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Adiwan (fromPersianدیوانdivân[d̪iːˈvɒːn];Arabic pronunciation:[diːˈwaːn]) is a collection ofpoems by a single author – usually excluding the poet'slong poems – inIslamic cultures ofWest Asia,Central Asia,North Africa,Sicily[1] andSouth Asia.[2]
The vast majority of Diwan poetry waslyric in nature: eitherghazals (orgazels, which make up the greatest part of the repertoire of the tradition) orkasîdes. There were, however, other common genres, most particularly themesnevî—a kind ofverse romance and thus a variety ofnarrative poetry; the two most notable examples of this form are theLayla and Majnun (ليلى و مجنون) of Fuzûlî and theHüsn ü Aşk (حسن و عشق – 'Beauty and Love') of Şeyh Gâlib.
Originating in Persian literature, the idea spread to the Arab, Turkic and Indic worlds, and the term was sometimes used in Europe, albeit not always in the same way.
The English usage of the phrase "diwan poetry" comes from thePersian worddiwān (دیوان) viaOttoman Turkish, and designated a list or register.[3] The Persian word derived from the Persiandibir meaningwriter orscribe.Diwan was alsoborrowed intoArmenian,Georgian,Arabic,Urdu,Turkish.[2] In Persian, Turkish and other languages the termdiwan came to mean a collection of poems by a single author, as inselected works, or the whole body of work of a poet. ThusDiwan-e Mir would be theCollected works ofMir Taqi Mir and so on. The first use of the term in this sense is attributed toRudaki.
The termdivan was used in titles of poetic works in French, beginning in 1697,[3] but was a rare and didactic usage, though one that was revived by its famous appearance inGoethe'sWest–östlicher Divan (Poems of West and East), a work published in 1819 that reflected the poet's abiding interest in Middle Eastern and specificallyPersian literature.
This word has also been applied in a similar way to collections ofHebrew poetry and to poetry ofal-Andalus.
Ottoman Divan poetry was a highlyritualized andsymbolic art form. From the Persian poetry that largely inspired it, it inherited a wealth ofsymbols whose meanings and interrelationships—both of similitude (مراعات نظيرmura'ât-i nazîr / تناسبtenâsüb) and opposition (تضادtezâd)—were more or less prescribed. Examples of prevalent symbols that, to some extent, oppose one another include, among others:
As the opposition of "the ascetic" and "the darvish" suggests, Divan poetry—much like Turkish folk poetry—was heavily influenced bySufi thought. One of the primary characteristics of Divan poetry, however—as of the Persian poetry before it—was its mingling of the mystical Sufi element with a profane and even erotic element. Thus, the pairing of "the nightingale" and "the rose" simultaneously suggests two different relationships:
Similarly, "the world" refers simultaneously to the physical world and to this physical world considered as the abode of sorrow and impermanence, while "the rosegarden" refers simultaneously to a literal garden and tothe garden of Paradise. "The nightingale", or suffering lover, is often seen as situated—both literally and figuratively—in "the world", while "the rose", or beloved, is seen as being in "the rosegarden".[4]
Divan poetry was composed through the constant juxtaposition of many such images within a strict metrical framework, thus allowing numerous potential meanings to emerge. A brief example is the following line of verse, ormısra (مصراع), by the 18th-centuryjudge and poet Hayatî Efendi:
Here, the nightingale is only implied (as being the poet/lover), while the rose, or beloved, is shown to be capable of inflicting pain with its thorns (خارhâr). The world, as a result, is seen as having both positive aspects (it is a rosegarden, and thus analogous to the garden of Paradise) and negative aspects (it is a rosegarden full of thorns, and thus different from the garden of Paradise).
As for the development of Divan poetry over the more than 500 years of its existence, that is—as the Ottomanist Walter G. Andrews points out—a study still in its infancy;[6] clearly defined movements and periods have not yet been decided upon. Early in the history of the tradition, the Persian influence was very strong, but this was mitigated somewhat through the influence of poets such as the AzerbaijaniImadaddin Nasimi (?–1417?) and theUyghurAli-Shir Nava'i (1441–1501), both of whom offered strong arguments for the poetic status of the Turkic languages as against the much-venerated Persian. Partly as a result of such arguments, Divan poetry in its strongest period—from the 16th to the 18th centuries—came to display a unique balance of Persian and Turkish elements, until the Persian influence began to predominate again in the early 19th century.
Despite the lack of certainty regarding the stylistic movements and periods of Divan poetry, however, certain highly different styles are clear enough, and can perhaps be seen as exemplified by certain poets:
InUrdu poetry diwan are also a collection of poems, but here they are mainlyghazals.[8]
In Mesopotamia Fuzuli was in intimate contact with three cultures – Turkic, Arabic, and Persian. Besides his native Azeri, he learned Arabic and Persian at an early age and acquired a through command of the literatures in all three languages, an accomplishment in which the cosmopolitan literary and scholarly circles of Hilla played an important role.
