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Iraj Bashiri
Iraj Bashiri is professor emeritus of history at the University of Minnesota, and one of the leading scholars in the fields of Central Asian studies and Iranian studies. Bashiri’s scholarly career begins with his dissertation that is based on Ibn Sina’s concept of existence. He shows that the verb budan (to be) has its own syntax. This syntax in the context of the concept of shodan (becoming) expresses transition, and in the context of kardan (doing) expresses action. Sentences are derived through the interaction and transformation of thought and the phenomenal world via this system.
Bashiri’s views regarding the internal structure of Hedayat’s Blind Owl are controversial. In 1974, concentrating on the word nag, he hypothesizes that a Buddhist subtext might underlie the narrative in the novella. In The Fiction of Sadeq Hedayat (1984), he shows how Hedayat uses the concept of transmigration of the soul from Tibetan death rituals to achieve the unearthly characters and the enigmatic mindset that bewilder the reader.
In the 1990s, the focus of Bashiri’s research shifts to Central Asia. Through the works of Sadriddin ‘Aini, especially ‘Aini’s Yoddoshtho (reminiscences), he explores life in the city of Bukhara and illustrates the intricacies of the socio-political situation of the Emirate on the eve of Soviet takeover. He analyzes Jamila and Farewell Gulsary!, novels by the Kyrgyz author Chingiz Aitmatov, in a similar manner.
Other authors to whose works Bashiri has applied structural analysis include Firdowsi, Hafiz, Rumi, and Jami. In Firdowsi’s Shahname, through the concept of the farr, he distinguishes the legendary Tur from Central Asia’s ethnic Turks. In the case of Hafiz, he shows how the poet uses the stations and states of the Tariqah to create ghazals (sonnet) that are at once popular and mystical.
In recent years, Bashiri has worked with Iranian identity, especially the transformation of ancient Iranian ideology from Zoroastrianism to Shi’ite Islam. In that context, he has authored Modern Iranian Philosophy: From Ibn Sina to Mulla Sadra Shirazi (2014). He is also the author of Ancient Iran: Cosmology, Mythology, History (2016), about the development of ancient Iranian identity; Modern Iran: Caliphs, Kings, and Jurisprudents (2017), about the contributions of Zoroastrianism to Shi’ite Islam; and The History of the Civil War in Tajikistan (2020), dealing with developments in the republic from the time of the Amirs of Bukhara until independence and post-civil war reconstruction. His most recent contribution is “Hedayat and Buddhism: The Blind Owl as a Complex Text,” in Hedayat on Religion (2023).
Contributions
Introduction This article has two objectives. It casts a look at the life and creative contributions of the Tajik poetess…
