Mas'ūd Sad from the Viewpoint of Seljuk Poets

Mas'ūd Sad is one of the great Iranian poets of the second half of the fifth century. Being among the avant-gardes of poetic revolutions of that era, he was held in high esteem by his contemporaries and those close to his time. Many of these poets have worshiped Mas'ūd and his works. Sanāyī, Muizzī and Oȿmān Mokhtārī, for example, composed certain odes and fragments in his praise. Other figures such as Rashīdī, Adīb Şābir, Jamāluddīn 'Abdurrazzāq and Falakī have mentioned him as a powerful poet in their writings. Additionally, Nizāmī 'Arūẕī and Rashīd Vaţvāţ, being expert at literary composition, have praised Mas'ūd in their works. Although most of these praises are vague, some cases are clear and critical, pointing to the characteristics of his poems like being easy but difficult to imitate, eloquent, firm, effective, deep in meaning and elegant in words. Some like Khāqānī did not approve of Mas'ūd Sad, dispelling him as an imitator. In this essay, after a review of the commentaries of Mas'ūd Sad's contemporaries and other poets and critics living close to his time, we come to the conclusion that some of these intellectual divergences can be justified in terms of revolutionary literary changes that spanned the 6th century. Poetry was progressing so fast in this historical period that Mas'ūd Sad's works went out of currency despite the fact that he was considered an innovative poet during his lifetime and was held in high esteem by great men of letters when he was alive. With the emergence of such great poets as Khāqānī, who brought about significant changes in Persian poetry, Mas'ūd Sad's poetry went out of fashion and found acceptance only among the regressive literati.