Nizami’s works became the model for subsequent romance literature

Nizami Ganjavi, one of the greatest romantic poets in Persian literature, was born in 1141 in Ganja, modern-day Azerbaijan and lived at a time of intense intellectual activity. Since he was not a court poet, his name does not appear in the records of the dynasties. A prominent poet acquainted with Arabic and Persian literature, he was also learned in mathematics, astronomy, medicine, botany, and the Qur’an.

Nizami composed qasidas and ghazals, only a small number of which have survived, but is best known for his five long narrative poems which have been preserved in a collection titled Khamsa (The Quintet). Written in masnavi style totalling 30,000 couplets, the Khamsa was a popular subject for lavish manuscripts. Three of the five works –  the romantic tale of Khusrau wa Shirin, the love story of Layla wa Majnun, and Haft Paykar (Seven Portraits) – were particularly inspirational for the generations of poets who followed. The other two works, Makhzanol-Asrar (The Storehouse of Mysteries) and Iskandarnama (The Book of Alexander) contain romantic  episodes but did not enter the canon of classic Persian love stories.

Khosrow wa Shirin is a fictional version of the story of the love of the Sassanian king Khosrow II (r. 590-628) for the Armenian princess Shirin who became his queen after a lengthy courtship strewn with difficulties including vanquishing his rival Farhad. Variants of the story were told under the title of Shirin and Farhad.

One of the best-known stories of Nizami’s Khamsa is that of Layla and Majnun, who met as school children and fell madly in love, but were forbidden to marry. Grief-stricken, Majnun retreated to the desert while Layla, in time, was married to a nobleman, but remained devoted to Majnun initiating several attempts to meet him. Eventually she died of a broken heart.

Nizami’s works in the Khamsa became the model for later poets of romance literature. In the late 1960s, Eric Clapton wrote his best-selling song Layla, inspired by the female beloved of Nizami’s story.* Azerbaijan’s celebrated composer Gara Garayev, wrote a ballet based on Nizami’s Haft Paykar.

References:
*Exhibition: Love and Devotion: From Persia and Beyond (Accessed September 2015)
Metropolitan Museum of Art (Accessed September 2015)
Nizami Ganjavi International Centre (Accessed September 2015)

Compiled by Nimira Dewji