Tour Guide, Shiraz, Iran
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Shiraz was once an important city in history since it was the homeland of Cyrus the Great, the founder of Persian Empire, the last abode of his successor such as Darius I. Shiraz is proud of its gardens known as Persian garden such as Eram garden that can display the outlet of Persian gardens very well. But among them, Shiraz is on the top of the list of literature and poetry of the world due to its great and major poets: Hafez and Saadi.
Khwaja Shams-ud-Dīn Muḥammad Hafez-e Shirazi who is addressed as Hafez by its people is an Iranian/Persian famous poet who's dating back to 14 century A.D.
Hafez was born, lived and died in Shiraz, Iran when Iran was ruled by the Ilkhanid era. Since he memorized the whole Holly Quran book at an early age, he got the pen name of Hafez among people. In his time, living was tough and difficult for people especially for those who wanted to express themselves and criticize the ruling system. Therefore, the young Hafez, who worked at court, used his tactfulness and brought his ideas to the public in the language of poetry and became one of the most important and major poets of the world. Since his reputation went beyond the borders of Iran, he found some followers and his influential work can be seen in the words of other famous personalities in the world such as William Jones, Thoreau, Goethe, and Ralph Waldo Emerson.
Goethe, the genius of modern German literature, greatly admired Hafez and regarded himself as a student of Hafez. While Emerson explained that Hafiz is a brave and thoughtful person who feared nothing. Prior to Hafez, ghazals(sonnet) were primarily used to write songs celebrating wine and earthly pleasure. Hafez revolutionized the form by utilizing the stock symbols of wine and pleasure as metaphors for spiritual experience. In so doing, Hafez elevated his short, simple verses to the level of high art.
His poems mainly talk of his longing for Shiraz, for Shakh-e Nabat(His beloved), for his spiritual Master, and also love! His collected works are regarded as a pinnacle of Persian literature and are often found in the homes of Persian speaking people in the world, who learn his poems by heart. He is one of the literary wonders of the world whose poems have been translated into different languages and his mastership in composing Persian ghazal-sonnets had been admired by many famous figures of the world. At the age of 69, he passed away and buried in the cemetery-garden at Shiraz. Later his mausoleum was built to honor him, various reconstructions and restoration had been carried out by benevolent people, and finally, this current mausoleum was built in Pahlavi dynasty, during the reign of Reza khan with the famous French architect, Andre Godard.