Literary History of Persia
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| The Drama.
The only indigenous form of drama is that connected with the Muḥarram mournings, the so-called “Passion Plays” discussed in a previous chapter824, and even in their case it is not certain that they owe nothing to European influence. Three at least of Molière’s plays (Le Médecin malgré lui, Le Misanthrope, and another entitled The Ass, which I think must be intended for L’Étourdi) have appeared in Persian translations, but are seldom met with, and seem never to have attained any great popularity. I possess only Le Misanthrope, printed at Constantinople in the Taṣwíru’l-Afkár Press in 1286/1860-70. The title is rendered as Guzárish-i-Mardum-guríz (“the Adventure of him who fled from mankind”), the characters are Persianized, and the text is in verse and follows the original very closely, though occasionally Persian idioms or proverbs are substituted for French. Here, for instance, is the rendering — in this case a paraphrase — of the “Vieille chanson” in Act I,- Scene 2: “Si le roi m’avait donné Paris, sa grand’ ville, Et qu’il me fallût quitter L’amour de ma mie, Je dirais au roi Henri ‘Reprenez votre Paris, J’aime mieux ma mie, o gail J’aime mieux ma mie!” [page 460] 
The following Persian version of Act II, Scene 7, if compared with the original, will give a fair idea of the translator’s method. The characters are Mú’nis (Alceste), Fatína (Célimène), Laylá (Éliante), Náṣiḥ (Acaste), Na’ím Beg (Philinte) and Farrásh (un garde de la Maréchaussée): 
[page 461] 
[page 462] No indication of the translator’s identity appears on the title-page of my edition, nor is there any prefatory matter. Curiously enough, in the very same year in which this Persian version of Le Misanthrope was published (1286/1869-70) Aḥmed Vefíq (Aḥmad Wafíq) Pasha printed his Turkish translations of George Dandin, Le Médecin malgré lui, and Le Mariage Forcé825, while Tartufe appeared in Turkish somewhat later826. In 1291/1874 there was lithographed in Ṭihrán a volume containing seven Persian plays with an Introduction on the educational value of the stage by Mírzá Ja‘far Qarája-dághí. These plays were originally written in Ádharbáyjání Turkish by Mírzá Fatḥ-‘Alí Darbandí, and were published in Tiflís about A.D. 1861. Five of them have been republished in Europe, with glossaries, notes and in some cases translations. These are (1) the Wazír of Lankurán, text, translation, vocabulary and notes, by W. H. D. Haggard and G. le Strange (London, 1882); (2) Trois Comédies traduites du dialecte Turc Azeri en Persan et publiées... avec un glossaire et des notes par C. Barbier de Meynard et S. Guyard (Paris, 1886); (3) Monsieur Jourdan, with translation, notes, etc. Edited by A. Wahrmund (Vienna and Leipzig, 1889). The three comedies contained in No. 2 are the “Thief-catching Bear” (Khirs-i-qúldúr-básán), “the Advocates” (Wukalá-yi-Muráfa‘a), and “the Alchemist” (Mullá Ibráhím Khalíl-i-Kímiyá-gar). The two remaining plays, hitherto unpublished in Europe, are “the Miser” (Mard-i-Khasís) and “Yúsuf Sháh the Saddler827.” [page 463] Three more plays, written at a date unknown to me, by the late Prince Malkom Khán, formerly Persian Minister in London, were partly published as a feuilleton (pá-waraq) in the Tabríz newspaper Ittiḥád (“Union”) in 1326/1908. A complete edition, from a copy in the library of Dr F. Rosen, the well-known scholarly German diplomatist, was published in 1340/1921-2 by the “Kaviani” Press in Berlin. These plays are (1) the “Adventures of Ashraf Khán, Governor of ‘Arabistán, during his sojourn in Ṭihrán in 1232/1817”; (2) the “Methods of Government of Zamán Khán of Burújird,” placed in the year 1236/1820-1; and (3) “Sháh-qulí Mírzá goes to Karbalá and spends some days at Kirmánsháh with the Governor Sháh Murád Mírzá.” Finally in 1326/1908 there appeared at Ṭihrán a bi-weekly newspaper called “the Theatre” (Tiyátr) which published plays satirizing the autocratic régime. I possess only a few numbers, containing part of a play entitled “Shaykh ‘Alí Mírzá, Governor of Maláyir and Túlysirkán, and his marriage with the daughter of the King of the Fairies.” These are all the Persian plays I have met with828. All are comedies, and all are satires on the administrative or social conditions of Persia. In the “Wazír of Lankurán” a rather weak and common-place love-story is combined with the satire, but generally speaking this element is lacking, and the object of the writer is simply to arouse dislike and contempt for the old-fashioned methods of government. In other words, these productions, like the “Travels of Ibráhím Beg,” of which we shall shortly have [page 464] to speak, are primarily political pamphlets rather than plays. Hardly one of them has ever been acted on the stage, and none has produced an effect comparable to Kemál Bey’s Turkish play Waṭan, yakhod Silistra829. In short the drama has not succeeded in establishing itself in Persia even to the extent which it has done in Turkey. The Novel. Of stories after the style of the “Arabian Nights” or the more popular and indigenous “Ḥusayn the Kurd” there is in Persia no end, but of the novel properly so called there is even less to be said than of the drama. Two rather ambitious attempts in this direction have recently come under my notice, and it is characteristic of recent tendencies to glorify Zoroastrian Persia that both of them deal with pre-Islamic times, the one with Cyrus, the other with Qubád and his son and successor Anúsharwán (Núshírwán) and the heresiarch Mazdak. The former (or rather the first volume of it, which, to judge by the colophon, was intended to be followed by two more volumes) was completed in 1334/1916, and printed at Hamadán in 1337/1919. It is entitled “Love and Lordship” (‘Ishq u Salṭanat), and was written by a certain Shaykh Músá, Director of the “Nuṣrat” Government College at Hamadán, who was good enough to send me a copy in January, 1920. It is described in the colophon as “the first novel (roman) composed in Persia in the Western fashion”: 
[page 465] It aims at being a historical novel, but the proper names generally have their French, not their Old Persian, forms, e.g. “Mítrádát” (correctly explained as Mihr-dád), “Akbátán” (Ecbatana, instead of Hagmatána, for Hamadán), “Agrádát,” “Ispákú (Spako)” and “Siyákzar”“ (Cyaxares, for Huvakhshatara), though Cambyses (Kambújiya) takes the intermediate form “Kámbúziyá.” The lengthy descriptions of the scenes and persons introduced into the story, and the numerous dialogues are evidently copied from European models. The story itself, into which an element of love as well as of war is introduced, is readable if not very thrilling, but is overloaded with dates, archaeological and mythological notes, and prolix historical dissertations ultimately based for the most part on the statements of Herodotus mixed with information derived from the Avesta. There is no attempt to make use of archaic language or to eschew the use of Arabic words, but the author has at any rate avoided glaring anachronisms. The following short extract (p. 247) from the description of the preparations for the marriage of Cyrus will suffice to show how far removed is the style of this book from that of the type of story hitherto current in Persia: 
“Yes! These preparations are the preparations for a wedding, and I do not think that it can be the wedding of anyone else than Cyrus, the mighty King of Persia and Media, for today none but he commands in so great a measure the affection of the people of Ecbatana, so that they regard his wedding as a great festival, and have decorated the bazaars, and from the bottom of their hearts make manifest their joy and gladness.” [page 466] I do not know what measure of success this “historical novel” has achieved in Persia, nor did I ever meet with more than the one copy sent me by the author, accompanied by a letter dated 4 Ṣafar, 1338 (Oct. 30, 1919), in which he requested me to review it in the Times. I hope he will accept this brief notice as the best I can do to make his book known in Europe as a praiseworthy attempt to instruct while entertaining his countrymen, and to introduce a literary form hitherto unknown in Persia. The second of the two historical novels mentioned above was printed at Bombay in 1339/1920-1, was written by Ṣan‘atí-záda of Kirmán, and is entitled “the Ensnarers: or the Avengers of Mazdak830.” Like the last it is incomplete, for it ends (on p. 110) with the words “here ends the first volume,” though how many more the author intended to add does not appear, nor do I know whether any further instalment was actually published. In general style it much resembles “Love and Lordship,” but presents more archaeological errors, as, for instance, where (p. 10) a portrait of the Sásánian king Bahrám Gúr is described as bearing a label written in the cuneiform character (khaṭṭ-i-míkhí)! Before leaving this subject I must at least mention a Persian translation of three episodes in the career of the immortal Sherlock Holmes, translated from a Russian version by Mír Isma‘íl ‘Abdu’lláh-záda, and printed at the Khurshíd Press in Ṭihrán in 1323/1905-6. They are entitled respectively the “Episode of the Gold Spectacles,” the “Account of Charles Augustus Milverton831,” and “the Village Lords.” Holmes in passing through a Russian medium has been transmuted into “Khums”  or “Khúmis”  : Dr Watson
[page 467] has been more fortunate. The adventures are narrated in the simplest possible style, and would form an admirable reading-book for beginners in Persian, if the book were obtainable in any quantity, which is unlikely. In Turkey Sherlock Holmes had an enormous success, and I remember a news-vendor on one of the Bosphorus steamers offering me a Turkish version of the “Engineer’s Thumb,” while the late Sulṭán ‘Abdu’l-Ḥamíd was said to entertain the greatest admiration for Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and to desire above all things to put him in charge of his Secret Police. It is hard to say whether Ḥájji Zaynu’l-‘Ábidín of Marágha’s fictitious “Travels (Siyáḥat-náma) of Ibráhím Beg,” which, according to Mírzá Muḥammad ‘Alí Khán “Tarbiyat832,” had an appreciable effect in precipitating the Persian Revolution of A.D. 1905-6, should be reckoned as a novel or not. The hero and his adventures are, of course, fictitious, but there is little exaggeration, and they might well be actual. The book is a bitter satire on Persian methods of government and social conditions, which are depicted in the most sombre colours, with the definite object of arousing discontent in order to bring about reform. The Persians are very sensitive to ridicule, but on the whole bear it much better than most European nations, and most Persian reformers have made extensive use of satire as a means of promoting their objects. This Siyáḥat-náma is well and powerfully written in a simple yet forcible style, and I know of no better [page 468] reading-book for the student who wishes to obtain a good knowledge of the current speech and a general, if somewhat lurid, idea of the country. In this connection mention should also be made of the Persian translation made by the talented and unfortunate Ḥájji Shaykh Aḥmad “Rúḥí” of Kirmán of Morier’s Ḥájji Bábá, published by Colonel D. C. Phillott at Calcutta in 1905833. This book, like the last, is a clever satire on the Persians, the more remarkable as being the work of a foreigner; but it belongs rather to the domain of English than Persian literature. All that I had to say about it is contained in the Introduction (pp. ix-xxiii) which I contributed to the edition published by Messrs Methuen in 1895, and all that need be said about the Persian translator and his work has been well said by Colonel Phillott in his Introduction to the Persian text. The Press. Of Persian journalism, which has been the most powerful modernizing influence in Persia, I have treated so fully in a previous monograph on the subject834 that little need be said here, save by way of summary. Printing was introduced into Persia about a century ago by ‘Abbás Mírzá, and the first Persian newspaper appeared about A.D. 1851, in the third year of Náṣiru’d-Dín Sháh’s reign. It was soon followed by others, but these early news-sheets, issued by the Government, were entirely colourless, and even when I was in Persia in 1887-8 the only Persian newspaper worth reading was the Akhtar (“Star”), published weekly at Constantinople. It was founded in 1875, and lasted about twenty years. Prince Malkom Khán’s Qánún (“Law”) [page 469] appeared in 1890 and was printed and published in London, but in consequence of its violent attacks on the Persian Government, the Sháh, and his Ministers, its circulation in Persia was prohibited. The Calcutta Ḥablu’l-Matín first appeared in 1893, the Thurayyá (“Pleiades”) in Cairo in 1898, and the Parwarish, which replaced it, in 1900. These were the most important Persian papers published outside Persia, and it was not until 1907, when the Revolution was an accomplished fact, and the conflict between King and Parliament was at its height, that independent and influential newspapers began to appear in Persia itself Amongst the most interesting of these from a literary point of view I should place the Ṣúr-i-Isráfíl (“Trumpet of Isráfíl” — the Angel of the Resurrection), the Nasím-i-Shimál (“Breeze of the North”), the Muṣáwát (“Equality”), and the Naw Bahár (“Early Spring”). The first, second, and fourth of these supplied me with many fine poems from the pens of Dakhaw, Sayyid Ashraf of Gílán, and Bahár of Mashhad, for my Press and Poetry in Modern Persia, but the Charand-parand (“Charivari”) column of the Ṣúr-i-Isráfíl also contained some excellent and original prose writing of which I shall now give two specimens, since they are unlike anything else which I have met with in Persian. Both are by Dakhaw: the first appeared in No. 1 of the Ṣúr-i-Isráfíl (May 30, 1907); the second in No. 2 (June 6, 1907). 
[page 470] 
[page 471] 
[page 472] 
Translation. “After several years travelling in India, seeing the invisible saints835, and acquiring skill in Alchemy, Talismans and Necromancy836, thank God, I have succeeded in a great experiment; no less than a method for curing the opium-habit! If any one in any foreign country had made such a discovery, he would certainly have received decorations and rich rewards, and his name would have been mentioned with honour in all the newspapers. But what can one do, since in Persia no one recognizes merit? “Custom is a second nature, and as soon as one becomes habituated to any act, one cannot easily abandon it. The only curative method is to reduce it gradually by some special procedure, until it is entirely forgotten. “To all my zealous, opium-eating, Muslim brethren I now proclaim the possibility of breaking the opium-habit, thus. First, they must be firmly determined and resolved on abandoning it. Secondly, one who, for example, eats two mithqáls837 of opium daily should every day diminish this dose by a grain (nukhúd) and add two grains of morphine
“Moreover great and eminent men who wish to make people forget some evil habit act in precisely this way. See, for example, how well indeed the poet says that intelligence and fortune are closely connected with one another. For example, when our great men consider that the people are poor and cannot eat wheaten bread, and that the peasant must spend all his life in cultivating wheat, yet must himself remain hungry, see what they do. “On the first day of the year they bake the bread with pure wheat-flour. On the second day in every hundredweight (kharwár) they put a maund of bitter apricot stones, barley, fennel-flower, sawdust, lucerne, sand — I put it shortly as an illustration — clods, brick-bats and bullets of eight mithqáls. It is evident that in a hundredweight of corn, which is a hundred maunds, one maund of these things will not be noticed. On the second day they put in two maunds, on the third three, and after a hundred days, which is three months and ten days, a hundred maunds of wheat-flour have become a hundred maunds of bitter apricot stones, barley, fennel-flower, sawdust, chaff, lucerne and sand, and that in such fashion that no one has noticed it, while the wheaten bread habit has entirely passed out of men’s minds. “In truth intelligence and fortune are closely connected with one another! “O my zealous, opium-eating brethren! Assuredly you know that man is a little world, and has the closest resemblance to the great world; that is to say, for example, that whatever is possible for man may happen also in the case of animals, trees, stones, clods, doors,
“For example, the late mujtahid Ḥájji Shaykh Hádí839 built a hospital and settled on it certain endowments so that eleven sick persons might always be there. So long as Ḥájji Shaykh Hádí was alive the hospital was accustomed to receive eleven patients. But as soon as Ḥájji Shaykh Hádí departed this life, the students of the college said to his eldest son, ‘We will recognize you as the Master only when you spend the hospital endowments on us!’ See now what this worthy eldest son did by dint of knowledge. In the first month he reduced the number of patients by one, in the second by two, in the third by three, in the fourth by four ; and so in like fashion until the present time, when the number of patients has been reduced to five, and gradually, by this excellent device, these few also will disappear in the course of the next five months. See then how by wise management it is possible to expel habit from the minds of every one and every thing, so that a hospital which was accustomed to eleven patients has entirely forgotten this habit without falling ill. Why? Because it also forms part of the macrocosm, so that it is possible to drive a habit out of its mind, just as in the case of man, who is the microcosm.” “Dakhaw.”
“In old days you used sometimes to be a help to people: if any difficulty befel your friends, you used to solve it. Latterly, there being no sign or sound of you, I kept telling myself that perhaps you too had taken to opium and were lolling841 at the foot of the brazier in the corner of the room. Now don’t tell me that842 you, you queer mug843, quietly, without any one’s knowledge (I do not know whether in order to study Alchemy, Talismans and Necromancy, as you have written in the Ṣúr-i-Isráfíl) have cut and run to India. Surely then you have found the key to a treasure also! At any rate, if I have entertained an unworthy suspicion of you, you must [page 479] forgive me: I ask your pardon! Anyhow, praise be to God, you have got safely back, a lasting cause of thankfulness, for you have come at just the right moment, seeing that affairs are all topsy-turvy. “May God forgive everybody’s departed friends844! May the earth not whisper it to him! In Qáqázán we had a certain Mullá Ínak-‘Alí845, a rawḍa-khwán846 and a very impudent fellow. Whatever may be the case now, he was at that time very thick with me. When he went to recite a rawḍa, he used first of all to put forward a long-winded prologue. He used to say (saving your presence)847, ‘In this way the matter will be more ass-plain’ (no need to quarrel over a mere illustration). It occurs to me that it would not be a bad thing if I too were to begin with a prologue for you, simply in order that you may get the hang of the matter. “In olden days there was in the world one great Persian Empire with the State of Greece as its neighbour. At that time the Persian Empire was puffed up with pride848. It was very well pleased with itself, and, if you will pardon the expression, its pipe took a lot of filling849. Its ambition was the King-of- Kingship of the world. Yes, there was then in Persia no ‘King’s Darling,’ ‘State’s Sweetheart,’ ‘Pet of the Province,’ ‘Beauty of the Privy Chamber,’ ‘Charmer of the Presence,’ or ‘Minion of the Kingdom850.’ Nor had they yet made ‘slides’ in their palaces851. Nor did the Mullás of that time include a ‘Club of the Canon Law,’ ‘Chamberlain of the Canon Law,’ or ‘Park of the Canon Law.’ At that time, in short, there did not exist a ‘Carriage of Islám,’ ‘Table
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