Persian Beyond Persia

After the Arabs’ conquest of Iran,Persian literature reappeared on the social scenario of Iran in the eight century A.D. However was the first poet of Iran who began the literary traditions of Persian literature. His neo-Persian poetry was destined to travel beyond the eastern frontiers of Persia.The Shahnameh of Ferdowsi, the Masnavi of Rumi, the metaphysics of Persia –the intellectual and artistic expressions of Persia over the ages began to show universal attractions.Persian language and literature found a second home in the Indian subcontinent where the medieval poets and writers and orientalists engaged themselves in their academic and scholarly pursuits. Western scholars accorded a warm reception to the Persian literature by translating and trans-creating the major works of Persian into English and other major European languages. Matthew Arnold was the first poet critic who made the story of Rustam and Sohrab of Shahname available in English literature. Besides the western reception, Indian people and society also engaged themselves in the pursuit of Persian language and literature. It resulted in birth of genius poets like Amir Khusrow, Iqbal and intellectual such as Maulana Azad to name a few. Beyond Persia, Amir Khosrow played the role of Rudaki to the development Persian poetics and stylistics. Iqbal’s philosophy of Khudi and Bekhudi repeated the Masnavi of the Persian mainland in Hindustan. Maulana Azad has used the ideas of many Persian poets and writers for the expression of his own thoughts and ideas in his seminal Ghubar-i-Khatir. Apart from the prose and poetry, literature of Akhlaque and Adab also found its way in the Moghul Court in India where writers like AbulFazl and Mohammad Baqir Najm Sani came forward with their work- Ain-i-Akbari and Mauiza-i Jahangiri respectively and gave similar message to Indian society as it was in Persia by Nizam-ul-MulkTusi and NaseeruddinTusi etc.
The Panel entiled Persian Beyond Persia shall consist of five papers (1) Rustam and Sohrab and Sohrab and Rustam: A Comparative Study by Syed Mdkazim(2) Amir Khosrow the Father of Indo-Persian literature by NahidMorshedlou (3) Poet Begets Poet: Ghalib and Iqbal A Case in Point by Golam Moinuddin (4) Reception of Hafez in the Works of Azad by Ramzan Ahmed (5) Capital Punishment in Indo-Islamic Advice Literature: Ideas and Practice by ZeyaulHaque


Presentations

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Rustam and Sohrab is one of the epic stories of the Shahnameh which has attracted the admiration of many intellectuals of the world. This literary masterpiece of Firdausi has made its impact on English literature through translations by William Jones, James Atkinson, J.W.Clinton and Warner Brothers. Matthew Arnold is the only poet critic who has applied his genius and introduced the Persian epic as one of the greatest tragedies in world literature. While other Orientalists just limited themselves to the translation of the story of Rustam and Sohrab, Arnold moved a step ahead of them by his art of transcreation. Refraining from simple translation, he transcreated the story of Rustam and Sohrab as Sohrab and Rustam and brought many changes into it. Nevertheless, Arnold kept the original theme of the story intact and successfully preserved the spirit of the great Persian tragedy in which a son unknowingly being killed by his own father.
The aim of this paper is to compare the poem of Sohrab and Rustam by Matthew Arnold with the original text of Rustam and Sohrab by Firdausi and present the artistic and poetic elements in the masterpiece of Arnold in English literature.

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After the Indo-Iran contact in 11th century, development and expansion of Persian language in India inspired many Indian poets, writers and Sufis to express their thoughts and feelings in Persian language. Amir Khosrow of Delhi was one of them. His works represent the beginning of a new trend in Indo-Persian literature and the influence of Indian literature on Persian writings in India and he inspired many other Indians to begin writing poetry in Persian in the Indian sub-continent. Amir Khosrow played pioneering role to fully develop Persian literature in the subcontinent and thus he emerged as the Father of Indo-Persian literature in India. He was a prolific and versatile poet and his contributions to Indo-Persian literature were rich and profound which earned him a high stature in the annals of Indo-Persian poetry. Amir Khosrow as a great medieval literary personality of Indian history played similar literary role which Rudaki performed in Greater Khorasan. In this paper, I will juxtapose Amir Khosrow's place as a founder of Persian literature in India vis a vis Rudaki. Both Rudaki and Khosrow appear on parallel lines to map the developments of Persian and Indo-Persian literature in Iran and India. What Rudaki was to the Greater Khorasan, Khosrow was to the Greater India. Hence, the former was called Sha’er i Khorasan or the Poet of Khorasan and the latter was regarded Tuti i Hind or the Nightingale of India.

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It was Daqiqi who inspired Ferdowsi to compose the Shahnameh and continue this literary tradition in Persia or when Rudaki breathed his last, Ferdowsi was born in Khorasan. Attar and Sanai paved way for Rumi to enter into the Sufi world of Persian literature. The fact which Rumi admitted in these words:

Attar was the soul and Sanai was his pair of eyes;
And I have come after Sanai and Attar.

This phenomenon is again witness in the annals of Persian literature when Sa’di succeeded Khwaja Abdullah Ansari and further he was succeeded by Khwaja Shamsuddin Muhammad Hafez in Shiraz. The history of Persian literature repeated itself in India, too. Iqbal emerged as the poet- philosopher, with his lofty ideas of Khudi and Bekhudi (Self and Selflessness) which gave a new dimension to Indo-Persian literature. But the greatness of Iqbal owed much to the genius of Ghalib who ushered fresh thoughts and expressions into the edifice of Indo-Persian literature in the sub-continent. Mirza Asadullah Khan Ghalib was the nightingale of the garden not yet created thereby meaning he was far ahead of his time. Iqbal inherited the rational tradition of ‘Urfi, Faizi, and Ghalib in his philosophical poetry. A study of Ghalib and Iqbal will certainly reveal that Iqbal’s writing is much influenced by Ghalib and owing to Ghalib, Iqbal has attained new heights in philosophical poetry and thus Ghalib has begotten Iqbal.

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Maulana Abul Kalam Azad was not only a freedom fighter of India’s independence movement against the British Raj but was a prolific writer of Urdu or Indo-Persian literature. His profound interest in Persian studies is a giant step towards understanding Indo-Persian literature. He has a sizeable account of Urdu writings in which the gems of Persian literature are studded. Azad had a genius to grasp prominent Persian literary figures and re-interpret them in his Urdu writings. Hafiz is one of the greatest Persian literary figures who have made profound impact on Azad. One may see Hafez oft-quoted in the works of Azad whom he considers as hidden tongue or Lisan-ul- Ghaib. The works of Azad namely Ghubar i Khatir, Karvaan i Khayal, Tazkera, etc. more often than not reflect the lyrics of Hafez. It transpires that Azad lived in an age and society which were akin to the time and space of Hafez. The leaner study of the life and time of Azad and Hafez offers striking similarity and enable us to understand the life, time and works of Hafez through the life, time and works of Azad. In other words, Hafez and Azad becomes synonyms and inter-changeable. My paper will show how Azad explains his circumstances of life and inner recess of his thought and feelings by means of the lyrics of Hafez. The twentieth century Azad is appears as re-incarnation of the fourteenth century Hafez.

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The recent debate on capital punishment is not new. Issues relating to punishment in general and capital punishment in particular were discussed in the literary works of Medieval Islamic societies as well, particularly in the advice literature (a literary work of norms on a wide range of topic). The concept of capital punishment discussed in advice literature is different from juristic Islam. Orthodox Islamic scholars hold on rigidly to the idea of capital punishment prescribed in the canonical law of Muslims. On the contrary, the authors of advice literature gave more emphasis on ‘reforming’ the offender than on corporal punishment. They proposed capital punishment in rare cases and as a last option.
Nasirud’din Tusi was the first scholar to express specific ideas on punishment in advice literature. The intellectuals of later centuries such as Jalalud’din Dawwani and Husain Waiz Kahsifi followed the line of Nasirud’din Tusi. These texts were widely in circulation in Mughal India, and the ideas on capital punishment became a topic of discussion in the Mughal courtly and intellectual circles.
This paper intends to analyse the ideas on capital punishment discussed in Indo-Islamic advice literature and place them in their historical context. An analysis of the role of contemporary political and social conditions in the formation of ideas on capital punishment is pre-eminently desirable. My paper also attempts to explore the extent to which the concept of capital punishment was practiced in Mughal India. I have selected advisory texts written in Medieval Central Islamic land such as Akhlaq-i Nasiri of Nasirud’din Tusi, Akhlaq-i Jalali of Jalalud’din Dawwani, Akhlaq-i Muhsini of Husain Waiz Kashifi; and texts written in the Mughal period such as the Ain-i Akbari of Abul Fazl, and Mauiza-i Jahangiri of Muhammad Baqir Najm Sani. For studying the practice of capital punishment I would use chronicles and documents (administrative orders, news-reports, etc.).