S Bejan Baran

Persian New Poetry S Bejan Baran

This collection 8 songs and 50 poems by Nima Yushij, Ahmad Shamlu, Foruq Farrokhzad, Mehdi Akhavan Salless, Saeed Soltanpour, Ahmadreza Ahmadi. The purpose of this collection of translations is to make a selection of the Iranian New Poetry available to the poets, who may see how much of their work is translatable (in universal language) or retained in the translations; to teachers and students of English who are stimulated by these translations and who may decide to translate additional poems; and to non-Iranians who wonder if poetry in Iran has stopped after Jammy or Attar. The, translations are offered here with the Iranian texts en face. Because each word of a poem is unique in itself and in its order, the reader should read the Iranian along with the English translations. Iranian poet has attracted more Iranian poets than he, whose humanism particularly recommends itself to poets of any age and stage of development. Contemporary poets follow Nima's descriptive, natural, conversational and declamatory tone; also his language, techniques, and themes in free style poetry (verse libre) are widely imitated. It is noted, however, that Iranian modern writers have been more successful in prose than in poetry. The reason lies in the writers' complete detachment from the classics and a susceptibility to contemporary Iran. The poets, on the other hand, have had one eye on the classics and the other one on the West, overlooking their own popular culture. The prose writers have had better training in the European languages than the poets, more intercontinental travel and aid from the national movie industry.