Zhukovski ends his introduction by an endeavour to distinguish three periods of development in Persian poetry down to the earlier Seljúq period, namely, the epic which accompanied the revival of Persian national feeling under the Sámánids, and which culminated in Firdawsí; the venal panegyric, against which Náṣir-i-Khusraw and 'Umar Khayyám revolted; and the mystic verse to which the disappointed and disillusioned panegyrist (such as Saná'í, and, though too late for practical results, Anwarí also) so often turned at last.
The materials for Anwarí's biography are far less copious than we could wish, but from the eight biographical works enumerated on pp. 369-370 supra, in conjunction with what can be gleaned from the poet's own works, Zhukovski has put together in the first chapter of his book nearly as full a notice of his life as it is at present within our power to construct. Of Anwarí's birth and early life we know practically nothing. That he was, as his biographers assert, a diligent student, and well versed in most of the sciences of his age, is proved not only by the varied learning which he is so prone to display in his verse, but by his own explicit declaration in a rather celebrated fragment to which allusion has been already made, and which begins:—
Garchi dar bastam dar-i-madḥ u ghazal yakbáragí,
Ẓan ma-bar k'az nadhm-i-alfádh u ma'ání qáṣir-am.*
In another fragment quoted by Zhukovski (p. 7), Anwarí similarly boasts of his more frivolous accomplishments, such as his skill in calligraphy, chess, and backgammon; his knowledge of verse, both his own and that of the older poets; and his powers of satire, wit, and invective; so that, as he remarks to his patron, “You need have no fear of being bored.”
It is also clear that the biographers are right in their opinion that Anwarí, while little disposed to underrate his own merits as a poet, was not inclined to rate poetry very high. In a verse whereof the correct text (which materially differs in sense from the version contained in the lithographed editions at my disposal) * is, I think, that given by 'Awfí (Lubáb, vol. ii, p. 117 of my edition), Anwarí says:—
“After all, I am like Saná'í, even though I be not like Ṣábir,”
Saná'í being, as we have seen, admittedly a poet of the first class, and far more celebrated than Adíb Ṣábir, whom, however, since he sang Sanjar's praises and died in rendering him a service, Anwarí probably deemed it improper to belittle. In the same poem he says:—
“Talent is, indeed, a disgrace in our time, else this verse
Declares that I am not [merely] a poet, but a magician!”
Again he says in another place (p. 694 of the Lucknow edition of 1880):—
“I have a soul ardent as fire and a tongue fluent as water,
A mind sharpened by intelligence, and verse devoid of flaw.
Alas! There is no patron worthy of my eulogies!
Alas! There is no sweetheart worthy of my odes!”
He likewise declares (p. 688) that his poetry goes all over the world, like carrier pigeons, and (p. 34, l. 5) that his style is, by common consent, the best amongst all contemporary work.
On the other hand, speaking of the art of poetry he says (p. 730):—
“O Anwarí, dost thou know what poetry and covetousness are?
The former is the child and the latter the nurse! …
Like the cock thou hast a crest of Science;
Why dost thou lay eggs like a hen?”
And he concludes by bidding himself no longer “fling the filth of poetry to the winds.” Another interesting fragment, which bears out, so far as it goes, the account given by the biographers of the motives which induced Anwarí to abandon learning for poetry, begins at the bottom of p. 629 of the Lucknow edition. He says:—
“Since my consideration may be increased by panegyric and ode,
Why should I consume my soul in the fire of thought?
I have thrown away twenty years in ‘perhaps’ and ‘it may be’;
God hath not given me the life of Noah!
Henceforth I will rein in my natural disposition,
If I see the door of acceptance and success open before me;
And if they vouchsafe me no gift, I will, after essaying praise,
Destroy with words of satire the head of such a patron!”
“Begging,” says Anwarí in another place (bottom of p. 41), “is the Law of the poets”; and he is ready enough with threats of satire—and that, generally, of the coarsest kind—when begging avails not. Yet he is keenly alive to the hatefulness of a courtier's life, while recognising, with anger and resentment against his time, that thus only, and not by the scholar's life which he would fain lead, can wealth be obtained. Thus he says (p. 711, ll. 2-4):—
“It is not fitting, in order to conform to the courtier's code,
Again to impose vexation on my heart and soul;To wag my tongue in prose or verse,
And bring forth virgin fancies from my mind;
For the whole business of courtiers comes to this—
To receive blows and give abuse.”
As to the spitefulness of Fortune towards men of learning, he says (p. 39, l. 6):—
“How can any one realise that this blue-coloured hump-back [i.e.,
the sky]
Is so passionately fond of annoying men of learning?”
And so poor Anwarí, scholar by taste and poet by profession, is torn asunder between this and that, neither content to share the scholar's poverty, nor able to reconcile himself to the hollow insincerity of the courtier's life; keenly sensitive to the rebuffs to which his vocation exposes him, holding his way of life in bitter contempt, longing to follow in the steps of Avicenna, yet living the life of Abú Nuwás. In spite of his dictum that a poet ought not to write verses after he has reached the age of fifty (p. 725, l. 1), he himself practised the art of poetry for at least forty years; since two of his poems (pp. 636 and 651) mention A.H. 540 (= A.D. 1145-46) as the date of the current year, while he continued to write verses after his astrological fiasco, which, as we have seen, took place in or about the year A.H. 581 (= A.D. 1185-86). Yet at the end of his life, after he had, without fault on his part, as it would appear, incurred the resentment of the people of Balkh, he appears to have forsworn courts and the service of kings and nobles, and to have returned to the quiet, secluded, scholarly life which he loved. To this some of his poems bear evidence, notably the fragment printed, with English rendering, at pp. 8-10 of the tirage-à-part of the Biographies of Persian Poets which I translated from the Ta'ríkh-i-Guzída in the J.R.A.S. for 1900-1. Herein he speaks enthusiastically of the peace and quiet which he enjoys in his humble cottage, where dry bread with some simple relish is his fare, and the ink-bottle and the pen take the place of the wine-cup and the rebeck. In the same sense he says in another place (Lucknow edition of 1880, p. 733, ll. 15-16):—
“O Lord, give me, in exchange for that luxury which was of yore,
The contentment of Truth and an innocent livelihood,
Security, health, and acceptable devotion,
A loaf of bread, a ragged cloak, and to sit apart in some corner.”
Although Sayyid Nuru'lláh Shushtarí, the author of that
great biography of eminent Shí'ites entitled the Majálisu'l-
“Through Muḥammad and 'Umar paganism was annulled and
religion strengthened;
Thy days naturally restored those days to life again.”
Nor, at least while he remained a Court-poet, was Anwarí inclined to observe at all strictly the Muḥammadan prohibition of wine. “Dost thou know any way,” he says (p. 688, ll. 4-5 of the Lucknow edition), “in which I can excuse my having got drunk and been sick?” And in another fragment (op cit., p. 698, ll. 12-14), he says:—