom to the verses of the ghazal and creates a new twist in it. Poetry methods: Iham and Ibham are one of the features of Ḥāfeẓ-e Shīrāzī’s style, and the concepts of “Rind”, “Rindana”, “Rinds” and “Rind school” were used more than 80 times in Ḥāfeẓ-e Shīrāzī’s divan. This article talks about the content and essence of the concept of “Rind” in Eastern poetry.

Paths Crossing in Damascus: Familiarity with Persian among Eleventh/Seventeenth-Century Arabic Literati

Abstract This article explores the phenomenon of familiarity with Persian among Arabic literati of the early modern period, with a focus on the eleventh/seventeenth century. It has long been recognized, in a general sense, that some scholars from the Ottoman Arab world had knowledge of Persian literature. Only recently have we seen the beginnings of detailed research on this topic. In the current article, the works of four authors are examined with an eye toward their discussion of things Persian or Iranian: Muḥammad Amīn al-Muḥibbī (d. 1111/1699), Shihāb al-Dīn al-Khafājī (d. 1069/1659), Ḥasan al-Būrīnī (d. 1024/1615), and ʿAbd al-Ghanī al-Nābulusī (d. 1143/1731). We find that, although familiarity with Persian was far from unheard-of in Arabic literary circles, the degree of interest varied widely. At one extreme is al-Muḥibbī, who goes out of his way to share samples of the work of prominent Persian poets that he has translated into Arabic. Closer to the opposite end of the spectrum is al-Khafājī, of whom it is not obvious whether he could read Persian. The remaining authors fall somewhere in between. One insight that becomes clearer through this study is that Ottoman Damascus was a place in which Persian could be learned. There were enough migrants and visitors from the Persianate realm, and sufficient circulation of texts, that a scholar like al-Būrīnī could attain fluency without traveling.

PERSIAN DIVAN OF JANBAZ MULTANI INTRODUCTION AND ANALYSIS

Janbaz Multani was a 17th century leading Persian poet of Multan. His only surviving work is his Persian divan available at Punjab University’s central library, Lahore. His poetry is deeply influenced by the prominent Persian poets like Sa'adi Shirazi, Hafiz Shirazi, Qasim Anwar, Urfi Shirazi, Kaleem Kashani and Saib Tabrizi. His divan consists of various genres of poetry like ghazal, mukhammas, mathnavi etc. His verse revolves around topics such as love -both worldly and divine, mysticism and morality. The balanced use of rhetoric increases the colour, taste and impact of his poetry. The article introduces Janbaz Multani’s hitherto unpublished Persian divan and analyzes his thoughts and art.

A Monument to Medieval Syrian Book Culture: The Library of Ibn ‘Abd al-Hadi

A Monument to Medieval Syrian Book Culture: The Library of Ibn ‘Abd al-Hadi

“The battle trumpet blown!” : Whitman’s Persian Imitations in Drum Taps

While Walt Whitman’s thematic use of the Orient continues to receive critical attention based on his explicit foreign references, aside from observations of specific Persian signifiers in “A Persian Lesson,” his engagement with the poetry of Iran has remained especially speculative and therefore analogical, with studies like J. R. LeMaster and Sabahat Jahan’s Walt Whitman and the Persian Poets showing how his mystical relation to his own religious influences tends to resemble the Sufism of Rumi and Hafez. A new discovery emerging from an examination of his personal copy of William Alger’s The Poetry of the East along with his reading of Emerson’s essay “Persian Poetry,” however, reveal a rather subtle yet sustained attempt to directly imitate the foreign verse throughout much of Drum-Taps. That his reliance upon identifiable foreign models to depict what he deemed his nation’s most significant historical moment further coincides with a dramatic shift in style of writing calls for closer comparative analysis of how and why he came to mimic translations of this poetry. Such a reading suggests that compared with previous Orientalist studies, Whitman appears even more personally invested in Persian verse, using it to surrender the distinct Romantic individuality of his earlier poems for the greater spiritual preservation of his conflicted nation.