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Iran Heritage Foundation and the Victoria and Albert Museum

Julius Baer
Ms. Elahe Kashanchi
Anonymous donors

As part of IHF's initiative to digitise as much material as possible and to reach the widest possible audience around the world, IHF is offering its first Podcast, providing a recording of the 9 December 2010 lecture by Professor Dick Davis at the Victoria and Albert Museum, on the subject of "The Shahnameh and Persian Poetry." We invite you to listen to this exceptional programme, just under an hour long, by either streaming the content on your computer or downloading the Podcast to listen to on your iPod. We welcome your feedback on this initiative, which you can post on our Facebook page or by emailing us at info@iranheritage.org.

If you like this programme and would like to see it extended into the future, please consider making a contribution to IHF on the Virgin Money Giving link below. IHF relies on contributions from supporters like you to maintain its stream of programmes and to bring Persian culture and heritage to a broad, worldwide audience. Our US supporters can contribute to IHF via the American Fund for Charities, and benefit from the full tax advantages available under US law using by clicking here.

"The Shahnameh is one of the great monuments of World literature, written by Ferdowsi around 1000 AD and of central importance in the cultural sphere of Greater Persia. In preserving the memory and the spirit of a heroic past, it has continued to inspire his countrymen in all areas of life and art, influencing, amongst others, generations of poets.

In his lecture, Dick Davis will talk about the importance of the Shahnameh in the subsequent development of Persian poetry. In many ways the uniqueness of the Shahnameh sets it apart from Persian poetry in general, but Dick Davis' talk will explore how themes and techniques of the poem became central concerns for many of the major Persian poets who followed Ferdowsi, even when, as for example with many Sufi poets, their works show few obvious resemblances to Ferdowsi's great masterpiece."

Dick Davis was born in Portsmouth, England, in 1945, and educated at the universities of Cambridge (B.A. and M.A. in English Literature) and Manchester (PhD. In Medieval Persian Literature). He lived in Iran for eight years (1970-1978), and also for some time in both Italy and Greece. He is currently Professor of Persian and Chair of the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Cultures at Ohio State University. As author, translator or editor, he has produced over 20 books as well as academic works. These include translations from Italian (prose) and Persian (prose and verse), and eight books of his own poetry (the most recent of which is 'A Trick of Sunlight', 2006). His translations from Persian include Attar's 'The Conference of the Birds', a book of medieval epigrams ('Borrowed Ware'), Pezeshkzad’s 'My Uncle Napoleon', and Ferdowsi’s 'Shahnameh'. He has recently completed a verse translation of the 11th century poet Gorgani's 'Vis and Ramin', one of the most beautiful of Persian love stories.