Abstract
Women are featured in the works of three major classical Persian poets, Nizami Ganjavi (1140–1202), Abul al-Qasim Firdawsi (932–1020), and Abd al-Rahman Jami (1414–92). These poets’ portrayals of their female characters vary considerably; however, because all three have written love stories, it is possible to compare them. Certain stories are common to at least two of these authors. Their stories include common characters, often based on historical figures. Moreover, Nizami was inspired by Firdawsi in a significant way and refers to his work, while Jami was inspired by Nizami and refers to him. Perhaps for these reasons, prominent scholars of classical Persian literature, including Meisami, Bürgel, and Moayyad, have compared some of these female characters. The existing literature on the topic, however, does not provide reasons for such diverse characterizations, but merely offers engaging descriptive analyses. This comparative study of the portrayals of women will seek to clarify the ambiguity surrounding the ideological and literary positions of these poets to explain the diversity in their presentations of the female. Such clarification carries broad significance, for in postrevolutionary Iran, the interpretation of these poets’ works has become the subject of intense debate among cultural and literary critics, many of whom are widely divided over Islamic discourse and state ideology.
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Notes
Ali Akbar Sa’idi Sirjani, Sima-yi du zan: shirin va layli [Layla] dar khamsah-i nizami ganjavi (Tehran: Nashr-i Naw Avaran, 1991).
Bihruz Sarvatiyan, A’inah-i ghayb, nizami ganjah-’i dar masnavi makhzan al-asrar (Tehran: Nashr-i Kalamih, 1989), 37, 40.
Bihruz Sarvatiyan, ed. Makhzan al-asrar-i nizami, Makhzan al-asrar / ba muqabilah-’i davazdah nuskhah, tashih va ta’liqat hamrah ba vazhah va amsal va hikam (Tehran: Tus, 1984), 283.
Jalal Matini, “Azadigi va Tasahul-i Nizami Ganjavi,” in Iran-Shinasi, 4,1 (Spring 1992), 1–20.
Fatamah Alaqih, “Sima-yi zan az didgah-i Nizami,” in Farhang 10 (Fall 1992), 317–30.
Ibid.
Julie S. Meisami, “Kings and Lovers: Ethical Dimensions of Medieval Persian Romance,” in Edebiyat 1 n. 1 (1987), 7.
J. C. Bürgel offers a comparison of romance writing in the work of Gorgani, Nizami, Amir Khosrow Dehlavi, Jami, and others. See J. C. Bürgel, “The Romance,” in E. Yarshater, Persian Literature (New York: Bibliotheca Persica, 1987), 161–79 and “Die Frau als Persien in der Epik Nizamis,” Asiatische Studien 42: 137–55.
For a treatment of this text as a work of drama, see Peter Chelkowski, “Nizami: Master Dramatist,” in E. Yarshater, Persian Literature (New York: Bibliotheca Persica, 1987), 190–213.
Abd al-Majid Ayati, Dastan-i khusraw va shirin; surudah-i nizami (Tehran: Shirkat Kitabhay-i Jibi, 1974), 27–29.
Ibid.
For a recent translation of Haft Paykar in English, see Nizami Ganjavi, The Haft Paykar: A Medieval Persian Romance, translated with an Introduction and Notes by Julie Scott Meisami. See also G. E. Wilson’s translation of The Haft Paykar (The Seven Beauties), (London: Late Probsthain and Company, 1924).
Elements such as colors, numbers, and weekdays play important roles in this book and indicate Nizami’s awareness of some of the sciences of his time. See Meisami, The Haft Paykar: A Medieval Persian Romance and Georg Krotkoff, “Colour and Number in the Haft Paykar,” in Logos Islamikos: Studia Islamica, ed. by Roger M. Savory and Dionisius A. Agius (Toronto, Canada: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 1984).
Peter Chelkowski argues that Puccini’s Turandot is very likely rooted in an Iranian original and in Nizami’s Haft Paykar. See “Āyā uprā-yi turāndut-i Puchini Bar Asas-i Kushk-i Surkh-i Haft PaykarA Nizami Ast?,” in Iran-Shinasi vol. 3, no. 4 (Winter 1991), 714–22.
Nizami, Haft Paykar, ed. Dastgirdi (Tehran: Ibn-i Sina, 1955), 233.
Ibid.
See Muhammad Taqi Jafari, Hikmat, Irfan, va Akhlaq dar Shir-i Nizami Ganjavi (Tehran: Intisharat-I Kayhan, 1991) and Bihruz Sarvatiyan, A’inah-i ghayb, nizami ganjah-’i dar masnavi makhzan al-asrar (Tehran: Nashr-i Kalamih, 1989), 37, 40.
Nizami, Haft Paykar, ed. Dastgirdī (Tehran: Ibn-i Sina, 1955).
Julie S. Meisami, “Fitnah or Azadah? Nizami’s Ethical Poetic,” in Edebiyat N. S. vol. I, no. 2, 1989, 41–77.
Julie Scott Meisami, Medieval Persian Court Poetry (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1987).
For a more detailed discussion of Layli’s character, see A. A. Sa’idi Sirjani, Sima-yi du zan (Tehran: Nashr-i Naw, 1989), 24.
Barat Zanjani, Layli va majnun-i nizami ganjai (Tehran: Tehran University Press, 1990), 113.
Jan Rypka, History of Iranian Literature (Dordrecht, Holland: D. Reidel Publishing Company, 1968), 211.
Arjang Maddi, “Bar rasi-i suvar-i khiyal dar haft paykar,” Farhang, 10 (Fall 1992), 331–408.
See J. C. Bürgel, “The Romance,” in E. Yarshater, Persian Literature (New York: Bibliotheca Persica, 1987), 161–79.
Hamid Dabashi, “Harf-i Nakhostin: Mafhum-i Sokhan dar Nazd-i Hakim Nizami Ganjavi,” in Iranshenasi vol. III, no. 4 (Winter 1992), 723–40.
Ibid., 733.
Sabatino Moscati, The Face of the Ancient Orient (Chicago: Quadrangle Books, 1951), 111.
Jalil Dustkhah, Avesta (Tehran: Murvarid, 1983), 9.
Nizami Ganjavi, Kulliyat-i khamseh-i hakim nizami ganjah-i, ed. Dastgirdī, fourth edition (Tehran: Amir Kabir, 1987), 23.
Shahrukh Miskub, Milliyat va zaban (Tehran: Karavan, 1989), 23.
For more information on the genre of the epic, see C. M. Bowra, Heroic Poetry (London: Macmillan; New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1961).
Julie S. Meisami, “Fitnah or Azadah? Nizami’s Ethical Poetic,” in Edebiyat, 1, n. 2 (1989), 44.
For English translations of Firdwasi’s work (in part), see Firdawsi, The Epic of the Kings: Shah-nama, the National Epic of Persia, translated by Reuben Levy (London: Routledge & K. Paul, 1967); Firdawsi, The Legend of Seyavash, translated with an introduction and notes by Dick Davis (London; New York: Penguin, 1992); Firdawsi, The Tragedy of Sohrab and Rostam: From the Persian National Epic, The Shahname of Abol-Qasem Ferdowsi, translated by Jerome W. Clinton (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1996); In the Dragon’s Claws: The Story of Rostam and Esfandiyar, translated by Jerome W. Clinton (Washington, DC: Mage Books, 2000). And for information about this work, see E. G. Browne, A Literary History of Persia, 2 vols.; J. Rypka et al., History of Iranian Literature (Dordrecht: D. Reidel, 1968); Dick Davis, Epic and Sedition: The Case of Ferdowsi’s Shahnameh (Fayetteville: University of Arkansas Press, 1992); Olga M. Davidson, Poet and Hero in the Persian Book of Kings (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1994).
Firdawsi, Abu al-Qasim, “Rostam va Sohrab,” Shahnameh, ed. M. A. Furughi (Tehran: Intisharat-i Javidan, n.d.), 83–98.
See M. Islami-Nudushan, “Mardan va Zanan-i Shahnamah,” in Nasir Hariri, ed. Firdawsi, zan, va tirazhidi (Babul, Iran: Kitabsara-yi Babul, 1986).
Julie S. Meisami, “Fitnah or Azadah? Nizami’s Ethical Poetic,” in Edebiyat N. S. vol. I, n. 2, (1989), 46.
Ibid., 63.
For more information, see Parvin Shakiba, Shi’r-i farsi az aghaz ta imruz (Tehran: Hirmand, 1992) and Nigahi guzara bar vizhagiha va digarguniha-yi shi’r-i farsi (Piedmont, CA: Shirikat-i Kitab-i Jahan and Iran Zamin, 1987).
Peter Jackson, ed. The Cambridge History of Iran, vol. 6, The Timurid and Safavid Periods (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986), 913.
Shannon Caroline Stack, Herat: A Political and Social Study Ph.D. Dissertation, University of California, Los Angles, 1975, 241.
Terry Allen, Timurid Herat (Wiesbaden: LRV, 1983), 15.
Abd al-Rahman Jami, Masnavi-i Haft Awrang, ed. M. Mudarris Gilani (Tehran: Sa’di, 1958), 331; Salaman va Absal, edited and introduced by Muhammad Rawshan (Tehran: Asatir, 1994), 118.
Ibid., 341.
Jami, Salaman and Absal, trans. Edward Fitzgerald, edited and with a literal prose translation by A. J. Arberry (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1956), 174–75.
J. C. Bürgel, “The Romance,” in Persian Literature, no. 3, Ehsan Yarshater, ed. (New York: Bibliotheca Persica, 1988), pp. 175–77. See also note number 7.
Hadland F. Davis, Wisdom of the East: The Persian Mystics, Jami (London: John Murry, 1908), 23.
For more information on women in Islam see, Amina Wadud, Qur’an and Woman: Rereading the Sacred Text From a Woman’s Perspective (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999); Anwar Hekmat, Women and the Koran: The Status of Women in Islam (Amherst, N.Y.: Prometheus Books, 1997); Haiden Moghissi, Feminism and Islamic Fundamentalism: The Limits of Postmodern Analysis (London; New York: Zed Books, 1999); Fatima Mernissi, Women and Islam: An Historical and Theological Enquiry. Trans. Mary Jo Lakeland (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1991); and M. E. Combs-Schilling, Sacred Performances: Islam, Sexuality, and Sacrifice (New York: Columbia University Press, 1989).
Fatima Mernissi, Women and Islam: An Historical and Theological Enquiry. Trans. Mary Jo Lakeland (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1991), viii, 126, and 128.
Abd al-Rahman, Jami, Silsalat-al-zahab (Golden Chain) in the collection Masnavi-i Haft Awrang (Tehran: Kitabfurushi-i Sa’di, 1972).
Gulam Husayn Yusufi, Chishmih-yi rowshan (Tehran: Ilmi, 1970), 269–78.
Abdelwahab Bouhdiba, Sexuality in Islam (London: Saqi Books, 1998), 30.
J. W. Wright, Jr. and Everett K. Rowson, Homoeroticism in Classical Arabic Literature (New York: Columbia University Press, 1997), xv.
Ibid., xv and 3.
Gayane Karen Merguerian and Afsaneh Najmabadi, “Zolaykha and Yusof: Whose ‘Best Story’?” International Journal of Middle East Studies, 29, no. 4 (November 1997), 485–508.
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© 2000 Kamran Talattof and Jerome W. Clinton
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Talattof, K. (2000). Nizami’s Unlikely Heroines: A Study of the Characterizations of Women in Classical Persian Literature. In: Talattof, K., Clinton, J.W. (eds) The Poetry of Nizami Ganjavi: Knowledge, Love, and Rhetoric. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-137-09836-8_4
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