The Gulistan (The Rose Garden)

Introduction

In his preface Saadi tells how one day he saw a friend gathering an armful of roses in a garden and said to him: flowers fade, and a garden's bloom is soon gone; I will write you a Rose Garden whose leaves no autumn wind can scatter. Written in 1258, the Gulistan has eight chapters: on the manners of kings, the morals of dervishes, the virtue of contentment, the benefits of silence, love and youth, weakness and old age, the effects of education, and the rules of conduct. Each is made of many short stories in prose interwoven with verse, in a language of grace and economy, full of humour and wisdom. For centuries it was a standard schoolbook throughout the Persian-speaking world; it has been translated into dozens of languages and was admired by Voltaire, Goethe and Emerson.