In 1342AH, Persian-speaking readers came across a small book which had a new approach and was refreshing. Until then, Persian classical texts were considered to be old fashioned and had lost their social effect and no more of use for today’s readers. Many people believe that those books talk about an ancient world that has no resemblance to our modern and semi-modern world. But that little book showed how unreasonable and baseless such an assumption is, and taking a fresh look at ancient texts such as the Shahnameh is necessary. The book that created such excitement among readers was called “An Introduction to Rostam and Efandiar” and was written by a young writer named Shahrokh Meskoub.
Meskoob’s book soon became viral and gained respect among Iranian readers. By reading Meskoub’s book, they realized how much a text like the Shahnameh aligns with the passionate ideals of Iran’s intellectuals. As quoted from Kamran Fani, a famous bibliographer, who was himself one of the young readers of the time, “Meskoob’s book showed the young generation that one can become a friend and a confident of the Shahnameh and find his/her own ideals hidden in the verses and live a life like the heroes of the Shahnameh lived.’ Soon Meskoob’s book evoked passion, and thus he became famous.
Two years later, the UNESCO National Commission recognized Meskoub’s book as one of the year’s best books and gave its author an award. In his diaries, on Esfand 25, 1344, Meskoub wrote sarcastically and humorously about that award: “Yesterday, the Secretary General of the UNESCO National Commission called me and said: “The book, “Introduction to Rostam and Esfandiar” was presented to the commission and recognized as one of the best books of the year and a prize of $400, equivalent to 3,000 tomans, has been awarded to it. The first question that came to me was, who were the judges? He said: [Dr. Zabihollah] Safa and another Safa who is the head of the National Library (1) and Iraj Afshar and a few others. I was happy for an hour or two and wondered how these people chose my book, which does not fit with their inferences from literature and especially research work. I did not understand anything. Anyway, today at ten o’clock in the morning, a ceremony was held in the National Library. Dr Safa gave a speech and Hekmat gave out the awards and congratulated us, and we also thanked him, had tea and biscuits, and left. In these days of money shortage, 3,000 tomans can serve 3,000 purposes!”
Meskoob and his continuous Shahnameh research
Shahrokh Meskoob tirelessly read and did research on the Shahnameh till the last days of his life. He, as he wrote, sought to know his “spiritual identity.” Meskoub started reading the Shahnameh in high school and wrote several important and valuable books about it in his youth and middle age.
In his youth Meskoob got caught in the political events of the time, was arrested in 1332 (1953) and spent some time in prison. There he came to his senses and realized that his path was to search into the culture and history of Iran, not political pursuits. That is how he put politics aside forever, after his release from prison, and wrote: “I saw many things in the prison; and learned a lot.” From that time until his death, the essential parts of his search for our cultural roots were sought inside the Shahnameh.
In addition to the books and articles he wrote about the essence of the Shahnameh, Meskoob wrote many side notes on the pages of the copies that he would read. Those notes were his immediate impressions from reading the Shahnameh and a wayfinding effort to find out what the Shahnameh is for us today. The preface of the book “Armaghan Mor, Jastari Dar Shahnameh, ” published a few months after Meskoub’s death, wrote: “I want to see what can be learned from the Shahnameh today – in this time and place we are in.” Such a method is very different from the work of those who look at the Shahnameh only from the point of view of vocabulary and grammatical points and literary receptions or spent all their efforts to give out another edition of the Shahnameh. Therefore, Meskoub’s work can be considered unprecedented and full of new ideas about Shahnameh. Most importantly, he presented his scholarly findings in beautiful and readable prose.
Apart from his books on the Shahnameh that we have mentioned, he has still some others: “Mourning Siavash; in death and resurrection”, which is an in-depth concept of the story of Shahnameh’s Siavash, published in 1350 (1971); another edition is the compilation of papers from the Ferdowsi conference in Paris, which was published in Iran, with a foreword by Meskoob, called “Dah Pahlavan and ravan Kheradmand” (10 heroes and the wise spirit) in 1374. There are also notes from Meskoob on the Shahnameh books that he read. Those notes were collected and published by Mehri Behfar, a Shahnameh expert, in the book “Shahnameh read twice”) (2012) Meskoob’s notes are in two parts: first are his side notes on the Shahnameh published by Rokhim, and the second part is his notes from 1358 onwards, written in Paris.
Shahrukh Meskoub, who spent the last years of his life in exile, passed away at 80, on Farvardin 23, 1384, in a hospital in Paris. Whatever he wrote about the Shahnameh is of great and eternal value, and is a guide for those who want to find a link between the cultural past of Iran and the current issues of the modern world. Meskoub considered it necessary to read the Shahnameh to achieve such an ideal. He spent 60 years of his fruitful life in search of the depths of the Shahnameh.
