Ferdowsi's Shahnameh...

[rjones2818]

The deluxe paperback edition is now available from Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/Shahnameh-Classic ... F8&s=books

This contains one of the versions of the Persian Alexander Romance. I've read that segment and is wonderful.

[marcus]

The deluxe paperback edition is now available from Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/Shahnameh-Classic ... F8&s=books

This contains one of the versions of the Persian Alexander Romance. I've read that segment and is wonderful.

Aha! Thanks for this link. I've been wondering if I'd be able to get any of the Persian stuff for a while (although I confess I was hardly "searching") ... this could do the trick!

ATB

[rjones2818]

[marcus]

A good reminder!

ATB

[amyntoros]

My copy arrived last week and I’ve finally found the time to read the chapters on Alexander. It IS beautiful, but had hoped for more evidence of Persian influence in this Alexander Romance. There's less than I expected. . .

It is believed that Ferdowsi used both written and oral sources for his poem, but Dick Davis in his introduction is of the opinion that “For the later section of the poem (from the advent of Sekandar – Alexander the Great – onwards ) he certainly utilized mainly and perhaps exclusively written sources , some of which still exist …” I see his point, for as far as Alexander is concerned the majority of the poem reproduces stories from the Greek Alexander Romance. There are some differences, of course; in this version Alexander is born of Filqus’ (Philip’s) daughter and the Persian king, Darab - the marriage results in an alliance with Greece and the payment of tribute to Persia! Next we have the tale of the daughter’s foul breath, and how, by the time she had taken a remedy in the form of an herb, Darab no longer loved her and sent her back to Filqus in Greece. The daughter, however, was pregnant but told no one ... and when Alexander was born, Filqus "claimed him as his own." (Poor Philip; he never seems to be able to get credit for his own son.)

All references to the other Macedonian characters from the early version of the Greek Romance are missing, and the story moves quickly to Alexander’s invasion of Persia. There’s a tale of Alexander acting as his own envoy (which is repeated later on); then the three defeats of Dara (Darius), son of Darab. Dara, although unaware of it, is of course a half-brother of Sekander. Then, after the defeat and the death of Dara, the mostly familiar stories of the western Medieval Romance appear.

Davis has chosen to use prose rather than rhyming couplets, although he inserts portions of rhyme every so often - often enough to make me want to find a version completely translated in rhyme! However, the language in this book is delightful in either instance. Here’s the first battle between Dara and Alexander:

The son rose over the mountains and the land glowed like a golden lamp. Dara mustered the ranks of his army, which covered the earth like a pitch-black cloak. He led his men, more numerous than blades of grass, across the Euphrates, and when Sekander heard of their approach, he had the war drums sounded and his troops prepared. The two hosts could not be counted, but in all the world there was only one Sekander. Dust loomed over the scene like a mountain, and the whole plain seemed a seething sea of weapons and warriors, of armor and Indian daggers, of war horses and barding. On each side the troops were drawn up, and the sun flashed on their swords. In the vanguard were the war elephants, and behind them the cavalry, men who had renounced all love of life. The very air seemed to cry out for blood, the land to groan with the warrior’s battle cries, the mountains to shake with the din of trumpets and Indian chimes. The horses’ neighing and the combatants’ shouts, the crashing of heavy maces on armor, all seemed to transform the plain to a mountain of warfare, and the air turned black with dust. For seven days the battle raged, and on the eighth a dust storm obscured the sun and blew against the blinded Persians, who fled from the battlefield. Sekandar’s men pursued them – the one host full of sorrow, the other of joy – back to the banks of the Euphrates, where innumerable Persians were killed. At first the Greek troops turned back from the river, but Sekandar ordered them across, and they entered the abandoned Persian camp in triumph.

Truly a “Romance” …