1.
History of literature
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Some recorded materials, such as compilations of data are not considered literature, and this article relates only to the evolution of the works defined above. Literature and writing, though connected, are not synonymous, scholars have often disagreed concerning when written record-keeping became more like literature than anything else, the definition is largely subjective. Moreover, given the significance of distance as a cultural isolator in earlier centuries, the historical development of literature did not occur at an even pace across the world. Much has been written, for example, about the destruction of the Library of Alexandria in the 1st century BC, the deliberate suppression of texts by organisations of either a spiritual or a temporal nature further shrouds the subject. Certain primary texts, however, may be isolated which have a role as literatures first stirrings. Many texts handed down by oral tradition over several centuries before they were fixed in form are difficult or impossible to date. The core of the Rigveda may date to the mid 2nd millennium BC, the Pentateuch is traditionally dated to the 15th century, although modern scholarship estimates its oldest part to date to the 10th century BC at the earliest. Homers Iliad and Odyssey date to the 8th century BC and mark the beginning of Classical Antiquity and they also stand in an oral tradition that stretches back to the late Bronze Age. The great Hindu epics were also transmitted orally, likely predating the Maurya period, the Classic of Poetry is the oldest existing collection of Chinese poetry, comprising 305 works by anonymous authors dating from the 11th to 7th centuries BC. The Chu Ci anthology is a volume of poems attributed to or considered to be inspired by Qu Yuans verse writing. Qu Yuan is the first author of verse in China to have his name associated to his work and is regarded as one of the most prominent figures of Romanticism in Chinese classical literature. The first great author on military tactics and strategy was Sun Tzu, among the earliest Chinese works of narrative history, Zuo Zhuan is a gem of classical Chinese prose. This work and the Shiji or Records of the Grand Historian, were regarded as the models by many generations of prose stylists in ancient China. The books that constitute the Hebrew Bible developed over roughly a millennium, the oldest texts seem to come from the eleventh or tenth centuries BCE, whilst most of the other texts are somewhat later. They are edited works, being collections of various sources intricately and carefully woven together, the Old Testament was compiled and edited by various men over a period of centuries, with many scholars concluding that the Hebrew canon was solidified by about the 3rd century BC. The works have been subject to various literary evaluations, friedrich Nietzsche wrote, “In the Jewish Old Testament, there are men, things and speeches in so grand a style that Greek and Indian literature have nothing to compare to it. One stands with awe and reverence before these tremendous remnants of what man once was, the taste for the Old Testament is a touchstone of greatness and smallness. ”Ancient Greek society placed considerable emphasis upon literature. Notable among later Greek poets was Sappho, who defined, in many ways, a playwright named Aeschylus changed Western literature forever when he introduced the ideas of dialogue and interacting characters to playwriting
2.
Ancient Egyptian literature
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Ancient Egyptian literature was written in the Egyptian language from ancient Egypts pharaonic period until the end of Roman domination. It represents the oldest corpus of Egyptian literature, along with Sumerian literature, it is considered the worlds earliest literature. Writing in ancient Egypt—both hieroglyphic and hieratic—first appeared in the late 4th millennium BC during the phase of predynastic Egypt. It was not until the early Middle Kingdom that a narrative Egyptian literature was created and this was a media revolution which, according to Richard B. However, it is possible that the literacy rate was less than one percent of the entire population. The creation of literature was thus an elite exercise, monopolized by a scribal class attached to government offices, However, there is no full consensus among modern scholars concerning the dependence of ancient Egyptian literature on the sociopolitical order of the royal courts. Middle Egyptian, the language of the Middle Kingdom, became a classical language during the New Kingdom. Scribes of the New Kingdom canonized and copied many literary texts written in Middle Egyptian, some genres of Middle Kingdom literature, such as teachings and fictional tales, remained popular in the New Kingdom, although the genre of prophetic texts was not revived until the Ptolemaic period. Popular tales included the Story of Sinuhe and The Eloquent Peasant, while important teaching texts include the Instructions of Amenemhat and The Loyalist Teaching. By the New Kingdom period, the writing of graffiti on sacred temple and tomb walls flourished as a unique genre of literature. The acknowledgment of rightful authorship remained important only in a few genres, while texts of the genre were pseudonymous. Ancient Egyptian literature has been preserved on a variety of media. This includes papyrus scrolls and packets, limestone or ceramic ostraca, wooden writing boards, monumental stone edifices, Texts preserved and unearthed by modern archaeologists represent a small fraction of ancient Egyptian literary material. The area of the floodplain of the Nile is under-represented because the moist environment is unsuitable for the preservation of papyri, on the other hand, hidden caches of literature, buried for thousands of years, have been discovered in settlements on the dry desert margins of Egyptian civilization. By the Early Dynastic Period in the late 4th millennium BC, Egyptian hieroglyphs, Egyptian hieroglyphs are small artistic pictures of natural objects. The Narmer Palette, dated c.3100 BC during the last phase of Predynastic Egypt, combines the hieroglyphs for catfish and chisel to produce the name of King Narmer. The Egyptians called their hieroglyphs words of god and reserved their use for exalted purposes, such as communicating with divinities, each hieroglyphic word represented both, a specific object and embodied the essence of that object, recognizing it as divinely made and belonging within the greater cosmos. Through acts of priestly ritual, like burning incense, the priest allowed spirits, mutilating the hieroglyph of a venomous snake, or other dangerous animal, removed a potential threat
3.
Chinese literature
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In more modern times, the author Lu Xun is considered the founder of baihua literature in China. An attempt at tracing the genealogy of Chinese literature to religious spells, there is a wealth of early Chinese literature dating from the Hundred Schools of Thought that occurred during the Eastern Zhou Dynasty. The most important of these include the Classics of Confucianism, of Daoism, of Mohism, of Legalism, as well as works of military science and Chinese history. Note that, except for the books of poems and songs, most of this literature is philosophical and didactic, however, these texts maintained their significance through both their ideas and their prose style. These nine books therefore became the center of the educational system and they have been grouped into two categories, the Five Classics, allegedly commented and edited by Confucius, and the Four Books. Other important philosophical works include the Mohist Mozi, which taught inclusive love as both an ethical and social principle, and Hanfeizi, one of the central Legalist texts, important Daoist classics include the Dao De Jing, the Zhuangzi, and the Classic of the Perfect Emptiness. Later authors combined Daoism with Confucianism and Legalism, such as Liu An, among the classics of military science, The Art of War by Sun Tzu was perhaps the first to outline guidelines for effective international diplomacy. It was also the first in a tradition of Chinese military treatises, such as the Wujing Zongyao, the Chinese kept consistent and accurate court records after the year 841 BC, with the beginning of the Gonghe Regency of the Western Zhou Dynasty. The earliest known history of China was the Zuo Zhuan, which was compiled no later than 389 BC. The Book of Documents included early information on geography in the Yu Gong chapter, the oldest extant dictionary in China is the Erya, dated to the 3rd century BC, anonymously written but with later commentary by the historian Guo Pu. Other early dictionaries include the Fangyan by Yang Xiong and the Shuowen Jiezi by Xu Shen, one of the largest was the Kangxi Dictionary compiled by 1716 under the auspices of the Kangxi Emperor, it provides definitions for over 47,000 characters. This groundbreaking text laid the foundation for Chinese historiography and the many official Chinese historical texts compiled for each dynasty thereafter and this was often difficult for the official dynastic historians, who used historical works to justify the reign of the current dynasty. Large encyclopedias were also produced in China through the ages, the Yiwen Leiju encyclopedia was completed by Ouyang Xun in 624 during the Tang Dynasty, with aid from scholars Linghu Defen and Chen Shuda. This included the Extensive Records of the Taiping Era, the Imperial Readings of the Taiping Era, the Finest Blossoms in the Garden of Literature, the rich tradition of Chinese poetry began with two influential collections. In northern China, the Shijing or Classic of Poetry comprises over 300 poems in a variety of styles ranging from those with a suggestion of folk music to ceremonial hymns. The word shi has the meaning of poem or poetry. Confucius is traditionally credited with editing the Shijing and its stately verses are usually composed of couplets with lines of four characters each, and a formal structure of end rhymes. Many of these early poems establish the tradition of starting with a description of nature that leads into emotionally expressive statements, known as bi, xing
4.
Indian literature
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Indian literature refers to the literature produced on the Indian subcontinent until 1947 and in the Republic of India thereafter. The Republic of India has 22 officially recognized languages, the earliest works of Indian literature were orally transmitted. Sanskrit literature begins with the literature of the Rig Veda a collection of sacred hymns dating to the period 1500–1200 BCE. The Sanskrit epics Ramayana and Mahabharata appeared towards the end of the first millennium BCE, Classical Sanskrit literature developed rapidly during the first few centuries of the first millennium BCE, as did the Tamil Sangam literature, and the Pāli Canon. In the medieval period, literature in Kannada and Telugu appeared in the 9th and 11th centuries respectively, later, literature in Marathi, Odia, Bengali, various dialects of Hindi, Persian and Urdu began to appear as well. Early in the 20th century, Bengali poet Rabindranath Tagore became Indias first Nobel laureate, in contemporary Indian literature, there are two major literary awards, these are the Sahitya Akademi Fellowship and the Jnanpith Award. Examples of early works written in Vedic Sanskrit include the holy Hindu texts, other examples include the Sulba Sutras, which are some of the earliest texts on geometry. Ved Vyasas Mahabharata and Valmikis Ramayana, written in Epic Sanskrit, are regarded as the greatest Sanskrit epics, the famous poet and playwright Kālidāsa wrote one epic, Raghuvamsha, it was written in Classical Sanskrit rather than Epic Sanskrit. Other examples of written in Classical Sanskrit include the Pāṇinis Ashtadhyayi which standardized the grammar. The Laws of Manu is an important text in Hinduism, some other famous plays were Mricchakatika by Shudraka, Svapna Vasavadattam by Bhasa, and Ratnavali by Sri Harsha. Later poetic works include Geeta Govinda by Jayadeva, some other famous works are Chanakyas Arthashastra and Vatsyayanas Kamasutra. The most notable Prakrit languages were the Jain Prakrit, Pali, Maharashtri, one of the earliest extant Prakrit works is Hālas anthology of poems in Maharashtri, the Gāhā Sattasaī, dating to the 3rd to 5th century CE. Kālidāsa and Harsha also used Maharashtri in some of their plays, in Jainism, many Svetambara works were written in Maharashtri. Many of Aśvaghoṣas plays were written in Shauraseni as were a number of Jain works. Canto 13 of the Bhaṭṭikāvya is written in what is called like the vernacular, the Pali Canon is mostly of Indian origin. Later Pali literature however was produced outside of the mainland Indian subcontinent, particularly in Sri Lanka. Pali literature includes Buddhist philosophical works, poetry and some grammatical works, major works in Pali are Jataka tales, Dhammapada, Atthakatha, and Mahavamsa. Some of the major Pali grammarians were Kaccayana, Moggallana and Vararuci, the Charyapadas are often cited as the earliest example of Assamese literature
5.
Vedic and Sanskrit literature
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There are contemporary efforts towards revival, with events like the All-India Sanskrit Festival holding composition contests. Some Sanskrit literature such as the Yoga-Sutras of Patanjali and the Upanishads were translated into Arabic and Persian, the Panchatantra was also translated into Persian. Composed between approximately 1500 BCE and 600 BCE in pre-classical Sanskrit, Vedic oral literature forms the basis for the development of Hinduism. There are four Vedas - Rig, Yajur, Sāma and Atharva, each with a main Samhita, the main period of Vedic literary activity falls into c. the 9th to 7th centuries when the various shakhas compiled and memorized their respective corpora. The oldest surviving manuscript of a composed in Sanskrit is the Devi Māhātmya on Palm-leaf dating from the 11th century CE. The older Upanishads belong to the Vedic period, but the part of the Muktika canon is post-Vedic. The Aranyakas form part of both the Brahmana and Upanishad corpus, in the Vedanga disciplines of grammar and phonetics, no author had greater influence than Pāṇini with his Aṣṭādhyāyī. Being prescriptive for all later works, such as Patanjalis Mahābhāṣya. The Backus–Naur form or BNF grammars used to describe modern programming languages have significant similarities with Paninis grammar rules and they are known as itihasa, or history. While not as long as the Mahabharata, the Ramayana is still twice as long as the Iliad, traditionally, the authorship is attributed to the Hindu sage Valmiki, who is referred to as Adikavi, or first poet. In the Ramayana, the meter was introduced for the first time. Like the Mahabharata, the Ramayana was also handed down orally and it includes tales that form the basis for modern Hindu festivals and even contains a description of the same marriage practice still observed in contemporary times by people of Hindu persuasion. The story deals with Prince Rama, his exile and the abduction of his wife by the Rakshasa king Ravana, similar to the Mahabharata, the Ramayana also has several full-fledged stories appearing as sub-plots. The Ramayana has also played a similar and equally important role in the development of Indian, the Ramayana is also extant in Southeast Asian versions. The Mahabharata is one of the longest poetic works in the world, while it is clearly a poetic epic, it contains large tracts of Hindu mythology, philosophy and religious tracts. Traditionally, authorship of the Mahabharata is attributed to the sage Vyasa, the broad sweep of the story of the Mahabharata chronicles the story of the conflict between two families for control of Hastinapur, a city in ancient India. The impact of the Mahabharata on India and Hinduism can hardly be overstated, having been molded by Indian culture, it has in turn molded the development of Indian culture. Thousands of later writers would draw freely from the story and sub-stories of the Mahabharata, Sanskrit also became a major language for Indian religions such as Buddhism and Jainism
6.
Byzantine literature
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Byzantine literature is the Greek literature of the Middle Ages, whether written in the territory of the Byzantine Empire or outside its borders. It forms the second period in the history of Greek literature, though popular Byzantine literature and early Modern Greek literature and this practice was perpetuated by a long-established system of Greek education where rhetoric was a leading subject. A typical product of this Byzantine education was the Greek Church Fathers, consequently, the vast Christian literature of the 3rd to 6th centuries established a synthesis of Hellenic and Christian thought. In addition, this style was also removed from the Koine Greek language of the New Testament, reaching back to Homer. In this manner, the culture of the Byzantine Empire was marked for over 1000 years by a diglossy between two different forms of the language, which were used for different purposes. However, the relations between the high and low forms of Greek changed over the centuries, the political recovery of the 9th century instigated a literary revival, in which a conscious attempt was made to recreate the Hellenic-Christian literary culture of late antiquity. Simple or popular Greek was avoided in literary use and many of the saints lives were rewritten in an archaizing style. By the 12th century the cultural confidence of the Byzantine Greeks led them to new literary genres, such as romantic fiction, in which adventure. Satire made occasional use of elements from spoken Greek, at the same time there was the beginning of a flourishing literature in an approximation to the vernacular Modern Greek. However the vernacular literature was limited to poetic romances and popular devotional writing, all serious literature continued to make use of the archaizing language of learned Greek tradition. Byzantine literature has two sources, Classical Greek and Orthodox Christian tradition, each of those sources provided a series of models and references for the Byzantine writer and his readers. The oldest of three civilizations is the Greek, centered not in Athens but in Alexandria and Hellenistic civilization. Alexandria through this period is the center of both Atticizing scholarship and of Graeco-Judaic social life, looking towards Athens as well as towards Jerusalem and this intellectual dualism between the culture of scholars and that of the people permeates the Byzantine period. Both tendencies persisted in Byzantium, but the first, as the one officially recognized, retained predominance and was not driven from the field until the fall of the empire, the reactionary linguistic movement known as Atticism supported and enforced this scholarly tendency. Alexandria, the center, is balanced by Rome, the center of government. It is as a Roman Empire that the Byzantine state first entered history, its citizens were known as Romans and its laws were Roman, so were its government, its army, and its official class, and at first also its language and its private and public life. The organization of the state was similar to that of the Roman imperial period, including its hierarchy. It was in Alexandria that Graeco-Oriental Christianity had its birth, on Egyptian soil monasticism began and thrived
7.
Japanese literature
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Early works of Japanese literature were heavily influenced by cultural contact with China and Chinese literature, often written in Classical Chinese. Indian literature also had an influence through the Diffusion of Buddhism in Japan, since Japan reopened its ports to Western trading and diplomacy in the 19th century, Western and Eastern literature have strongly affected each other and continue to do so. Before the introduction of kanji from China, Japanese had no writing system and it is believed that Chinese characters came to Japan at the very beginning of the fifth century, brought by immigrants from the mainland of Korean and Chinese descent. Chinese characters were further adapted, creating what is known as manyōgana. The earliest literary works in Japan were created in the Nara period, one of the stories they describe is the tale of Urashima Tarō. The Heian period has been referred to as the era of art. During this era, literature became centered on an elite of nobility. The imperial court patronized the poets, most of whom were courtiers or ladies-in-waiting. Reflecting the aristocratic atmosphere, the poetry was elegant and sophisticated and expressed emotions in a rhetorical style, editing the resulting anthologies of poetry soon became a national pastime. The iroha poem, now one of two standard orderings for the Japanese syllabary, was developed during the early Heian period. Genji Monogatari written in the early 11th century by a woman named Murasaki Shikibu is considered the pre-eminent masterpiece of Heian fiction, other important writings of this period include the Kokin Wakashū, a waka-poetry anthology, and Makura no Sōshi. The Pillow Book was written by Sei Shōnagon, Murasaki Shikibus contemporary and rival, as an essay about the life, loves, another notable piece of fictional Japanese literature was Konjaku Monogatarishū, a collection of over a thousand stories in 31 volumes. The volumes cover various tales from India, China and Japan, the 10th-century Japanese narrative, Taketori Monogatari, can be considered an early example of proto-science fiction. The protagonist of the story, Kaguya-hime, is a princess from the Moon who is sent to Earth for safety during a celestial war and she is later taken back to her extraterrestrial family in an illustrated depiction of a disc-shaped flying object similar to a flying saucer. During the Kamakura period, Japan experienced many civil wars led to the development of a warrior class, and subsequent war tales, histories. Work from this period is notable for its more sombre tone compared to the works of previous eras, with themes of life and death, simple lifestyles, and redemption through killing. A representative work is Heike monogatari, an account of the struggle between the Minamoto and Taira clans for control of Japan at the end of the twelfth century. Other important tales of the period include Kamo no Chōmeis Hōjōki, despite a decline in the importance of the imperial court, aristocratic literature remained the center of Japanese culture in the beginning of the Kamakura period
8.
Kannada literature
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Kannada literature is the corpus of written forms of the Kannada language, a member of the Dravidian family spoken mainly in the Indian state of Karnataka and written in the Kannada script. Attestations in literature span something like one and a half millennia, with some literary works surviving in rich manuscript traditions. Although much of the prior to the 18th century was religious. The Veerashaiva movement of the 12th century created new literature which flourished alongside the Jain works, after the decline of the Vijayanagara empire in the 16th century, Kannada literature was supported by the various rulers, including the Wodeyars of the Kingdom of Mysore and the Nayakas of Keladi. In the 19th century, some forms, such as the prose narrative, the novel. In the early period and beginning of the period, between the 9th and 13th centuries, writers were predominantly Jains and Lingayats. Jains were the earliest known cultivators of Kannada literature, which dominated until the 12th century. Jain authors wrote about Tirthankaras and other aspects of religion, the Veerashaiva authors wrote about Shiva, his 25 forms, and the expositions of Shaivism. Lingayat poets belonging to the vachana sahitya tradition advanced the philosophy of Basava from the 12th century, thereafter, Lingayat and Vaishnava writers dominated Kannada literature. Vaishnava writers focused on the Hindu epics - the Ramayana, the Mahabharata, the devotional songs of the Haridasa poets, performed to music, were first noted in the 15th century. Writings on secular subjects remained popular throughout this period, writings eulogising kings, commanders and spiritual heroes waned, with a proportional increase in the use of local genres. The champu Sanskritic metre was the most popular written form from the 9th century onwards, other Sanskritic metres used were the saptapadi, the ashtaka and the shataka. There were numerous translations and adaptations of Sanskrit writings into Kannada and, to a lesser extent, the medieval period saw the development of literary metres indigenous to the Kannada language. These included the tripadi, one of the oldest native metres, the shatpadi, of six types exist, the ragale, the sangatya. There were rare interactions with Tamil literature, as well, though religious literature was prominent, literary genres including romance, fiction, erotica, satire, folk songs, fables and parables, musical treatises and musical compositions were popular. The topics of Kannada literature included grammar, philosophy, prosody, rhetoric, chronicles, biography, history, drama and cuisine, as well as dictionaries and encyclopedias. According to critic Joseph T. Shipley, over fifty works on subjects including medicine, mathematics. Kannada literature of this period was written on palm leaves
9.
Old English literature
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Old English literature or Anglo-Saxon literature, encompasses literature written in Old English, in Anglo-Saxon England from the 7th century to the decades after the Norman Conquest of 1066. The Peterborough Chronicle can also be considered a text, continuing into the 12th century. The poem Beowulf, which begins the traditional canon of English literature, is the most famous work of Old English literature. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle has also significant for historical study, preserving a chronology of early English history. In all there are over 400 surviving manuscripts from the period, besides Old English literature, Anglo-Saxons wrote a number of Anglo-Latin works. Later, on account of the work of Bernard F. Huppé, a large number of manuscripts remain from the Anglo-Saxon period, with most written during its last 300 years, in both Latin and the vernacular. There were considerable losses of manuscripts as a result of the Dissolution of the Monasteries in the 16th century, Scholarly study of the language began in the reign of Queen Elizabeth I when Matthew Parker and others obtained whatever manuscripts they could. There are four major poetic manuscripts, The Junius manuscript, also known as the Cædmon manuscript, is a collection of poems on biblical narratives. The Exeter Book is an anthology, located in the Exeter Cathedral since it was donated there in the 11th century, the Vercelli Book contains both poetry and prose, it is not known how it came to be in Vercelli. The Beowulf Manuscript, sometimes called the Nowell Codex, contains prose and poetry, typically dealing with monstrous themes, including Beowulf. Seven major scriptoria produced a good deal of Old English manuscripts, Winchester, Exeter, Worcester, Abingdon, Durham, regional dialects include, Northumbrian, Mercian, Kentish, and the main dialect, West Saxon. Some Old English text survives on parchment, stone structures, Old English poetry falls broadly into two styles or fields of reference, the heroic Germanic and the Christian. Almost all Old English poets are anonymous, although there are Anglo-Saxon discourses on Latin prosody, the rules of Old English verse are understood only through modern analysis of the extant texts. The first widely accepted theory was constructed by Eduard Sievers, who distinguished five distinct alliterative patterns and his system of alliterative verse is based on accent, alliteration, the quantity of vowels, and patterns of syllabic accentuation. It consists of five permutations on a base verse scheme, any one of the five types can be used in any verse, the system was inherited from and exists in one form or another in all of the older Germanic languages. Alternative theories have proposed, such as the theory of John C. Pope, which musical notation to track the verse patterns. J. R. R. Tolkien describes and illustrates many of the features of Old English poetry in his 1940 essay On Translating Beowulf
10.
Persian literature
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Persian literature is one of the worlds oldest literatures. It spans two-and-a-half millennia, though much of the material has been lost. For instance, Mowlana Rumi, one of best-loved Persian poets, born in Balkh or Vakhsh, wrote in Persian, the Ghaznavids conquered large territories in Central and South Asia and adopted Persian as their court language. There is thus Persian literature from Iran, Mesopotamia, Azerbaijan, not all Persian literature is written in Persian, as some consider works written by ethnic Persians in other languages, such as Greek and Arabic, to be included. The bulk of surviving Persian literature, however, comes from the following the Islamic conquest of Iran c.650 CE. After the Abbasids came to power, the Iranians became the scribes and bureaucrats of the Islamic empire and, increasingly, also its writers and poets. The New Persian literature arose and flourished in Khorasan and Transoxiana because of political reasons——the early Iranian dynasties such as Tahirids and Samanids were based in Khorasan, Iranians wrote in both Persian and Arabic, Persian predominated in later literary circles. Persian poets such as Ferdowsi, Sadi, Hafiz, Attar, Nezami, Rumi, very few literary works of Achaemenid Iran have survived, due partly to the destruction of the library at Persepolis. Most of what remains consists of the inscriptions of Achaemenid kings, particularly Darius I. Many Zoroastrian writings were destroyed in the Islamic conquest of Iran in the 7th century, the Parsis who fled to India, however, took with them some of the books of the Zoroastrian canon, including some of the Avesta and ancient commentaries thereof. Some works of Sassanid geography and travel also survived, albeit in Arabic translations, no single text devoted to literary criticism has survived from Pre-Islamic Iran. However, some essays in Pahlavi, such as Ayin-e name nebeshtan, some researchers have quoted the Shoubiyye as asserting that the Pre-Islamic Iranians had books on eloquence, such as Karvand. No trace remains of such books, there are some indications that some among the Persian elite were familiar with Greek rhetoric and literary criticism. While initially overshadowed by Arabic during the Umayyad and early Abbasid caliphates, New Persian soon became a literary language again of the Central Asian, in short, the ability to write in verse form was a pre-requisite for any scholar. For example, almost half of Avicennas medical writings are in verse, works of the early era of Persian poetry are characterized by strong court patronage, an extravagance of panegyrics, and what is known as سبک فاخر exalted in style. The tradition of patronage began perhaps under the Sassanid era. The Qasida was perhaps the most famous form of panegyric used, khorasani style, whose followers mostly were associated with Greater Khorasan, is characterized by its supercilious diction, dignified tone, and relatively literate language. The chief representatives of this lyricism are Asjadi, Farrukhi Sistani, Unsuri, panegyric masters such as Rudaki were known for their love of nature, their verse abounding with evocative descriptions
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Bengali literature
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Bengali literature denotes the body of writings in the Bengali language. The earliest extant work in Bengali literature is the Charyapada, a collection of Buddhist mystic songs dating back to the 10th and 11th centuries, thereafter, the timeline of Bengali literature is divided into two periods − medieval and modern. Novels were introduced to Bengali literature in the mid-19th century, Rabindranath Tagore, poet, playwright, novelist, painter, essayist, musician, and social reformer, is the best known figure of Bengali literature to the world. He won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1913, after the post-partition era, Bengali literature comprises literature of erstwhile East Pakistan and modern-day Bangladesh and of West Bengal. The first works in Bengali, written in new Bengali, appeared between 10th and 12th centuries C. E and it is generally known as the Charyapada. These are mystic songs composed by various Buddhist seer-poets, Luipada, Kanhapada, Kukkuripada, Chatilpada, Bhusukupada, Kamlipada, Dhendhanpada, Shantipada, Shabarapada etc, the famous Bengali linguist Haraprasad Shastri discovered the palm leaf Charyapada manuscript in the Nepal Royal Court Library in 1907. Pre-Chaitanya or Early Vaishnava literature denotes the literature of the preceding the time of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu. Sri Krishna Kirtana was written by Boru Chandidas in the half of 14th century CE. It is considered as the second oldest work of Bengali literature after Charyapada, the 15th century is marked by the emergence of Vaishnava lyrical poetry or the padavali in Bengal. The poetry of Vidyapati, the great Maithili poet, though not written in Bengali and he flourished in the modern-day Darbhanga district of Bihar, India in the 14th century. His Vaishnava lyrics became very popular among the masses of Bengal, the first major Bengali poet to write Vaishnava lyrics was Chandidas, who belong to the modern-day Birbhum district, Paschimbanga in the 15th century. Chandidas is also known for his humanist proclamation—Sabar upare manush satya, tahar upare nai —The supreme truth is man, the Bengali translations of two great Sanskrit texts the Bhagavata Purana and the Ramayana played a crucial role in the development of Middle Bengali literature. Maladhar Basu’s Sri Krishna Vijaya, which is chiefly a translation of the 10th and 11th cantos of the Bhagavata Purana, is the earliest Bengali narrative poem that can be assigned to a definite date, Maladhar Basu flourished in the modern-day Bardhaman district of Paschimbanga in the 15th century. Composed between 1473 and 1480 C. E, Sri Krishna Vijaya is also the oldest Bengali narrative poem of the Krishna legend. The Ramayana, under the title of Sri Rama Panchali, more known as the Krittibasi Ramayana, was translated by Krittibas Ojha who belonged to the modern-day Nadia district. He also, like Maladhar Basu, flourished in the 15th century, post-Chaitanya or Late Vaishnava literature denotes the literature of the time succeeding the time of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu. These include, biographies of Chaitanya by Gaudiya Vaishnava scholar-poets and later Vaishnava Padavali with a subgenre based on the life of Chaitanya. Major figures of the Late Vaishnava literature are Krishnadasa Kaviraja, Vrindavana Dasa Thakura, Jayananda, Govindadasa, Jnandada, there are also minor Mangalkāvyas known as Shivāyana, Kālikā Mangal, Rāya Mangal, Shashtī Mangal, Sītalā Mangal and Kamalā Mangal etc
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