Layli and Majnun: Love, Madness and Mystic Longing in Nizami’s Epic Romance

This book is the first comprehensive analysis of Nezami’s romance Layli and Majnun (1188). It examines key themes such as chastity, constancy and suffering through an analysis of the main characters. Majnun’s asceticism, kingship, love-madness, poetic genius, ill-fate and love-death are treated in separate chapters. The patriarchal society in which Layli lives, her anxieties and dilemmas, incarceration, secret love, imposed marriage and finally her death are discussed in detail. One chapter is devoted entirely to the different ways parents raise their children and the consequences. Finally, the book gives an analysis of Nezami’s style, the narrative structure of the romance and the symbolism of time and setting.