Alyssa Gabbay

Alyssa Gabbay is Associate Professor Emerita at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. Her areas of research include Indo-Persian Culture, Shi‘ism, and Women and Islam.

Now available for preorder!

Exquisite Things and Strange Wonders: In Defense of Persian Poetry, by Amir Khusraw Dihlavi

Edited and translated by Alyssa Gabbay

A defense of poetry from a towering figure of the medieval Persianate world

Written in 1294 as the introduction to a book of poetry, the Dībācha-yi dīvān-i ghurrat al-kamāl became a lauded work in its own right. Its author, Amir Khusraw Dihlavi (1253–1325), was a poet, historian, courtier, Sufi, and musician whose influence still resonates. In this extraordinary text, he defends poetry against its critics, especially religious scholars, while offering a bold system for understanding its forms and for mastering the art. Blending manifesto and autobiography, Khusraw recounts personal struggles and triumphs in a voice by turns aggrieved, proud, and humble yet always commanding.

More than a defense of poetry, the work makes audacious claims about its cultural power and about the central place of Persian poets in India. One of the earliest examples of literary criticism in Persian, it challenges assumptions about poetry, religion, and authority while opening a window onto the world of the Delhi Sultanate. Presented here in a new English translation with the Persian text in the Naskh script, Exquisite Things and Strange Wonders offers readers a vivid portrait of a poet who helped define the literary and intellectual landscape of his time.

For purchase information, please visit the Harvard University webpage here.

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