Nov 9, 2025
Jamal ad-Dīn Abū Muḥammad Ilyās ibn-Yūsuf ibn-Zakkī better known as Nizami is considered the greatest romantic epic poet in Persian literature. His love story of Layla and Majnun inspired the Eric Clapton hit record of 1970, “Layla” and there are monuments of Nizami as far as Beijing and Rome.
Oct 22, 2025
Farīd al-Dīn Abū Ḥamid Muḥammad ʿAṭṭār lived and died in Nishapur. Though he was little known beyond his city as a poet, his enduring legacy can perhaps be summarised by Rumi: Attar has roamed through the seven cities of love while we have barely turned down the first street.
(1) Attar was born in Nishapur...
Sep 27, 2025
Hakim Abul-Majd Majdūd ibn Ādam, better known as Sanai, was an influential poet of Sufism who was attached to the Ghaznavid court in modern day Afghanistan. His major work The Walled Garden of Truth has been an enduring classic. An adaption of his verses were quoted at the end of the 2017 Hollywood film The Shape...
May 24, 2025
Writing to his brother from prison in 1949, a young African American man opens his letter citing these lines from a medieval Persian poet:
Indeed the Idols I have loved so long,
Have done my credit in this World much Wrong:
Have dropped my Glory in a shallow Cup,
And sold my Reputation for a song
The writer would later...
Apr 6, 2025
Born 1004CE in present-day Tajikistan then under control of the Ghaznavid dynasty, Abū Muʿīn al-Dīn Nasir Khusraw was an Ismaili convert and missionary who became better known for his poetry.
To discuss with us today the life, works and legacy of Nasir Khusraw is Ali Hammoud. Ali Hammoud is a PhD candidate at...