The Persian Mirror: Reflections of the Safavid Empire in Early Modern France. Susan Mokhberi. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019. xii + 223 pp. £47.99

• Published in: Renaissance Quarterly Vol. 74; no. 2; pp. 647 - 648
• Main Author: Meserve, Margaret
• Format: Journal Article Book Review
• Language: English
• Published: Cambridge Cambridge University Press 01.07.2021
• Subjects: Arabic language; Autobiographical literature; Christian Islamic relations; Diplomatic & consular services; Folklore; French literature; Literary criticism; Louis XIV, King of France (1638-1715); Persian language; Travel literature; France; Persia
• DOI: 10.1017/rqx.2021.52
• ISSN: 0034-4338

Mokhberi deploys impressive methodological flexibility as she analyzes sources that reported on, commented on, praised, or scorned Safavid Persia and its rulers: travel literature, French-inflected editions of Persian folklore, diplomatic memoirs, eyewitness accounts of Persian diplomatic missions to France, salon paintings, popular prints, and early journalistic texts. [...]French consumers eagerly adopted Persian customs (which in practice were just as much Turkish or Arabic), such as drinking coffee, smoking water-pipes, wearing silks, and visiting baths, and then eagerly collected pictorial representations of Persians enjoying the same. Mokhberi offers a dazzling analysis of the meanings, texts, and subtexts of an early modern diplomatic mission, from its elaborate protocols to the significance of its gift exchanges, speeches, gestures, sights, sounds, and commemorations. [...]her attention to the popular response to the mission, as recorded in periodical literature, prints, diaries, and other sources provides a rich, added dimension to the account, as we see not just what the Persian embassy did at Versailles but how the visit was read and understood by the broader public.