Is There a Persian Literary History? Twentieth-century Journals and the Formation of Literary Criticism

Aria Fani (UC Berkeley)

This talk will consider the role of early twentieth-century Persian-language journals in institutionalizing what we know as Persian literary history today in Iran and Afghanistan. The focus of the talk will be Mohammad Taqi Bahar’s journal Daneshkadeh, and in particular ‘Abbas Eqbal-Ashtiyani’s series titled “Tarikh-e adabi” (Literary history, 1918-1919). Once we investigate the ways in which literary journals have helped to forge and institutionalize Persian literary history, they will emerge not just as a byproduct of literary modernization, but as one of its main sites of power and literary production.

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