Bahar, Muhammad Taqi Malik Al-Shuara

Born Dec. 10, 1886, in Meshed; died Apr. 21, 1951, in Tehran. Iranian poet, scholar in philology, and public figure. Professor at the University of Tehran from 1935.

Bahar was a son of Malik al-Shuara (King of the Poets) Muhammad Kazam Saburi, official court poet at the shrine of Imam Reza in Meshed. Bahar took the place of his father after the latter’s death. During the Iranian Revolution of 1905–11 he took part in the antifeudal and anti-imperialist struggle. His poems “Iran is the Blessed of God” (1909) and “Message to Sir Edward Gray” won him fame. His poems and articles were directed against reaction and religious fanaticism (“Hell,” “Grief from the Nobility,” and others). He favored the renewal of Persian literature. In 1932 he was banished to Isfahan for his antimonarchist poems. While in Isfahan he wrote his best works on social themes: the collection Prison Writings, the poem “Nightingale,” and the three-volume work Stylistics. Between 1941 and 1951, Bahar wrote the poems “Pages of History” and “Curse on England,” the narrative poem Owl of War, and articles on Lenin and on the Russian revolution. He devoted a great deal of effort to preparing for publication a literary legacy in the Persian language. In 1943 he became a member of the Iranian Society for Cultural Relations with the USSR. In 1950 he became head of the Society of Iranian Partisans of Peace.