A diwan (from Persian ; ) is a collection of poems by a single author â usually excluding the poet's long poems â in Islamic cultures of West Asia, Central Asia, North Africa, Sicily and South Asia.
The vast majority of Diwan poetry was lyric in nature: either ghazals (or gazels, which make up the greatest part of the repertoire of the tradition) or kasîdes. There were, however, other common genres, most particularly the mesnevîâÂÂa kind of verse romance and thus a variety of narrative poetry; the two most notable examples of this form are the Layla and Majnun (ÃÂÃÂÃÂàààìÃÂÃÂÃÂ) of Fuzûlî and the Hüsn ü Aà Âk (ÃÂóààùôàâ 'Beauty and Love') of à Âeyh Gâlib.
Originating in Persian literature, the idea spread to the Arab, Turkic and Indic worlds, and the term was sometimes used in Europe, albeit not always in the same way.
The English usage of the phrase "diwan poetry" comes from the Persian word diwÃÂn () via Ottoman Turkish, and designated a list or register. The Persian word derived from the Persian dibir meaning writer or scribe. Diwan was also borrowed into Armenian, Georgian, Arabic, Urdu, Turkish. In Persian, Turkish and other languages the term diwan came to mean a collection of poems by a single author, as in selected works, or the whole body of work of a poet. Thus Diwan-e Mir would be the Collected works of Mir Taqi Mir and so on. The first use of the term in this sense is attributed to Rudaki.
The term divan was used in titles of poetic works in French, beginning in 1697, but was a rare and didactic usage, though one that was revived by its famous appearance in Goethe's WestâÂÂöstlicher Divan (Poems of West and East), a work published in 1819 that reflected the poet's abiding interest in Middle Eastern and specifically Persian literature.
This word has also been applied in a similar way to collections of Hebrew poetry and to poetry of al-Andalus.
Ottoman Divan poetry was a highly ritualized and symbolic art form. From the Persian poetry that largely inspired it, it inherited a wealth of symbols whose meanings and interrelationshipsâÂÂboth of similitude (àñçùçê ÃÂøÃÂñ mura'ât-i nazîr / êÃÂçóè tenâsüb) and opposition (êöçï tezâd)âÂÂwere more or less prescribed. Examples of prevalent symbols that, to some extent, oppose one another include, among others:
As the opposition of "the ascetic" and "the darvish" suggests, Divan poetryâÂÂmuch like Turkish folk poetryâÂÂwas heavily influenced by Sufi thought. One of the primary characteristics of Divan poetry, howeverâÂÂas of the Persian poetry before itâÂÂwas its mingling of the mystical Sufi element with a profane and even erotic element. Thus, the pairing of "the nightingale" and "the rose" simultaneously suggests two different relationships:
Similarly, "the world" refers simultaneously to the physical world and to this physical world considered as the abode of sorrow and impermanence, while "the rosegarden" refers simultaneously to a literal garden and to the garden of Paradise. "The nightingale", or suffering lover, is often seen as situatedâÂÂboth literally and figurativelyâÂÂin "the world", while "the rose", or beloved, is seen as being in "the rosegarden".
Divan poetry was composed through the constant juxtaposition of many such images within a strict metrical framework, thus allowing numerous potential meanings to emerge. A brief example is the following line of verse, or mñsra (àõñçù), by the 18th-century judge and poet Hayatî Efendi:
Here, the nightingale is only implied (as being the poet/lover), while the rose, or beloved, is shown to be capable of inflicting pain with its thorns (îçñ hâr). The world, as a result, is seen as having both positive aspects (it is a rosegarden, and thus analogous to the garden of Paradise) and negative aspects (it is a rosegarden full of thorns, and thus different from the garden of Paradise).
As for the development of Divan poetry over the more than 500 years of its existence, that isâÂÂas the Ottomanist Walter G. Andrews points outâÂÂa study still in its infancy; clearly defined movements and periods have not yet been decided upon. Early in the history of the tradition, the Persian influence was very strong, but this was mitigated somewhat through the influence of poets such as the Azerbaijani Imadaddin Nasimi (?âÂÂ1417?) and the Uyghur Ali-Shir Nava'i (1441âÂÂ1501), both of whom offered strong arguments for the poetic status of the Turkic languages as against the much-venerated Persian. Partly as a result of such arguments, Divan poetry in its strongest periodâÂÂfrom the 16th to the 18th centuriesâÂÂcame to display a unique balance of Persian and Turkish elements, until the Persian influence began to predominate again in the early 19th century.
Despite the lack of certainty regarding the stylistic movements and periods of Divan poetry, however, certain highly different styles are clear enough, and can perhaps be seen as exemplified by certain poets:
In Urdu poetry diwan are also a collection of poems, but here they are mainly ghazals.