Laila Wal-Majnoon in the Arabic and Persian Literature: A Comparative Study

Abstract

Qais and Laila are the heroes of genuine love who became very famous

in the Arab Badia (Desert). The first who were affected by this story were

the people of Persia thanks to the nature of neighborhood and mixture

between the two nations which went deep in the remote past. So, we see that

this story is changing from the genre of genuine love in Arabic literature

into safest love as a Persian literary genre .Thus, we find that the safest

nature is the one which shaped this love story, giving it its name: Laila walmajnoon

(Laila and the fanatic lover).the writers of literature in Persia

changed some of the events in the story but kept the most important ones.

Even the characters of the story witnessed some changes that will be clarified

during this research.

This research comes within the context of the comparative study for the

story of: Laila wal-majnoon in the Arabic and Persian literature. The study

first talks about the historical relationships between the two people then

about the relationships between the Arabic and Persian literature.

The researcher narrated the story of Majnoon Laila (the fanatic lover of

Laila) in old literature, followed by some refrences talking about Laila walmajnoon

in the Persian literature for different poets such as: Nitham Al-

Kanjouri, Al-Jami, Ameer Khasro, Hatifi and others, so as to clarify the

image of the heroes of the story and the events that followed in the Arabic

Persian literature. After that, the researcher made a comparative study for

Laila wal-Majnoon in the two literatures, through which mutual effects

between both of them were found.