Woqu’ Ghazals: Hidden Actual Love in Persian Poetry during the Reign of Shah Tahmasp Safavi, 17th century

During Shah Tahmasp Safavi's reign (1524-1576/ 930-984 AH) when Shia's government had been formed recently in Iran, a new style of Persian poetry called “woqu’ ghazal” appeared and very soon spread throughout central Iran, from Kashan, Qom, Isfahan, Shiraz, and Khorasan to Tabriz. “Woqu’ ghazal” (factual lyric sonnet) was common throughout Iran up to about 1611 CE/ 1020 AH.
Unlike the Sufi ghazal, the new ghazal does not refer to spiritual and metaphysical love; the love experience in it is real and actual. All poets, including court poets, religious scholars, and people of high culture wrote about their actual love experiences in a manner similar to that of popular and folk poetry. Hidden love was the main content of this kind of poetry.
This paper discusses the non-erotic love and the lovers’ behavior in the “woqu’ ghazal,” and argues that the enjoyment and pleasures of love in it are different: that the lovers in it actually enjoy the anxiety, the fear, the furtive glances to the beloved in public places, and the covert speaking that marks this kind of love. It also examines the social and cultural factors that formed and affected this kind of love-expression.