A conference on Persian poet Saadi (1213-1291 AD) and Chinese philosopher Confucius (551-479 BC) will be hosted on January 8-9 by Hebei University in China’s Hebei Province.
The conference is a follow-up to the session which was held at the Cultural Center of the Book City Institute in Tehran last April, ISNA reported.
At the two-day event, four Iranian literary experts and 10 Chinese academics will speak about the life and works of Saadi and Confucius.
From the Iranian side, poet and philosopher Zia Movahed, author and mythologist Abolqassem Esmailpour, author and deputy director of Book City Institute Ali Asghar Mohammadkhani and author and researcher of Persian literature Mahdi Mohabbati, are attending.
The Iranians will also meet Chinese authors and publishers to discuss mutual cooperation in the field of translating contemporary literary works from the two countries, and holding meetings for writers and poets from both sides.
The event is organized by the Book City Institute, the Center for Saadi Studies, the Iranian Cultural Center in China and Hebei University.
Symbols of literature, Philosophy
Saadi is a symbol of Persian language and literature while Confucius is a symbol of Chinese philosophy. Their works show the similarity between their views with regard to human society based on the shared feeling of love for human beings.
The Persian poet is renowned for his ‘Gulistan’ and ‘Bustan’ and some chapters of the books are on ethics and politics. Saadi’s works particularly ‘Gulistan’ have been rendered into Chinese several times.
Confucius was an influential Chinese philosopher, teacher and political figure known for his popular aphorisms and for his models of social interaction. His teachings, preserved in ‘Analects’, focused on creating ethical models of family and public interaction, and setting educational standards.
In cooperation with Saadi Studies Center, the Book City Institute has started a 10-year program since 2012, through which Persian classic literature and Saadi’s works are introduced to the world. Moreover, the works of scholars and poets of other countries are presented and a comparative study of their works and thoughts with Saadi are made.
So far, conferences to compare Saadi’s works with those of the Russian poet and novelist Alexander Pushkin (1799-1837), Turkish poet Yunus Emre (1240-1320), Spanish writer Miguel de Cervantes (1547-1616) and the Arab poet Mutanabbi (915-965) have been held in the past four years in Tehran, Moscow, Ankara and Madrid respectively.
