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It is a must to read book. The Book of King is the book that helped Iranians to get through all the invasions to their country in the past 1,000 years.
This is an interesting read that corresponds with another excellent read: The Kite Runner. Excellent text.
The books are slightly bigger and thicker than I expected and the story is told in a very attractive way. Expensive of course, but a book of excellent quality. There are old miniatures on almost every page.
Through out the mythological portion of the book the author explores the concepts of what is observable reality (good, god) and contrasts that with unobservable conjecture or sorcery magic. Through these intermediaries the thought process borne in conversation brings the king to order just or unjust deeds reveals the prevailing philosophy.The lineage of Kayanid Kings of the House of Sasson begins with quick summaries of names from the family Kayumars beginning with Siamak who is killed by a black demon, and then Hushag's victory, where the Kayumars pursue and kill the black demon. While the lineage progresses through many kings, it is when you read of King Ardesher that you sense you are reading ancient history rather than myth. The author does this so that he can introduce the concept of a dark magic that clouds the mind of one who feels cheated. This book is about the lineage of Persian Kayanid Kings and the Persian House of Sasson.
In a reign of a king that expands or contracts finds in each battle the combatants making declarations towards the other as to why he shall prevail in the contest. As the family cypress tree branched the lineage of kings became difficult to track. To garner the philosophy conveyed in this book, the reader need only to pay attention to the dialogue between warriors, or between a king and his vizier. It is here that Ferdowsi begins the practice of dedicating whole chapters to one king's reign.
Every king has a vizier and a champion. With that lineage comes an evolving philosophy of man's thought from the perspective of justice and injustice. King Feraydon through his champion Zal who is blessed by the Zoroastrian Angel Smiorgh avenges the evil acts of his other two sons. A cheated mind draws on vengeance. Another received land in India, which would be today's Afghanistan, and Pakistan and the third Turan, which would be today's Turkmenistan. Feraydun's reign was the first to go into a bit more detail.
The early kings of Persia had much in common with early Arab kings and hence the family tree found relatives of mixed royal blood and the two peoples were very close, while rule still came from Persia. The primary way in which the Persian kingdom expanded was through a sitting King doling out frontier land to his sons.
All gains of kingdoms came either through war, marriage or the giving of a daughter. For an example one of the notable champions, Rostam declares to Gorgin.please to a keyword search for cigarroomofbooks.blog to read of my insights on the book and to share your opinion.
As Persia expanded its reach into India, China, and Turkmenistan they too came under the influence of Persia's King of Kings. It begins in a mythological setting and then over time evolves into a story that may have taken place in the time when Persia was great, concluding with the triumph of Islam over Persia.
The brothers that were ruling Turan and India felt they did not get the favored Persia and plotted to and did kill the son who received Yemen. In the beginning one son received Yemen, which would be today's Middle East.
The subtle clues would be when Ferdowsi describebes the king writing a letter in Palhavi, an ancient language. This fast moving chronology leaves Hushag to inherit the crown, as he is the one with the royal farr and the presence of a tall cypress tree who can think with clarity, all prerequisite to inheriting the throne.
I could complain mildly: I find the prose a bit too flat and short-winded for this subject-matter; and I'm not convinced that occasional bursts of rhyming couplets add much. So don't be in a rush to finish it, pace yourself. The "Iliad" happens almost in real time; but the "Shahnameh" follows Iran's legendary Royal Line over centuries from its origins: the first Kings are culture-heroes who teach men the use of fire, metals, medicine, weaving.Ancient epics crammed with unfamiliar names are not everyone's taste. But that would border on ingratitude: this is a wonderful book. This is poetry, concise and allusive, so stylised images replace gritty detail; psychological realism is absent and emotions are painted by numbers.Fairy-tale colours and seething incident compensate for the absence of that large-scale architecture that draws you through the "Iliad". Nobody has been very enthusiastic up till now, and so it must be up to me.
Who could resist a story that tells you, "He was like a tall cypress tree topped by the moon", or, "He gathered together fairies, leopards and lions".The "Shahnameh" or "Book of Kings" is one of the world's great epic poems; but the episodic structure, the frequent fantastic and supernatural elements, make it more like "Tales of King Arthur" than the "Iliad". Read a bit, leave it for a while and then come back to it.The truth that remains behind, as with all epic poetry, is the Invincibility of Fate, and Transience: the illusoriness of what seemed most real. I loved and adored this book. This book is very long, not repetitious but, let's say, uniform: it is all marzipan throughout. At last those of us too lazy to learn Farsi have some idea what the fuss was about. I was entranced from the very beginning.
For me, nothing beats these tales of a time when everything was bigger and brighter, as if the world had a childhood as well as individuals; when every morning was different and everything that happened was wondrous simply because it happened.
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