Lecture by: Mr. Nosrat-allah Nooh
Topic: Evolution of Persian Poetry
Sallam,
Once again Doreh will have the pleasure of enjoying the most precious Iranian scholars around on October 19th. I am honored to announce that Mr. Nooh accpeted our invitation, bA Aghooshe bAz! :-) Mr. Nooh will talk about the evolution of Persian poetry from Roodaki to Nima. He will introduce the great players in history of Persian poetry.If time allows he will go over some Tanz as well.
Please find Fariba Mehranfar's email on Mr. Nooh's biography. I will be hosting doreh for this event. See directions below. Your RSVP by tuesday the 17th is appriciated:-) See directions below. Please be there at 7:30.
Please read the following notes from last week's doreh. Mansoor has done a great job summarizing Mr. Nooh's talk. Thank you much Mansoor. (I like the comments! :-)
If you wish to purchase Mr. Nooh's books ("Tanz dar zabane Farsi" or "Ahangar collection" let me know). Also as some of you know, he teaches 'Hafez' class on tuesdays. I can give you his number if you're interestd.
And lastly, H.A. Sayeh (hooshang ebtehaj) will be in San Jose State dept of Engineering (don't know the room#) this thursday.
Thx,Mr. Nooh, as usual dazzled us with his presence of mind and reciting many poems from memory (az bar). He began with our favorite topic, the Arab invasion...
After the Arab invasion, Persian poetry and literature in general remained unchanged. This was primarily attributed to fragmentation in the society and a non homogenous community. Zarin-koob in his book "Do gharn sokoot (Two centuries of Silence)" amplifies on this issue.
Persian poetry begins a revitalization era with emergence of Roodaki who is known as the father of Persian poetry. Others such as Farokhi SystAni and Asjodi follow his foot steps. Then we have a major one, a real biggy. Yes my friends, Ferdosi (aka Ben Mahjoor's favorite). Ferdosi spent 30 years on ShahnAmeh which indeed gave a new identity to the Persian poetry. This great peice of work could be contrasted with works of Onsori which was merely in praise of kings.
Within the same time period, Manuchehri appears who brings a new style to poetry. Before him the poetry style was either Masnavi or Ghaseedeh. Manuchehri brings about what is referred to as Mosamat.
Kheezid 'O khaz Areed ke' hengAme' khazAn ast
bAde' khonak az jAnebe' khArazm vazAn ast
MolAnA (aka Molavi) is the next poet initiating a new style of MostazAd. This is essentially one long mesra' (half a bait) followed by a short one. Molavi is also very well known for his masnavi and tasavof. After Molavi, poetry did not change much. Most of the poets efforts was on the meaning of poems rather than new styles. There were many but the two deserving mention are Hafez and Saddi. Hafez did not institute a new style, however, he was able to write his poems w/ such meaning unparalled by anyone before or after his time. Following Hafez, once again everything goes to 'dandeh khalAs'. There was not much innovation untill Safavid dynasty.
In this era Hendi style emerges which is stating an idea in one mesra' and reaffirming it in the second. This style was created by Iranian poets who were fed up w/ political times and had fled to India. This style in time degraded producing what some consider as meaningless poetry. Toward the end of Safavi dynasty, Kourosh's (IIT) buddies in EsfAhan went back to the old style. What can I say, you can't beat the classics.
Then we had the Mashrooteh era. There was Ali Akbar SAber followed by DehkhodA and Naseem ShomAl (Remember this is GhAjar time, from NAser addin shah down to that little chunky one Ahmad). They were followed by some other heavy weighters like Iraj Mirza, Farokhi, Malek O Shoa'rA BahAr, EhsAn Tabari, etc... Most of these poets were pursing a different message. It was not ErfAn or necessarily poetic description of nature, but rather had a message for the populace (she'r mardomi, w/ apologies this is my own anecdote).
Then came Pahlavi dynasty and according to Mr. Nooh, once again silence. However, Nima was not so silent at home. In fact he was quite busy creating a new style. Known as the father of new poetry (in France we call him papa neo-poetic), Nima changed the length of mesra's while maintaining the old rhythms (OzAn Aroozi). Eventhough Nima did not create masterpieces in this style, he however paved the way for his pupils: Mehdi AkhavAn SAles, ShAmloo, SAyeh (by the way his coming here), Nosrat RahmAni, .... It was AkhavAn SAles who was able to use this style effectively and also brought out the similarities between the old and new styles.
On the Tanz side from Mashrooteh onward, we could mention SAberi, Baseem Shomal, AbutorAb Jali, GholAm-Reza Rohani, Tavaloli, Sangesari, AfrAshteh, and of course myself.
We all enjoyed Mr. Nooh's interesting examples. If you are interested in learning more, he has written a book on the subject matter which makes for some exciting reading.
Bedrood
Monshi
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