Layla and Majnun - The Classic Love Story of Persian Literature

Writing nearly 1000 years ago, Nizami captures the lightness of heart that falling in love can bring, the thrill of shared affection, the sorrows of separation, the pains of jealousy and the grief that comes with loss. Nizami inspired rock star, Eric Clapton, to write his song "Layla". The text is a prose rendition of Nizami's 12th-century poetic masterpiece, in which he reshapes the legends of Majnun, the quintessential romantic fool, into a tale of the ideal lover. For the Sufis, Majnun represents the perfect devotee of the ""religion of the heart, "" and the story is an allegory of the soul's longing for God. This is a beautiful production, and it includes a final chapter newly translated from the Persian by Omid Safi and Zia Inayat Khan