Le cantique des oiseaux
Subtitle: illustré par la peinture en Islam d'orient
By: traduction du persan, Leili Anvar ; commentaires des œuvres, Michael Barry avec la contribution de Leili Anvat
Contributors: Anvar, Laylī; Barry, Michael A., 1948-
Publisher: Diane de Selliers
Published: 2012
Place of publication: Paris
Language: fre
Number of pages: 430
ISBN-13: 9782364370036
Subjects: Persian Sufi poetry; Translations into French; Iranian Illumination of books and manuscripts; Turkish Illumination of books and manuscripts; Mogul Illumination of books and manuscripts
Work titles: Manṭiq al-ṭayr
Description: Song of the birds, a masterpiece of mystical poetry, written in Persian at the end of the twelfth century, sings the journey of thousands of birds in search of Simorgh, a mythical bird, the visible manifestation of the Divine. They will be guided through seven valleys by the hoopoe, Solomon's messenger, who encourages them on their mystical track by telling them stories of wisdom. Only thirty birds finally reach the end of the chemin. The beauty and symbolic value of the 207 works reproduced in this work resonate with the poem, illuminate and magnify it. The iconographic research has been conducted within the public and private collections of Islamic art in Europe and the United States, as well as the Near and Middle East. Those are barely accessible collections, keeping treasures rarely reproduced: the museums of Cairo, Baghdad and Kabul, the Golestan Palace Library and the National Museum in Tehran, as well as the Topkapi Museum in Istanbul. This is a new translation.