Kindred Voices: A Literary History of Medieval Anatolia. Michael Pifer (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2021). Pp. 320. $45.00 hardcover. ISBN: 9780300250398

Abstract

that allusions suggest between Iranian and Islamic culture, between different love stories, and among prophets. Although the Persian ghazal is typically homoerotic, many of the legendary pairs of lovers are in fact heteroerotic, and the allusion to narrative verse romances in Persian in the lyric ghazal entails both contrast and connection between these distinct genres. Among prophets, Joseph plays a significant role in articulating desire for a beloved or a patron, and Brookshaw points out that the written, oral, and aural experience of the ghazal relied on the audience’s knowledge of history, legend, and scripture, just as one who reads or listens to the Qurʾan may draw on knowledge of the stories of the prophets. In conclusion, Brookshaw argues that Hafiz along with his contemporaries Jahan Malak Khatun and ‘Ubayd Zakani disrupted the binaries of erotic roles and mystical and nonmystical interpretation, and intersecting devotion to a beloved, a patron, or the city of Shiraz. Based on his distinction between modern and medieval perspectives, one might believe that such binaries existed in medieval culture but had gained an exaggerated significance in the poet’s contemporary times. Brookshaw’s persuasive response to ongoing debates about interpretation and the thoughtful discussion of selections of poetry by Hafiz and his contemporaries (which are included in the main text in Persian and in translations that are both accurate and pleasant to read) make this book an important contribution to the study of the ghazal in Persian and other languages.