Carleton College professors Adeeb Khalid and Yaron Klein, along with Dr. William Buffet (Carleton Class of 1955), will present a panel discussion on the Shahnameh, the epic poem written in medieval Persia, in the Gould Library Athenaeum at 5:15 p.m. on Thursday, April 19. This event is free and open to the public.
The Shahnameh is an epic poem of some 60,000 verses written by the Persian poet Ferdowsi in the years between 977 and 1010 AD. The poem recounts the history of pre-Islamic Iran, beginning in the mythical period of Creation, and continuing towards the Arab invasion of the seventh century, which brought the new religion of Islam to Persia. Regarded as a central literary masterpiece of the Persian culture, the Shahnameh is also of importance to modern adherents to Zoroastrianism for tracing the historical roots of that religion in the wake of the death of the final Zoroastrian ruler of Persian.
Participating in the panel will be Adeeb Khalid, the Jane and Raphael Bernstein Professor of Asian Studies and History, who studies the history of Islamic Central Asia; Yaron Klein, a professor of Arabic, with areas of expertise in Arab music and medieval Arabic literature; and Dr. William Buffet, writer, philosopher and Carleton alumnus.
The Gould Library is located on the Carleton campus off of College Street; it is also accessible via Highway 19 in Northfield. For further information and disability accommodations, contact Peggy Pfister at (507) 222-4303 or ppfister@carleton.edu.
