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Sohrab and Rustum

Sohrab and Rustum: An Episode is a narrative poem in blank verse by English poet Matthew Arnold, first published in 1853 in his collection Poems. It retells a tragic episode from Abolqasem Ferdowsi's Persian epic Shahnameh (completed c. 1010 CE), in which the mighty Iranian warrior Rustum unknowingly slays his son Sohrab in single combat amid a war between Persian and Turanian forces.^[1]^[2] Comprising around 900 lines, the poem faithfully adapts Ferdowsi's account of the father-son tragedy, emphasizing themes of fate (qadar and qaza), misrecognition, and heroic destiny within a mythological ancient Persia.^[2] Rustum's loyal horse Rakhsh and the token armband play key roles in the unfolding events.^[3] Arnold's work exemplifies Victorian engagement with Eastern classics, blending epic grandeur with introspective pathos to explore paternal legacy and the inexorability of loss, influencing later literature and adaptations.^[1]

Background and Composition

Literary Sources

The primary literary source for Matthew Arnold's "Sohrab and Rustum" is the Shahnameh (Book of Kings), the monumental epic poem composed by the Persian poet Abu'l-Qasem Ferdowsi between approximately 977 and 1010 CE.^[4] Ferdowsi drew from earlier oral traditions, prose chronicles, and pre-Islamic Persian mythology to create this work, which chronicles the mythical and historical kings of Iran over some 50,000 verses, establishing it as the cornerstone of Persian literature and Iran's national epic. Within the Shahnameh, the episode of Rostam and Sohrab forms a pivotal tragic narrative in the heroic age section, depicting the unwitting fatal battle between the legendary warrior Rostam and his son Sohrab, who seeks to conquer Iran under the guidance of his mother Tahmineh's secrets and his own ambition. In Ferdowsi's version, the story underscores epic heroism tempered by fate and human error, with Rostam's prowess and Sohrab's valor driving the conflict to its sorrowful conclusion, where recognition comes too late after Sohrab's mortal wounding.^[5] Arnold adapted this episode for his 1853 poem, using summaries from Sir John Malcolm's History of Persia (1815) and a review by Charles-Augustin Sainte-Beuve of Jules Mohl's French prose translation of the Shahnameh (first volume published in 1838), the first complete European rendering of the epic.^[6] In his adaptation, Arnold shifts emphasis from Ferdowsi's heroic ethos—where characters actively shape their destinies through valor and cunning—to a profound sense of fatalism, portraying the father-son tragedy as an inexorable classical inevitability driven by ignorance and cosmic indifference, as seen in his heightened focus on omens, dreams, and the inexpiable sorrow of recognition.^[5] This transmission of Persian mythology to 19th-century Europe occurred amid the broader Orientalist movement, where European scholars and writers, inspired by colonial encounters and philological advances, sought to recover and reinterpret Eastern texts as exotic yet morally instructive alternatives to classical Greek and Roman sources; Goethe's earlier enthusiasm for Persian poetry, expressed in his West-östlicher Divan (1819), further popularized such interests, indirectly influencing Arnold's engagement with the Shahnameh through shared Romantic admiration for Oriental wisdom.^[7]

Publication History

Matthew Arnold composed "Sohrab and Rustum" during 1852 and 1853, amid his efforts to establish himself as a poet in the Victorian era. The work was completed in April 1853 after numerous interruptions, with Arnold dedicating much of his spare time to it in the preceding months. In a letter to his mother dated May 1853, he described the poem as "the best thing I have yet done," attributing its quality in part to the inherent nobility of the source story from Persian legend.^[8] This composition reflected Arnold's ambition to revive epic poetry, a form he pursued despite widespread Victorian skepticism toward grand classical narratives, which were often viewed as incompatible with the era's emphasis on individualism and scientific doubt about heroic absolutes.^[9] The poem first appeared in Arnold's Poems: A New Edition, published by Longman & Co. in 1853, marking a significant expansion of his poetic output following his initial Poems volume of 1849. This collection positioned "Sohrab and Rustum" as a centerpiece, showcasing Arnold's shift toward narrative verse before he increasingly focused on literary criticism in subsequent years. The subtitle "An Episode" underscored its design as a self-contained piece, deliberately extracted from the broader epic framework of the Persian Shahnameh, allowing Arnold to experiment with epic scale in a compact form without committing to a full-length work.^[10] In the preface to Poems: A New Edition, Arnold elaborated on his poetic principles, advocating for a focus on "action" over subjective expression and praising the simplicity of ancient epic styles as models for modern writers, though he did not reference the poem explicitly. He also included appended notes drawing from sources like Sir John Malcolm's History of Persia (1815) to contextualize the legend, noting his reliance on secondary translations since he lacked direct access to certain originals.^[11] Initial reception among contemporaries highlighted the poem's strengths in evoking Homeric grandeur and tragic pathos. James Anthony Froude, in correspondence around the time of publication, deemed it "all but 'perfect'" for its execution. Reviews in periodicals such as the North American Review praised its "architectonic power" and vivid narrative, contrasting it favorably with more introspective Victorian verse, while noting its success in adapting ancient heroism to modern sensibilities.^[12]^[13]

Narrative and Structure

Plot Summary

The poem opens at dawn along the banks of the Oxus River, where the Tartar camp stirs amid the mist, as the young warrior Sohrab, son of the legendary Persian hero Rustum and the Tartar princess Tahmineh, awakens with a burning desire to seek out his absent father.^[14] Rustum, now retired in seclusion at Seistan with his aged father Zal, has long withdrawn from the wars of King Kaikobad, unaware of his son's existence due to Tahmineh's secrecy in raising Sohrab among the Tartars to protect him from peril.^[14] Sohrab, having grown into a formidable champion unmatched in strength and valor, learns fragments of his heritage from his mother and resolves to lead the Tartar host in an invasion of Persia, hoping to encounter and ally with Rustum against their common foe, the Turanian king Afrasiab.^[14] As the Tartars advance, Sohrab proposes a temporary truce to the Persian forces under Prince Ferood and challenges their mightiest warrior to single combat, intending to identify Rustum through the duel and thereby conquer swiftly without prolonged bloodshed.^[14] The Persian commander Gudurz dispatches riders to summon the reluctant Rustum from his retreat, and though the hero initially resists, citing his age and weariness, he ultimately agrees to fight but insists on doing so incognito, clad in plain armor without his famed insignia to avoid the burden of his reputation.^[14] Neither father nor son recognizes the other as they meet on the river's sandy shore under a gathering storm, with Sohrab mistaking Rustum for a common soldier and Rustum viewing Sohrab merely as a bold adversary.^[14] The duel commences fiercely, spanning a day of intense combat where Sohrab, wielding superior youth and vigor, first overpowers Rustum with javelin throws, sword strikes, and grapples, pinning him to the ground and sparing his life only because he doubts this humbled foe can be the renowned Rustum he seeks.^[14] Revived and feigning greater humility to lure Sohrab into overconfidence, Rustum rallies on the second day, parrying blows with his massive club and shattered sword until, in a moment of desperate cunning, he draws a sharp onyx dagger and plunges it into Sohrab's side, inflicting a mortal wound.^[14] As Sohrab collapses, dying, he reveals his identity by baring his arm to show the jeweled armlet and seal Rustum had given Tahmineh at their parting, confirming the tragic bond between them.^[14] In profound grief, Rustum cradles his son's body, cursing the fateful onyx dagger that severed their unrecognized kinship and lamenting the inexorable workings of destiny that brought them to this clash.^[14] Sohrab, in his final breaths, forgives his father and requests burial in the sands of Seistan with a grand mound and pillar to commemorate his unfulfilled life, urging Rustum to spare the Tartar army and send them home in peace.^[14] Rustum honors these wishes, carrying Sohrab's body back to Seistan for interment amid his own inconsolable mourning, while the poem concludes as a self-contained episode of paternal tragedy, drawn from the broader Shahnameh epic.^[14]

Poetic Style and Form

Matthew Arnold's "Sohrab and Rustum" is composed in blank verse, consisting of unrhymed iambic pentameter lines that evoke the grandeur of classical epics such as Homer's Iliad and Milton's Paradise Lost. This form, with its five unstressed-stressed syllable pairs per line, provides a rhythmic regularity suited to the poem's epic scope, allowing for a sustained narrative flow without the interruption of rhyme. The poem unfolds in a single, continuous episode of 891 lines, maintaining a formal impersonality that aligns with Arnold's admiration for Homeric directness combined with Miltonic complexity and enjambment for subtle variations in pace.^[15]^[16] The diction in "Sohrab and Rustum" is deliberately archaic and elevated, incorporating words like "frore," "sate," and "spake" to impart a timeless, heroic tone reminiscent of ancient verse traditions. Drawing from Persian sources such as Ferdowsi's Shahnameh—via translations like those by Sir John Malcolm—and classical influences including Homer and the King James Bible, Arnold's language achieves purity, lucidity, and precision, avoiding Romantic ornamentation in favor of a noble simplicity that heightens the epic's emotional dignity. This elevated register, with its idiomatic directness and occasional biblical echoes, fosters a sense of universality, transporting readers to an ancient Persian landscape while underscoring the poem's moral gravity.^[17]^[16]^[15] Narratively, the poem employs a third-person omniscient voice that externalizes the action, focusing on vivid battle descriptions enriched by 22 epic similes to emphasize spectacle and visual imagery, such as comparisons of combatants to natural forces or pastoral scenes. These descriptive passages alternate with dialogic sections, where integrated speeches between characters like Rustum and Sohrab build dramatic tension through revelations and confrontations, and reflective interludes that provide moral commentary on fate and heroism. This structural division—into scenes of exposition, confrontation, and contemplation—mirrors epic conventions while prioritizing sensory immediacy in combat, as seen in the detailed portrayal of the father-son duel, to heighten the tragic intensity without digressing into allegory.^[15]^[17]^[16]

Themes and Interpretation

Central Themes

One of the central themes in the "Rostam and Sohrab" episode of Ferdowsi's Shahnameh is the tension between divine predestination (qaza wa qadar) and human agency (ikhtiyar), reflecting pre-Islamic Zoroastrian beliefs in a moral universe governed by Ahura Mazda yet allowing for personal choice. The narrative depicts the tragic father-son encounter as foreordained by fate, with Sohrab's quest for recognition leading to ironic death despite opportunities for revelation. This motif underscores the inexorability of destiny, as seen in Rostam's unwitting slaying of his son, symbolizing how cosmic forces override mortal intentions. In the Zoroastrian context, acceptance of divine will provides solace, evident in the characters' submission to heaven's decree, emphasizing ethical conduct amid inevitable loss.^[3] Heroism and its burdens form another core theme, portraying the ideal Iranian warrior (pahlavan) through Rostam's reluctant defense of the realm and Sohrab's prodigious valor. Rostam represents the seasoned hero, isolated by his unmatched strength and duty to King Kay Kavus, while Sohrab's youthful ambition propels him into peril. Their duel illustrates heroism's tragic cost, with Rostam's remorse highlighting the conflict between martial obligation and familial bonds. Within the Shahnameh's framework, this critiques unchecked prowess without wisdom, promoting balance between strength, honor, and humility as virtues for preserving Persian identity.^[18] The father-son conflict and crisis of identity highlight generational and cultural disconnection, symbolizing the perils of absence and miscommunication in a vast empire. Sohrab's concealed lineage amplifies the tragedy of separation, as he seeks paternal union only to perish unrecognized, revealing the armband too late. This misrecognition evokes profound alienation, where blood ties fracture under deception by Turanian king Afrasiyab, mirroring broader Iran-Turan rivalries. The theme critiques ambition driven by incomplete knowledge, fostering estrangement that resolves in sorrowful acknowledgment.^[3] The narrative also engages with cultural and territorial clash between Iran and Turan, using the invasion as an allegory for threats to Persian sovereignty and Zoroastrian order. Ferdowsi contrasts the noble, divinely favored Iranian forces with the treacherous Turanians, reinforcing a binary of civilized heritage versus barbaric aggression. The Oxus River setting evokes ancient Central Asian boundaries, framing encounters as existential struggles for cultural survival, fraught with fate's irony.^[18]

Symbolism and Imagery

In Ferdowsi's "Rostam and Sohrab," the Oxus River (Amuy) symbolizes the boundary of Iranian identity, eternity, and the inexorable flow of time enveloping human drama. The story unfolds along its banks, where armies encamp, establishing a timeless backdrop to the conflict. This imagery recurs in the resolution, with the river persisting unchanged amid tragedy, interpreted as nature's cycle transcending personal fate and providing catharsis through continuity. The river's murmuring evokes the Persian landscape, contrasting warriors' passions with cosmic detachment.^[3] The onyx armband (dastband), a token Rostam leaves with Tahmineh at Sohrab's conception, embodies fate's irony and belated recognition. Engraved with a lion or symbolic seal, it proves Sohrab's lineage, yet is revealed only after Rostam's fatal wound. As blood flows, Sohrab displays it, transforming the emblem from unity to doom—the intended bond now marking irreversible loss. This highlights destiny's cruelty, where the armband's dark stone evokes valor shadowed by tragedy, exposed too late.^[18] Vivid imagery of dawn, blood, and armor intensifies contrasts between youth and experience, amplifying the epic's heroic intensity. The duel begins at dawn, symbolizing illusory hope yielding to violence. Blood signifies spilled vitality, Sohrab's youthful essence staining the earth in futile glory, while Rostam's blows represent age's toll. Armor delineates character: Sohrab's ornate gear reflects ambition and naivety, Rostam's battle-scarred plates seasoned wisdom and solitude. Epic similes liken warriors to lions or mountains, underscoring generational rift.^[3] Rostam's horse Rakhsh symbolizes loyalty and fateful intervention, its theft initiating the separation and return sparking reunion. Intelligent and swift, Rakhsh aids Rostam in recognizing Sohrab indirectly, reinforcing themes of divine guidance through natural bonds. Nature's indifference is depicted in celestial elements unmoved by grief, stars and river flowing eternally, framing personal catastrophe within an ordered, uncaring cosmos governed by Zoroastrian dualism. Such imagery amplifies the epic's scope, dissolving individual fate into cultural and cosmic continuity.^[18]

Characters

Rustum

Rustum is a legendary Persian hero drawn from the epic traditions of the Shahnameh, the 10th-century Persian national epic by Abu'l-Qasim Firdausi, where he appears as Rostam, a towering figure renowned for his unparalleled strength, bravery, and numerous exploits against demons, dragons, and rival kings. In Matthew Arnold's 1853 narrative poem Sohrab and Rustum, Rustum is reimagined as an aged warrior living in seclusion in Seistan with his father Zal, having withdrawn from the battlefield after decades of glory to seek a quiet life amid the thankless wars of Persian kings.^[8] This portrayal contrasts sharply with his epic past, where he was the invincible champion of Iran, emphasizing his transition from youthful invincibility to mature weariness, as evidenced by his self-description: "If Iran’s chiefs are old, then I / Am older" and his streaked gray hair signaling the toll of endless battles.^[19] Rustum's personality in the poem is marked by caution and world-weariness, traits that underscore his reluctance to reengage in combat despite his undiminished prowess. He expresses a deep fatigue with violence, lamenting, "And full of blood and battles is my age, / And I shall never end this life of blood," and initially fights incognito in plain armor to test his opponent's mettle without revealing his identity, a deceptive tactic born of strategic prudence rather than cowardice.^[8] This guarded demeanor reflects a seasoned warrior's pragmatism, wary of the perils of fame and the futility of heroic deeds in an indifferent world, yet it also reveals an underlying tenderness, as seen in his initial reluctance to harm the youthful challenger who turns out to be his son Sohrab.^[20] Throughout the poem, Rustum's arc unfolds from reluctant participant to tragic victor overwhelmed by remorse. Drawn into the duel against the invading Tartar forces, he declares his indifference to fame—"For what care I, though all speak Sohrab’s fame?"—and fights with measured restraint, only to deliver a fatal blow in self-defense.^[8] Upon Sohrab's revelation of their father-son bond, Rustum's triumph shatters into profound grief; he defiles himself in mourning, throwing dust on his head and smearing it across his face and arms, vowing to carry his son's body to the ancestral palace in atonement.^[21] Arnold portrays Rustum as a flawed hero whose tragedy embodies Victorian-era doubts about the value of martial glory and the fragility of legacy in an age of industrial change and moral uncertainty. Unlike the unblemished champions of classical epics, Rustum's ignorance and pride contribute to the irreversible loss, highlighting the hollowness of heroic isolation and the personal costs of a life devoted to war, a critique resonant with Arnold's broader concerns about cultural decline and the search for enduring meaning.^[19]

Sohrab

Sohrab is the illegitimate son of the Persian warrior Rustum and the Tartar princess Tahmineh, conceived during Rustum's brief liaison in her homeland of Samengan.^[8] Raised in secrecy among the Tartars without knowledge of his father's identity, Sohrab grows up fueled by a deep-seated quest for paternal recognition and his own heroic legacy, as his mother reveals fragments of his heritage only upon his maturity.^[22] This obscured origin propels his drive to seek out Rustum amid the brewing conflict between Tartar and Persian forces, embodying a profound search for identity in Arnold's narrative.^[21] As a young warrior, Sohrab possesses extraordinary physical prowess and an invincible spirit, often likened in the poem to a "tiger" in ferocity and a "cypress" in graceful stature, marking him as the mightiest champion in the Tartar army despite his youth.^[8] His traits reveal a blend of idealism and naivety: restless and ambitious, he dreams of grand conquests to honor his lineage and reunite with his absent father, yet his bold challenge to the Persian host stems from an optimistic belief in his unassailable strength and destiny.^[22] This pursuit highlights his soft-hearted tenderness beneath a warrior's exterior, driven by love and aspiration rather than mere aggression.^[21] In the poem's events, Sohrab leads the Tartar invasion of Persia under King Afrasiab, strategically positioning himself to draw out Rustum through single combat with Persian champions.^[8] His quest culminates in a fateful duel where, unknowingly facing his father, he fights with heroic valor but ultimately succumbs to a mortal wound, dying in a moment of unrecognized kinship.^[22] Matthew Arnold emphasizes Sohrab as a poignant symbol of untapped potential, portraying his tragic end as the perilous consequence of an unrecognized heritage that severs familial bonds and heroic promise before they can fully bloom.^[21] Through Sohrab's idealism and fatal curiosity, Arnold underscores the fragility of youthful ambition in the face of inexorable fate.^[22]

Reception and Influence

Critical Reception

Upon its publication in 1853 as part of Poems, "Sohrab and Rustum" received enthusiastic praise from contemporaries for reviving the epic form in English poetry, with J. A. Froude describing it in correspondence as "all but perfect" in its execution and Homeric grandeur.^[23] ^[12] However, some reviewers critiqued its archaic diction and elevated blank verse as out of step with the emerging realist tendencies in mid-Victorian literature, viewing the poem's Oriental epic framework as an escapist contrast to contemporary social realism.^[24] In the broader nineteenth-century reception, the poem solidified its reputation as Arnold's finest narrative achievement, often lauded for its tragic depth and heroic ethos; critics like Francis Turner Palgrave ranked it among the era's most ambitious poetic efforts, influencing later works on martial heroism such as Henry Newbolt's "Vitai Lampada" (1892), which echoes the poem's themes of duty and generational conflict.^[25] Editions by scholars C. B. Tinker and H. F. Lowry further emphasized this view in their 1950 compilation of Arnold's poetry, interpreting the narrative's inexorable tragedy as a manifestation of Arnoldian fatalism, where human agency succumbs to destiny amid the vastness of the Oxus landscape.^[26]^[27] Twentieth- and twenty-first-century scholarship has shifted toward more nuanced interpretations, with postcolonial critics examining the poem's Orientalist lens, as in Natalie Melas's analysis of how Arnold's adaptation of Ferdowsi's Shahnameh constructs an exoticized Persian world to affirm Victorian imperial perspectives.^[28] Feminist readings, such as those by Linda Ray Pratt, highlight the marginalization of female figures and rigid gender roles, portraying the father-son duel as a patriarchal erasure of the feminine that underscores Arnold's ambivalence toward domesticity.^[29] Modern essays on visual narrative, including Daniel Pollack-Pelzner's exploration of the poem's epic similes, frame "Sohrab and Rustum" as a critique of spectacle, where vivid imagery both captivates and reveals the futility of heroic display in an age of cultural fragmentation.^[30]

Adaptations and Legacy

The Rostam-Sohrab myth, as reinterpreted in Arnold's poem, has inspired numerous theatrical and musical adaptations across cultures, particularly in the 20th and 21st centuries. One early example is the mugham opera Rustam and Zohrab (1910) by Azerbaijani composer Uzeyir Hajibeyov, which draws directly from Ferdowsi's episode and incorporates traditional Azerbaijani musical elements to dramatize the tragic father-son confrontation. More recently, Iranian-Armenian composer Loris Tjeknavorian's opera Rostam and Sohrab, composed over 25 years and premiered in Yerevan in April 2025 at the Spendiaryan National Academic Theatre of Opera and Ballet, blends Western operatic forms with Persian motifs to explore themes of fate and identity. In Iran, contemporary theatrical productions, such as the 2024 musical play featuring celebrated actors such as Amir Aqai as Rustam, Sina Mehrad as Sohrab, and Elnaz Shakerdoost as Tahmineh, have staged the story to emphasize its emotional depth and cultural resonance.^[31] Modern retellings of the narrative have extended into film and graphic formats, often bridging Arnold's Victorian lens with contemporary interpretations of the Shahnameh episode. The 2013 Iranian animated film Battle of the Kings: Rostam & Sohrab, directed by Kianoush Dalvand, adapts the tale for younger audiences while altering elements like Sohrab's fate to highlight heroism and reconciliation.^[32] Earlier, the 1963 Indian Hindi film Rustam Sohrab, produced by F. U. Chauhan and starring Prithviraj Kapoor, incorporates Bollywood spectacle to retell the myth, influencing South Asian popular culture. In graphic media, a 1960s British comic series in The Victor magazine titled "Sohrab the Warrior" loosely adapted Arnold's poem, serializing the battle and tragedy for young readers.^[33] Arnold's Sohrab and Rustum holds a significant place in English literature's Orientalist tradition, serving as a key Victorian example of exoticized Eastern narratives that blend Homeric grandeur with Persian sources to evoke imperial fascination with the "Orient." The poem's depiction of father-son conflict has permeated global media as a archetypal trope of unrecognized kinship and tragic heroism, echoed in works from epic fantasies to family dramas. It remains a staple in educational curricula for Victorian poetry and comparative mythology, fostering discussions on cultural translation and heroism.^[8] In recent developments, the poem's imagery of the Oxus River (modern Amu Darya) has resonated in diaspora literature and environmental discourse, symbolizing lost heritage amid Central Asia's ecological crises. Iranian-American writers, such as those exploring identity in the U.S.-Iran context, invoke the Rostam-Sohrab tragedy to navigate themes of division and reconciliation in exile.^[34] The river's portrayal in Arnold's work has also been linked to real-world concerns, like the Aral Sea disaster, where the Amu Darya's diversion evokes the poem's elegiac flow toward renewal.^[35]

References

[1]
The Tragedy of Sohrab and Rostam - University of Washington Press
$$30.00It is a stark and classic tragedy set against the exotic backdrop of a mythological Persia where feasting, hunting, and warring are accomplished on the most ...Missing: summary | Show results with:summary
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[PDF] <em>The Silmarillion</em> by J.R.R. Tolkien and <em>Shahnameh ...
In the story of “Rostam and Sohrab,” Rostam's horse, Rakhsh, is lost beyond and over the borders of the enemy, and as discussed, this leads to the perfect ...
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Shahnameh - World History Encyclopedia
May 22, 2020 · The Shahnameh (“Book of Kings”, composed 977-1010 CE) is a medieval epic written by the poet Abolqasem Ferdowsi (l. c. 940-1020 CE) in order to ...Missing: date | Show results with:date
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Rustam and Sohrab and Sohrab and Rustam: A Comparative Study
The aim of this paper is to compare the poem of Sohrab and Rustam by Matthew Arnold with the original text of Rustam and Sohrab by Firdausi.
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ŠĀH-NĀMA TRANSLATIONS iii. INTO ENGLISH
Sep 4, 2014 · The poem “Sohrab and Rustum” by Matthew Arnold (1822-88) is the best known adaptation of the Šāh-nāma. Originally published in 1853 as an ...
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ENGLISH ii. Persian Influences in English and American Literature
Dec 31, 1998 · Goethe's enthusiasm for the German translations of Persian poetry by ... Javadi, “Matthew Arnold's 'Sohrab and Rustum' and Its Persian ...
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MATTHEW ARNOLD'S SOHRAB AND RUSTUM AND OTHER POEMS
By them Arnold has exerted a remarkable influence[p.xii] on public thought and stamped himself as one of the ablest critics and reformers of the last century.
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An Introduction to Matthew Arnold's "Sohrab and Rustum" (1853)
Aug 26, 2004 · ... source, and Sainte Beuve's notice (Causeries du lundi, I) of a French translation by Mohl of the Shahnama, the Persian national epic by ...Missing: Jules 1832
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Matthew Arnold's Sohrab and Rustum, and other poems
Dec 22, 2009 · Sohrab and Rustum is based on an episode in Firdausi's Shahnama and was first published in Arnold's Poems, London, 1853.
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Preface to the First Edition of Poems. I have, in the present collection, omitted the Poem from which the volume published in 1852 took its title. I have ...Missing: Sohrab | Show results with:Sohrab
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the Poems of 1853-'Sohrab and Rustum', he writes to Clough, 'is to my taste all but "perfect" '.2 But he was against a Preface. 'He rather discounsels from ...Missing: initial reception
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Jan 7, 2009 · SOHRAB AND RUSTUM[6]. AN EPISODE. And the first grey of morning fill'd the east, And the fog rose out of the Oxus stream. But all the Tartar ...
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The verse form and formulaic expressions are not, of course, the only aspects of literary co-adaptation of the classical epic form in Sohrab and Rustum and ...
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[PDF] sohrab and rustum - balder dead
The story of Sohrab and Rustum is, as Arnold said in a letter, a very noble and excellent one and full of the deep and simple elements of human feeling ...
[16]
[PDF] El-Komy, M. Shebl (1978) The theme of alienation in Matthew Arnold ...
Arnold, however, in selecting the actions of Sohrab and Rustum from. Persian ... elevated language of the sestet, with its subtle interplay of consonants,.<|separator|>
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Sohrab and Rustum | The Poetry Foundation
Through the black tents he pass'd, o'er that low strand,. And to a hillock came, a little back. From the stream's brink—the spot where first a boat,.
[18]
[PDF] THE HERO IN THE POETRY OF MATTHEW ARNOLD APPROVED: -v
The beautiful discription of the Oxus river at the closing of "Sohrab and Rustum" is an integral part of the message of Stoicism contained in the poem. The Oxus ...
[19]
None
Summary of each segment:
[20]
Notes for Matthew Arnold's "Sohrab and Rustum: An Episode" (1853)
Jan 2, 2013 · This is the symbolic significance of the role of Oxus river in the Persian episode in which Arnold narrates the life and death of Sohrub and ...
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Sohrab and Rustum - Matthew Arnold's Spectacle - Academia.edu
Matthew Arnold's 'Sohrab and Rustum' critiques the hegemony of visual aesthetics in 19th-century culture. The poem employs approximately twenty epic similes to ...<|control11|><|separator|>
[22]
A journey to the source of Arnold's Oxus - Lugubelinus
Jul 2, 2020 · An essay on my favourite English-language poem, Sohrab and Rustum by Matthew Arnold, from the TLS quite a few years ago.
[23]
Sohrab and Rustum: Analysis of Major Characters | Research Starters
"Sohrab and Rustum" centers on the tragic relationship between Sohrab, a young and mighty warrior of the Tartar army, and Rustum, his father and a legendary ...
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[PDF] Anthropocentrism in Matthew Arnold's poem the death of sohrab
ABSTRACT. The present paper aims to explore the theme of Anthropocentrism reflected in Matthew Arnold's poem 'The Death of Sohrab.Missing: preface episodic
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The surprisingly modern Arthur Hugh Clough | Craig Raine
Oct 16, 2020 · “Sohrab and Rustum” derives from Homer and Firdausi's Persian epic ... Clough reviewed Arnold's Poems (1853) in the North American Review ...
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Some major critics of the period (V) - Cambridge University Press
He based his 1853 poem 'Sohrab and Rustum' on an incident from the heroic ... Yet despite its refreshing style and realistic sensibility, it soon became a dated ...Missing: archaic | Show results with:archaic
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[PDF] A Short History of English Literature, Second Edition
Sep 14, 2024 · ... Sohrab and Rustum', a sombre and stately 'epic' fragment. The ... Vitai Lampada' ('There's a breathless hush in the Close tonight') has ...
[28]
Untitled
Arnold's sensitivity concerning 'Sohrab and Rustum' during the composition process and his eagerness to seize upon praise of the poem after its publication ...
[29]
Arnold's "Balder Dead" on JSTOR
Clyde de L. Ryals, Arnold's "Balder Dead", Victorian Poetry, Vol. 4 ... C. B. Tinker and H. F. Lowry (London, 1950). 67 ... for Sohrab and Rustum We may be sure ...
[30]
Orientalism in the Victorian Era
### Summary of Matthew Arnold's *Sohrab and Rustum* in Relation to Imperialism, Cultural Clash, and Orientalism
[31]
MATTHEW ARNOLD AND THE LOSS OF THE FEMININE - jstor
"Sohrab and Rustum" is in fact a kind of double suicide. The "puny girl ... hypothetically and evanescently, fuses male and female. The disguise.
[32]
Celebrated actors join cast for musical play on Rustam and Sohrab
May 29, 2024 · The story of Rustam and Sohrab from the Shahnameh is a poignant and tragic tale of a father and son unknowingly facing each other in a battle ...
[33]
Battle of the Kings: Rostam & Sohrab (2012) - IMDb
Rating 5.5/10 (229) Story of Rostam,king of Iran trying to save his land from enemies.But then he found himself fighting against Sohrab,his own son.
[34]
Unexpected Reversals – What I remember from the 'Victor'
Jan 4, 2013 · I remembered the unlikely adaptation of Arnold's poem into a Victor series, which appeared under the title “Sohrab the Warrior” between August ...
[35]
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[36]
Opinion | Upon the Aral Sea - The New York Times
Jan 17, 1989 · The calamity that has befallen the Aral Sea and the river Oxus, renamed Amu Darya (editorial, Dec. 27), will sadden those who recall the closing ...Missing: environmental | Show results with:environmental