Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies
Subject: The reception of the epic poem Shah-Nama ("The Book of Kings") in Iran, Tajikistan and among Iranian immigrants and exiles in the United States and Europe in the 20th century until present days.
Supervisor: Dr. Julia Rubanovich
Abstract: In my doctoral thesis, I investigate the reception methods of the epic poem Shāh-nāma ("The Book of Kings") in Iran, Tajikistan and among Iranian immigrants and exiles in the United States and Europe in the 20th century until present days. The poem, composed in Persian language by the poet Abu al-Qasim Firdausī (c. 1020-940), unfolds through a multitude of stories and characters the mythical, legendary and historical past of the Iranian people, from the beginning of time to the end of the Sasanian Empire (224-651) by the Arab-Muslim conquerors. In the course of time, the Shāh-nāma established itself as a canonical work in the Persian-speaking cultural space, with its stories spread in diverse forms both in courtly milieus and in popular literature. Later, with the rise of nationalism, the Shāh-nāma was perceived as the Iranian national epic, essential for building national identities and preserving collective memory both in Iran and abroad. Moreover, in modern times, despite its formal and conceptual archaism, the epic poem began to be used as a tool to promote political interests of various social groups. In this study, I will research the acceptance of the Shāh-nāma in four historical contexts: (1) under the Pahlavi dynasty (1925-1979) in Iran, which made extensive use of the Shāh-nāma to promote its secular and anti-Arab monarchist agenda; (2) under the theocratic regime of the Islamic Republic since 1979 which is characterized by extreme fluctuations in relation to Perdusi's work; (3) by the Persian-speaking opponents of the Islamic Republic in Iran and the Diaspora; (4) in the Republic of Tajikistan, both Soviet and post-Soviet. In each of these contexts, the epic was subject to biased reading and selective interpretation for various purposes, whether in order to present Islam as an idea brought by Arab conquerors which shadowed the light of Iranian civilization, or whether to emphasize the pre-Islamic past to prove the age-old presence of the Iranian component in Central Asia.
MA Honors 2020/21