A few works of Persian literature survive from the pre-Islamic period, notably the Avesta, which is of literary as well as religious significance and a number of early Pahlavi works. The latter are mostly religious commentaries, with interesting fragments of poetry, and some secular. works which formed the basis of early modern Persian literature. Ferdowsi's Shahnameh, for example, is based on a Pahlavi original, unfortunately lost, like so much of what was undoubtedly an extremely rich literature.
Because of the similarities in the technical terminology of prosody it has long been assumed that Arabic poetics had a deep influence on the earliest Persian poets. But recent research has disproved this, and it is now realized that Persian poetics was primarily an indigenous development, and indeed exerted a powerful influence on the Arabic and Turkish poetic traditions. One of the greatest early poets was Rudaki, who not only wrote but accompanied and perhaps sang his compositions to the lyre, thus continuing a Sassanian tradition of minstrelsy from which the European troubadours indirectly derived their inspiration. Unfortunately little of Rudaki's work has survived.
Ferdowsi's great epic the Shahnameh, which combines mythology, royal saga, history and popular life, is not only the greatest single Persian poem, but a continuing force in the cultural and national awareness of all Iranians, and a work that has decisively influenced the development of literary Persian to this day. Ferdowsi wrote in rhymed couplets, a form that lent itself well to historical romance, particularly with Gorgani, Nezami and Jami, and was alsc used by some of the best mystic poets, the greatest of whom were Attar and Rumi.
Another popular form was the ghazal, aptly compared with the sonnet which came into vogue relatively late in Persian literary history. Hafez is the acknowledged master of the ghazal and perfected the traditions of his Sufi forebears, notably Sana'i and Sa'di (Saadi). The ruba'i or quatrain was ideally suited by its brevity to aphorisms anc glimpses of philosophic truth. The greatest exponent of the ruba'i was Omar Khayyam, whose Ruba'iyat was beautifully, but somewhat freely, rendered into English by FitzGerald, and more recently again by Robert Graves.
Modern Persian prose is also of great antiquity. The earliest known prose work is a late tenth-century translation of Tabari's Universal History, written in Arabic though by an Iranian scholar. Bal'ami, vizir to the Samanid ruler Mansur I, was the first to restore Persian as a language of scholarship. His example was gradually followed by others, for several generations Iranians continued to write scientific works in Arabic also, much the way Latin was the language of scholarship and science in medieval Europe. Early Persian prose consists mainly of historical texts, many of which are also of high literary value. Later, a tradition of philosophic and ethical prose writing developed, with advice to rulers, often written by kings or vizirs, being among the more interesting works. The greatest prose work of classical Persian literature is the Golestan of Sa'di, a didactic work in which prose and poetry merge.
The simple style of early Persiar prose gradually gave way to more com plex writing, much of which is only of interest to the literary historian today. A similar decadence occurred in poetry, and from the fifteenth century onwards there was a general decline in Persian literature, although the seven teenth-century "Indian" school, which originated in Iran but acquired its name because many of its best-known figure lived at the courts of the Moghul Emperors, is now enjoying a revival in favor.
In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries a literary renaissance occurred as poets and prose-writers returned to simpler styles, while keeping within the traditional forms. Popular language was introduced into literature and journalism, closely linked to libera lpolitics and social reform, made its appearance. Since World War II, Persian literature, influenced as much by Western trends as by Persian folklore and tradition, has experimented along completely new lines. The classical tradition has survived, but often appears stilted, while the innovators have produced few universally recognized talents. Clearly, Persian literature is undergoing a period of transition, the outcome of which remains to be seen.