World of Khusrau Innovations and Contributions (With a Music CD)
Contents: 1. Preface. 2. Introduction. 3. Life and legends. 4. Poet in the service of Sultans. 5. In praise of India. 6. Elements of stars and planets. 7. On Music. 8. As a mystic. 9. Chronology. 10. Glossary. 11. References.
Amir Khusrau Dehlvi a poet and scholar, is an iconic figure in the cultural history of the Indian subcontinent. This is the first book to comprehensively illustrate the vast range of Khusrau’s genius.
With diverse and insightful visual references it fully expands his work as they contribute to the making and continuity of Indo-Islamic cultural heritage.
Born as Ab’ul Hasan Yamin al-Din Khusrau in Patiali in present-day Uttar Pradesh, Amir Khusrau Dehlvi 1253-1325 AD went on to create the largest and most versatile corpus of literature in the Persianate world of his time and of today.
His dynamic personality had many facets—he was a great scholar, an eminent poet, a celebrated historian, a proved astrologer, a noted musician and a trusted statesman. Amir Khusrau studied and had an understanding of diverse knowledge ilm from science to religion which formed the core of medieval scholarships and intellectual developments in the 13th-century Muslim world, extending from Gibraltar to India. Though Amir Khusrau did not travel out of the region the destruction of the Muslim world by Chengiz Khan brought the best of those regions to India, with whom he interacted richly. The World of Khusrau: Innovations and contributions cites such interactions and elaborates on them in the context of India’s medieval history and its opulent cultural canvas, which saw the merging of the world’s two greatest civilizations—Hindu and Islamic.
This lavishly illustrated volume exemplifies the innovations and contributions of Amir Khusrau with a vast array of rare manuscripts, objects and images from several collections. It includes manuscripts of Amir Khusrau the Khamsa of Nizam Ganjavi in response to whom Khusrau wrote his own khamsa and works of many other eminent poets of the Persianate world who incited and influenced him. Their poetry inspired Amir Khusrau to compose a diverse body of literature comprising of masnavis qasidas, ghazals, ruba’ is and local vernacular verses and rhymes. At the same time, the book draws upon references from astronomy and astrology—to illustrate his knowledge of the celestials, music to trace his writings on music traditions and musical instruments of the time and the oral traditions which claim him as a great musician and innovator of many musical forms, Vedic traditions and Sanskrit literature-to support his respect for them, Indian seasons and flora and fauna to depict his love for India, and the historical and cultural environment of the many Delhi Sultans and nobles in whose service he spent his entire adult life. It concludes with Amir Khusrau as the mystic who continues to be venerated as the beloved of the 13th century Sufi Saint Hazrat Nizamuddin Auliya. (jacket)