Abbas Yamini-Sharif 

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Dr. Yamini Sharif was the principle and founder of the elementary school I went to in Tehran, called "Raveshe-No" (New Method). It was one of the most, if not the most progressive school of the day. The following is reproduced with gratitude from http://www.geocities.com/zimbbo/SharifKianush.htm#_ftn11

4.1.1.1 Abbas Yamini-Sharif                     
Abbas Yamini-Sharif (1298-1368/1919-89), is considered the father of children’s poetry in Iran. Before his pioneering work there had been little Farsi poetry written for children. Yamini-Sharif began his career in 1317/1938, and was the most prolific children’s poet of the period, after Baghcheban.[1]  Between 1946 and 1986, he published 27 works: 11 collections of poetry, 12 volumes of prose, one play and three translations. The genre flourished in the period 1350/1971 to 1356/1977, with Mahmud Kianush also publishing seven books of poetry for children aged from five to fifteen. Yamini-Sharif and a few others occasionally wrote poems in syllabic meter and in the colloquial style of nursery rhymes, and lullabies.[2]
Many of Yamini-Sharif’s poems, on themes related to the lives and development of children, were later collected and published in book form: Feri be asman miravad (Tehran, 1344/1965), Avaz-e fereshtegan ya as‘ar-e kudakan (Tehran, 1345/1966), and Nim qarn dar bagh-e she‘r[3] (Tehran 1366/1987).[4] He has also produced a Farsi language instruction book for foreigners, which includes Farsi poetry, information about the Iranian people and the country itself, Farsi-English vocabulary and some conversational sentences in Farsi along with the phonetic alphabet and English translations.[5]
Yamini-Sharif was part of the group of 37 experts, teachers and educators, along with Lili Ahi, Tamina Bagcheban, Turan Mirhadi (Komarlu), that established the Children’s Book Council in 1341/1963; and which was officially registered as an NGO in 1968.[6] In 1986, the CBCI honored Abbas Yamini-Sharif with a celebration of his work.  Professor Noushine Ansari reported as follows:
 ‘On November 15 1986 CBCI celebrated the 50th anniversary of AbbasYamini-Sharif’s career as a poet, writer and translator for children and young adults. He studied education in Iran and at Columbia University in USA and worked for many years as a distinguished teacher and school director. In 1943 he published the first Iranian magazine for children called “Children’s Games”. Since 1946 he has published 27 works – 11 collections of poetry, 12 volumes of prose, one play and three translations. Mr. Yamini-Sharif has won several national as well as international awards. He is one of the founding members of CBCI and also established its annual awards to an Iranian author, illustrator and for an unpublished manuscript.’[7]
Fereshte Sarisa, Yamini-Sharif’s niece, also a poet, attributes her vocation to having grown up in a family in which nearly all were poets:  ‘My uncle Abbas Yamini Sharif wrote poetry for children, and also my grandmother and my mother.’[8] Yamini-Sharif, himself,[9] tells how his six year-old twin grandchildren, Peyman and Sahar, liked books better than any toys, and especially the three books of Khaneh-ye Baba Ali which were written for them. He says his stories and poems are set in the village because he spent most of his youth in the village of Darband, which had yet to become a suburb of Tehran, and preferred the clean air and peacefulness, and the warmness, gentleness and innocence of country people compared to the noise and pollution of Tehran.  He wrote the Two Kadkhoda (Village Headmen) to describe life in the village and Donkey and Donkey-boy to describe urban living.[10]
Yamini-Sharif says that later, as the children were growing up, they were still read bedtime stories before they went to sleep and adds ‘When I was young, I wasn’t satisfied with fewer that two stories to send me to sleep, and would insist and be so stubborn that one night when my mother had a helper to tell stories, and had told her first story and didn’t know which story to tell next, and I was still pestering her, she gave in and told the story of Yertanyert Zertanzert; she just made up these stories.  And how enjoyable they were!  She talked about two creatures born to a stepmother who lived in a village. All they did was eat and eat and eat. They ate all the food, all the inhabitants of the village, all the trees, all the animals, even the ones in the stable. There was only one child that they were unable to eat. In the end this child destroyed them and brought everything out of their stomachs.’[11]
When Yamini-Sharif was a child, his family and relatives were fond of poetry. As well as reading Hafiz’s poetry for fâl [12] and for ecstatic enjoyment, and reading Saadi and Mowlavi for morals and sayings and folk wisdom, they also read contemporary poetry.[13] They read the press and newspapers, and whatever poem or song became popular, they also memorized it and used it. Yamini-Sharif too, under the influence of this environment, and being blessed with a good memory at the time, read and memorized all these compositions and poems. In addition, his family had become friendly with Farrokhi Yazdi[14] because, both during his membership in the parliament and after his return from exile in Germany, he lived in the Kolah Farangi section of their orchard in Darband and considered its atmosphere perfect for poetry.
Yamini-Sharif recalls: ‘Of all the factors which drew me towards poetry, were those times when professional singers were employed to bring critical and political poems to people’s attention by singing songs and proclaiming messages in that garden on the mountain next to the Darband River. On Friday and Saturday nights, many families would take a stroll up and down the valley of Darband and Sarband, or rest in the gardens taking refreshments. Farrokhi used to write poems which he wished a singer to sing for the ordinary people so that his message would reach them, but the singer was illiterate; so I, who was 10 years old and attending Maktab, and could read, would sit next to the singer in the highest part of the garden overlooking the Darband River, and from Farrokhi’s handwritten notes, I would read the texts to the singer, and he would sing the words in a loud and resonating voice which spread throughout the valley and echoed several times around the mountains, and the whole of the valley would enjoy this beautiful poetry and lovely words, which had arisen from the heart …’[15]
Yamini-Sharif was thus exposed to critical and political poetry, as well as news and classical writings of all kinds, at an early age. Yet Samad Behrangi accuses him of only writing for rich children and of having a narrow, upper class, outlook on life, saying that his poetry has no message except possibly antiquated moral codes.[16] This is strong criticism for a writer who is considered the father of children’s poetry in Iran.
An example of Yamini-Sharif’s poetry for pre-elementary and early elementary age group children (5-8yrs) follows:
 
I fell to the Ground (Oftadam Zamin)  
From up I fell                 down to the ground
my face became            scraped and bloody
I just laughed                      again and again
my mum said                  sweet child
you didn’t cry                   well, well, bravo![17]
                 (from Songs of Angels, 1325/1946)
 
The next two poems are for children at the end of elementary and in guidance (10-14yrs):
 
Harvest Time (Hengam-e Deru)
 
The fall wind is blowing                                we’re getting everything ready
get up reaper                                                   get up with jumping feet
 
See how the harvest has become golden            God has given us help
from each seed that we planted                        the earth has given a hundred grains
 
We were all fully occupied                          whether it was easy or hard
so that we could get back quickly             to fill the barn with produce.[18]
 
(from Talking Flowers, 1350/1971)
 
***
 
Drop and the Sea (Qetre va Darya)
 
It appeared from the drops of rain from the teeny weeny grains of sand
What oceans without shores             what mountains & plains without limit or end
 
From goodness little by little kindness            from cheerfulness and eloquence
The world goes round like heaven                  full of affection & loyalty & happiness
 
What value is there from time if it becomes immediate?
What will come of so much immediacy in time?
But because instant is added upon instant
Time appears eternal.[19]
 
(from The Garden of Melodies, 1352/1973)
 
***
From these examples, it can be seen that concrete issues close to the hearts and everyday lives of children are touched upon, as well as universal and philosophical themes. ‘Arrow and Song’[20] is another poem in the second group which compares the effect of an arrow with that of a song, saying that one never knows where a song that you sing goes, unlike an arrow which you can trace.  After years, the poet realized that his arrow had fallen on a tree and his song, which he thought had not affected anyone, had fallen upon the heart of his friend or soul mate. Such issues are delicate and open a way of deeper thinking for children that may not relate to everyday life and conditions. Farsi poetry traditionally deals with such issues, and children have been learning how to interpret abstract and intangible language and concepts for many centuries. Possibly it is this quality of tradition and abstraction in Yamini-Sharif’s work which Behrangi takes offence to. The next writer to be investigated, Mahmud Kianush, was strongly influenced by Yamini-Sharif and their work shares many similarities.
 
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[1] L.Ayman, et. al., 1992, p.418, describe this author as follows: ‘Mirza Jabbar Askarzadeh Baghcheban (1246-1345/1885-1966), who established the first kindergarten in Tabriz in 1303/1924, was the first to write books for young people on the basis of his experience with children. His first children’s play, Khanum Khazuk (Shiraz 1307/1928), was in a combination of verse and prose. In the following year he published Zendagi-e Kudakan (Tehran 1308/1929), a collection of verse.’
[2] L.Ayman, et. al., Encyclopaedia Iranica,Vol.5, Costa Mesa, California: Mazda Publishers, 1992, p.421.
[3] Abbas Yamini-Sharif, Nim Qarn dar bagh-e she'r kudakan, Tehran: Daftar-i Nashr-i Chap-i Ataliyah, 1986, (Tehran: Ravesh-e No, 1987).
[4] L.Ayman, et. al.,1992, p.418.
[5] Abbas Yamini-Sharif, Persian (Farsi) the language of Iran, Tehran: Ravesh-e No, 1988.
[6] ‘Getting Acquainted with the Children’s Book Committee of Iran’, Zanan,  (Monthly), Vol. 3, No. 22, January- February 1994, pp.26-33.
[7] Bookbird, Vol.25 No.1 June 1987, p.111.
[8] In an interview with Anahid Baklu in:- Pagine; Quadrimestrale di poesia internazionale, Anno X, numero 25, gennaio-aprile 1999 at: <http://www.otto.to.it/site/pdf/pagine25.pdf>
[9] Nim Qarn dar bagh-e she'r kudakan, 2nd intro, p.10. All translations of this work by the present author, edited by Ms. Laleh Khalili.
[10] Idem.
[11] Nim Qarn dar bagh-e she'r kudakan, p.13.
[12] When a text is opened at random to see what one’s fate will be.
[13] Nim Qarn dar bagh-e she'r kudakan,  p.14.
[14] Mirza Mohammad Farrokhi Yazdi, 1267-1318/1889-1939, one of Iran’s first modernist poets, publisher of Toufan newspaper, Majlis representative, & freedom fighter.
In 1909, the governor of the province of Yazd, ordered that his lips be sewn together in punishment for a poem he had written about liberty, which left him scarred for life. Later, during the reign of Reza Shah, Farrokhi was imprisoned for his journalistic writings, but he eventually managed to flee the country and settled in Berlin, from where he sued the government for depriving its citizens of freedom of expression. But he was persuaded by the government to return to Iran and ended his days in prison, where he died in 1939.
Sources: <http://www.geocities.com/yazdestan/Farrokhy.html>
<http://www.fas.org/news/iran/1999/991223-iran1.htm>.
[15] Nim Qarn dar bagh-e she'r kudakan, p.15.
[16] Samad Behrangi, ‘Literature for Children,’ June 1968 in Majmu’ah-e Maqalah-ha (A Collection of Essays), 1348/1969, p.122.
[17] Nim Qarn dar bagh-e she'r kudakan, p.44.
[18] Nim Qarn dar bagh-e she'r kudakan, p.72.
[19] Ibid. p.80.
[20] Arrow and Song, (Tir va Nava) from The Garden of Melodies, 1352/1973, Nim Qarn dar bagh-e she’r kudakan, p.78.