Persian Love Poetry

Into the climate of linking and debunking the connection between the Middle East and violence come a truly magnificent examination of the rich culture of Persian poetry and art. Both Vesta Sarkhosh Curtis and Sheila R. Canby are astute scholars of the region and of its art, and this compilation of love poetry is proof of that expertise. Curtis’ previous works included examined Persian myths, art and archeology while Canby’s have analyzed artistic depictions of Royal Persian paintings. Together, Curtis and Canby have created a fantastic tour of Persian culture useful to both the experienced student of the region and its art and the novice interested in broadening their horizons.

Curtis and Canby introduce the reader to the language and its changes over time, the forms of poetry unique to the Persian style, and most importantly, the influential artists whose works transcend time and culture. Important figures in Persian poetry as well as their history, mythology and stories are covered in brief, but fulfilling biographies; Men like Rumi, Hafiz, and Gurgani and women like Parvin Etesami and Raba’a Qazdari. These figures are not only important to Persian society, but to the world’s culture, as Curtis and Canby prove in their opening poem by Goethe (P. 7):

He who wants to understand the art of poetry

Must go to the land of poetry

He who wants to understand the poet

Must go to the poet’s country.

Each poem throughout the book is accompanied by Persian works of art, some of which evokes the mood of the poem perfectly; others serve to accentuate a feeling or a moment captured by the poem. The poems themselves are expressions not only of romantic love, but of all types of love in all its incarnation; pre-Islamic Sasanian heroic epics (P. 24), the courtly love of Farrukhi Sistani (Pp. 26), forlorn love of Jahan Malik Khatun (P. 60), and sensual and fiery like Raba’a Qazdari’s forbidden love (P. 16). The passion, the allegories, the emotion are all transmitted in an excellent translation of the original New Persian text, a boon to those who are unable to read the Farsi.

Persian Love Poetry illustrates concepts of the universality of love, the beauty of poetry and the timelessness of true art, regardless of origin, that are desperately needed in this growing age of uncertainty and rhetoric. It may come as a surprise to some who are not from Iran that poets such as Hafiz, of whom Goethe wrote so glowingly, are still revered and honored in their homeland, and their poetry is considered a national treasure. Are there not poet-laureates in every culture, whose words encapsulate the emotions and psyche of their time and place? Then why should Iran be any different? Curtis and Canby have compiled a first-rate scholarly work analyzing the art, poetry and literature of Persia into a work that can be enjoyed by any audience and have made a vital, spiritual and artistic connection between the Persia and the world.

Review: Persian Love Poetry by Vesta Sarkhosh Curtis and Sheila R. Canby Northhampton, Massachusetts: Interlink Books, 2006 95 p. $16.95 ISBN: 1-56656-628-2