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Persian Literature

Course instructor: Prashant Keshavmurthy

Course number: ISLA 388

Term: Winter 2016

Meets: 4:05 – 5:25, Wednesday and Friday

Location: SH688 1078 Office hours: Institute of Islamic Studies Office 311, Wednesday 2:00 – 3:00 or by appointment.

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Persian Literature (ISLA 388)

Course number: (ISLA 388) Term: Winter 2016 Meets: 4:05 – 5:25, Wednesday and Friday Location: Leacock 116, Course instructor: Prashant Keshavmurthy, Office hours: Institute of Islamic Studies Office 311, Wednesday 2:00 – 3:00 or by appointment.

Course goals: This course introduces students to major texts in classical (or pre-19th century) and modern Persian literature. We will read these texts with an attention to literary and conceptual topics that their authors and contemporaneous readers would themselves have attended to while also asking how our locations as twenty first century readers of medieval poems and modern fiction and poetry might serve as points of interpretative vantage and disadvantage. The course introduces major themes, lyric and narrative strategies and motifs from classical Persian literature and how Iranian literary modernism defines itself through a variety of appropriations of the classical Persian heritage among others.

Method of evaluation: While a varying portion of every class will be taken up by a lecture by the instructor, students will be called upon in pairs to make joint presentations of around 7 minutes each person at the beginning of every class on the readings of the week or fortnight. These 7 minutes class presentations along with meaningful participation in class discussions and mandatory weekly attendance will account for 30% of your final grade. The mid-term paper will account for another 30% and the final essay for the remaining 40% of your final grade.

Deadlines: The deadline for the mid-term essay (of 5 to 7 double-spaced pages interpreting a topic chosen in consultation with the instructor) is February 14th. The deadline for the final essay (of the same length but on different topic, also chosen in consultation with the instructor) is April 25th.

Topics for the mid-term paper and final essay must be devised in consultation with the instructor and will be judged for coherence of over-all argument, interpretative insight and grammatical correctness. Your weekly readings for this course will range between 90 to 100 pages per week with the exception of Zoya Pirzad’s

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Things We Left Unsaid which is 334 pages long and Iraj Pezeshkzad’s My Uncle Napoleon: a Novel which is 499 pages long. Both must be read in their entirety. Students will be expected to come to class on time and attend every class having read the week’s assignments.

Texts to be purchased: if you do not already possess the following texts, you may buy them from the McGill University bookstore: 1. Farid ud-din Attār, The Conference of the Birds; translated by Dick Davis and Afkham Darbandi (Penguin Classics, 2011) 2. Jalāl al-Din Rūmi, The Masnavi: Book 1; translated by Jawid Mojadeddi (Oxford University Press, USA, 2008) 3. Abolqāsem Ferdowsi, Shāhnāmeh: the Persian Book of Kings; translated from the Persian by Dick Davis (Penguin Classics, 2007) 4. Obeyd Zākāni, Ethics of the Aristocrats and Other Satirical Works; edited and translated by Hasan Javadi (Washington D.C: Mage Publishers, 2008). 5. Shahrnoush Parsipour, Women Without Men: a Novel of Modern Iran; translated by Kamran Talattof and Joycelyn Sharlet (New York City: The Feminist Press, 2004) 5. Zoya Pirzad, Things We Left Unsaid; translated by Franklin Lewis (Oneworld Publishers, 2011).

Weekly readings:

Fri. Jan 8: a brief introduction to the aims and methods of this course as well as a discussion of the readings and criteria of evaluation. You will also choose readings that you would like to present in class.

Wed. Jan. 13: a) Shams-i Qays-i Rāzi, Conclusion to Al-Mu’jam fi ma’āyir ash’ār al-‘ajam (Compendium on the Rules of Poetry in the Persian East, circa 1258, Iran, Central Asia), translated by Jerome Clinton; b) A selection of short poetics texts by Abdullāh Rūdaki (d. 941 C.E., Bukhara, Samarqand) who is considered the earliest major poet in New Persian; translated by Sasan Tabatabai (Purdue U Press, 2008); and c) “An Account of Autumn and in Praise of Aḥmad bin Abdus Samad, Vizier of Sultan Mas‘ūd” by Manūchheri of Dāmghān (d. 1040, Dāmghān), a master of the sub-genre of the panegyric/qasidah called “the wine panegyric”/khamriyya; my translation. I will send you PDFs of these texts.

Fri. Jan. 15: Selection of ghazals by Hāfiz (d. 1390, Shiraz) and my translation of a 17th century Sufi commentary on a famous couplet by Hāfiz. I will send you PDFs of these texts.

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Wed. Jan. 20: Shaykh Muslihuddin Sa‘di, Translator’s Preface, Sa‘di’s Prologue and Chapters 7 and 8 from his Gulistān (The Rose Garden, 1258 C.E., Shiraz). I will send you PDFs of these sections.

Fri. Jan. 22 & 2 Wed. Jan. 27 & Fri. Jan. 29 & Wed. Feb. 3: Farīd al-Dīn ‘Aṭṭār (d. 1221, Nishapur, Iran), The Conference of the Birds; translated by Dick Davis and Afkham Darbandi (Penguin, 1984).

Fri. Feb. 5: THIS CLASS IS CANCELLED AS I WILL BE AWAY FROM MONTREAL FOR A CONFERENCE.

Wed. Feb. 10: Selections (to be specified) from Jalāl al-Din Rūmi (d. 1273, Central Asia), The Masnavi: Book 1; translated by Jawid Mojadeddi (Oxford University Press: 2008).

Fri. Feb. 12 & 2 Wed. Feb. 17: Sufi discourses on the ethics of listening to music by Ali Hujwiri (d. 1073 – 1077, Lahore), Kashf al-mahjūb (The Unveiling of the Veiled); translated by RA Nicholson (Gibb Memorial Trust, 2014); Yāhyā Maneri (d. 1381, Maner, North India), Maktūbāt-i sadi (The Hundred Letters); translated by Paul Jackson (Paulist Press, 1979). I will send you PDFs of these readings.

Fri. Feb. 19 & Wed. Feb. 24 & Fri. Mar. 2 & Wed. Mar. 9: Farīd al-Dīn ‘Aṭṭār, (selections from) Memorial of God’s Friends: Lives and Sayings of Sufis; trans. Paul E. Losensky (Paulist Press, 2009).

Fri. Mar. 11: Selections to be specified from Abolqāsem Ferdowsi (d. 1019 – 1025, Ghazna, present-day Afghanistan), Shāhnāmeh: the Persian Book of Kings; translated from the Persian by Dick Davis (Penguin, 2008).

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Wed. Mar. 16: a) Obeyd-i Zākāni (d. 1370, Shiraz, Qazvin), Ethics of the Aristocrats and Other Satirical Works; edited and translated by Hasan Javadi (Washington D.C: Mage Publishers, 2008); b) Paul Sprachman, “Introduction” to Suppressed Persian: An Anthology of Forbidden Literature (Mazda: Costa Mesa, 1995).

Fri. Mar. 18: Forugh Farrokhzad, Sin: Selected Poems of Forugh Farrokhzad, translated by Sholeh Wolpe (University of Arkansas Press, 2010). I will send you PDFs of the selected poems.

Wed. Mar. 23 & Wed. Mar. 30: Shahrnoush Parsipour, Women Without Men: a Novel of Modern Iran; translated by Kamran Talattof and Joycelyn Sharlet (New York City: The Feminist Press, 2004).

Wed. April 6 & Fri. April 8: Zoya Pirzad, Things We Left Unsaid; translated by Franklin Lewis (Oneworld Publishers, 2011).

Wed. April 13 & Fri. April 15: Selections to be specified from Stories from Iran, 1921 – 1991: A Chicago Anthology; edited by Hashmat Moayyad. I will send you PDFs of the selected stories.

McGill Policy Statement

McGill University values academic integrity. Therefore, all students must understand the meaning and consequences of cheating, plagiarism and other academic offences under the Code of Student Conduct and Disciplinary Procedures (see www.mcgill.ca/students/srr/honest/ for more information).(approved by Senate on 29 January 2003)

L'université McGill attache une haute importance à l’honnêteté académique. Il incombe par conséquent à tous les étudiants de comprendre ce que l'on entend par tricherie, plagiat et autres infractions académiques, ainsi que les conséquences que peuvent avoir de telles actions, selon le Code de conduite de l'étudiant et des procédures disciplinaires (pour de plus amples renseignements, veuillez consulter le site www.mcgill.ca/students/srr/honest/).

In accord with McGill University’s Charter of Students’ Rights, students in this course have the right to submit in English or in French any written work that is to be graded.

Conformément à la Charte des droits de l’étudiant de l’Université McGill, chaque étudiant a le droit de soumettre en français ou en anglais tout travail écrit devant être noté (sauf dans le cas des cours dont l’un des objets est la maîtrise d’une langue).