Love and Devotion: From Persia and Beyond

About this book

Yusuf and Zulaykha. Khusrau and Shirin. Layla and Majnun. For hundreds of years Persian poets have captivated audiences with recitations and reinterpretations of timeless tales of earthly and spiritual love. These tales were treasured not only in Iran but also across the neighboring Mughal and Ottoman Empires. In Love and Devotion leading specialists in literature art history and philosophy reveal new perspectives on these evocative stories and the exquisite illustrated manuscripts that convey them. Particularly in courtly settings poetry was a key component of Persian cultural life from the fourteenth through the eighteenth century and elite patrons commissioned copies of lyrical poems and epics told in verse. Beautifully presented here in full-page reproductions are more than one hundred folios from these illustrated manuscripts representing masterful works from Hafiz Rumi and many others. Echoes of works by Persian poets are manifest across European literature from Dante and Shakespeare to the present and this lavishly illustrated book reveals new perspectives on the universal theme of love.