Zindagī va zamānah-yi Malik Khātūn: (maḥbūb-i Ḥāfiẓ-i Shīrāzī) va barguzīdah-yi chand ghazal-i ʻāshiqānah

Zindagī va zamānah-i Malik Khātūn reconstructs the life and literary setting of Jahān Malik Khātūn, a fourteenth-century Persian poet whose dīvān preserves one of the most substantial bodies of verse by a woman from the medieval Iranian world. Asad Allāh ʻImādī brings together reports, biographical traditions and readings of the poetry to discuss her family background, courtly environment, education and position within the political and cultural life of Injuid Shīrāz. Particular attention is given to her poetic relationship with Ḥāfiẓ, the possibility of mutual influence and the shared conventions through which both poets fashioned desire, separation, memory and praise. The study also addresses the transmission and rediscovery of Malik Khātūn's work and the problems involved in recovering a woman poet's voice from fragmentary evidence. A concluding selection of love ghazals allows readers to encounter the imagery, rhetoric and emotional range on which the critical discussion is based.