IRAN is in our sociocultural and civilisational abiogenesis. Urdu, our national language, an amalgam of many Indo-European languages, draws most of its sweetness from Persian. One can count on one hand those who can name a couple of great, or even popular, poets of competing great languages and civilisations, such as Arabic, Turkic and Sanskrit. However, thousands among us know the Persian greats such as the Shirazi duo, Hafez and Saadi. Ferdowsi and Khayyam might as well be household names. Saib, Naziri, Urfi — the list is endless. The national anthem draws mostly on Farsi, with a fair bit of Arabic, and only one everyday Urdu link — the word ‘ka’, meaning belong/of.

Dreams and reality also entwine when it comes to our two countries. While Pakistan is often called a poet’s dream, given Allama Iqbal’s role in the politics of the day, Ferdowsi’s grand epic, the Shahnameh, is also believed to have been the result of a dream. According to lore, Daqiqi Tusi, a 10th-century Samanid-era court poet, appeared in Ferdowsi’s dream one night and urged him to complete what Daqiqi could not — the history of the Persian civilisation. Thus the legend of Rostam and Sohrab was born. It should actually be called........

© Dawn