Julie Scott Meisami
Julie Scott Meisami is a native of Berkeley, California. She received her Ph.D. in Comparative Literature from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1971. From 1971-1980 she taught English Literature and Comparative Literature in Tehran, Iran, chiefly at the University of Tehran, where she was instrumental in forming the M.A. program in Comparative Literature. After several years in California, where she taught courses in Comparative Literature and pursued independent research, in 1985 she was appointed University Lecturer in Persian at the University of Oxford, teaching courses in Persian and Arabic literature until her retirement in 2002. In 2002-2003 she held an Aga Khan Fellowship in Islamic Architecture at Harvard University. She currently lives in Point Richmond, California, where she continues her research on two major projects: depictions of Majnun in Persian illustrated manuscripts, and a re-evaluation of the so-called “Gazelle Mosaic” at Khirbat al-Mafjar. Her publications include Structure and Meaning in Medieval Arabic and Persian Poetry: Orient Pearls (2003), Persian Historiography to the End of the Twelfth Century (1999), the Encyclopedia of Arabic Literature (co-edited with Paul Starkey, 2 Vols., 1998), and Medieval Persian Court Poetry (1987). Her translations include The Haft Paykar: A Medieval Persian Romance (1995) and The Sea of Precious Virtues (Bahr al-Fava’id), A Medieval Islamic Mirror for Princes (1991).
