Nezami Ganjavi (1141-1209) is considered the greatest romantic epic poet in Persian literature. A Sunni Muslim born to a Persian father and a Kurdish mother, he lived most of his life in his hometown of Ganjeh, in present-day Azerbaijan. He was married three times; all three of his wives predeceased him, and, rarely for a Persian poet of his time, he wrote with apparently heartfelt and surprisingly personal eloquence about his affection for them and his sorrow at losing them. His introduction of an element of mysticism into his romance narratives is an innovation that was followed by most of his many imitators.

Dick Davis (translator/introducer) is the foremost English-speaking scholar of medieval Persian poetry in the West and "our finest translator of Persian poetry" (The Times Literary Supplement). A fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and an emeritus professor of Persian at Ohio State University, he has published more than twenty books. His other translations from Persian include The Conference of the Birds; Vis and Ramin; The Mirror of My Heart: A Thousand Years of Persian Poetry by Women; Faces of Love: Hafez and the Poets of Shiraz; and Shahnameh: The Persian Book of Kings, one of The Washington Post's ten best books of 2006. Davis lives in Columbus, Ohio.

ONE OF THE WORLD'S MOST FAMOUS LOVE STORIES: The inspiration not only for Eric Clapton's megahit "Layla" but also for countless poems, dances, paintings, films, and other songs, Layli and Majnun is referenced throughout Khaled Hosseini's A Thousand Splendid Suns and in books by Nobel Prize winner Orhan Pamuk.

ONE OF THE MOST FAMOUS WORKS OF MIDDLE EASTERN LITERATURE: It is rivaled only by The Arabian Nights and is a core text for Middle Eastern literature and history courses, but one that has long been unavailable in a reputable English translation-until now.

THE MOST COMPLETE, AUTHORITATIVE ENGLISH TRANSLATION, which reproduces the original's rhyming couplets and is rooted in a lifetime's engagement with poetry and Persian literature

TRANSLATOR IS A REVERED SCHOLAR AND POET, whose many acclaimed translations from Persian include Shahnameh, which was named one of The Washington Post's ten best books of 2006, and who has been called "the pre-eminent translator of Persian poetry of our time" by Newsweek, "the foremost English-speaking scholar of medieval Persian poetry and translator of Hafez now working in the West" by The Washington Post, and "our finest translator of Persian poetry" by The TLS.

PROMOTABLE FOR VALENTINE'S DAY (February 14), THE PERSIAN NEW YEAR (March 21), ARAB AMERICAN HERITAGE MONTH (April), and NATIONAL POETRY MONTH (April)-and also the 50th anniversary of Eric Clapton's "Layla."

SIMULTANEOUS PUBLICATION OF ANOTHER NEW TRANSLATION BY DICK DAVIS: The Mirror of My Heart: A Thousand Years of Persian Poetry By Women (9780143135616).