The Poetry of Hafiz of Shiraz
Hafiz in Persian
Over the centuries there have been many attempts to
translate the subtleties of Hafiz's Persian verse into English. By
all accounts even the best translations have been only partially
successful. For those who have the ability to read Persian or modern
Farsi, a partial collection of Hafiz, in the original Persian, is
available online in PDF file format. click here
to download your copy of this free collection.
Comparing Translations
To get an
idea of how different translators may emphasize very different aspects of
a particular ghazal, click here and take a
brief tour of eight different translations of the same ghazal.
The featured ghazal is the very first one in
the divan of Hafiz.
Translators
(Some of these authors
have translated Hafiz directly from the Persian, others have adapted their
poetry from the work of other translators. For the sake of
convenience, we have made no distinction here between the two.)
Free
Poetry
Click
on a translators name to see an example of one of their English language
versions of a Persian ghazal composed by Hafiz.
A.
J. Alston
A. J. Arberry
Peter
Avery and John Heath-Stubbs
Coleman
Barks
Gertrude Bell
H.
Wilberforce Clarke
Elizabeth Gray
Abbas
Aryanpur Kashani
Daniel Ladinsky
James
R. Newell
Haleh
Pourafzal and Roger Montgomery
Paul
Smith