"Children’s Song Writer"
by: Homan Yamini Sharif
“Never dies one whose heart lived with love
Registered in the universe I remain”
Sa’di, a 7th century poet of Iran
Early morning on 28th of Azar 1368, December 18, 1989, Abbas Yamini Sharif, the famous children’s writer and poet of Iran closed his eyes forever. With his departure Iranian children’s literature lost one its most prominent serving contributors. He was one the few pioneers of contemporary Iranian children’s literature that until few days before his death passionately enriched its heritage; one of the few who made history while lived the presence.
Abbas Yamini Sharif was born on 1st of Khordad 1298, May 21, 1919, in Pamenar neighborhood in Tehran. At the age of five he moved with his family to a mountainside property in Darband, then a small and quiet mountain village, north of Tehran. From that early time his observations and experiences of living with nature formed a strong base for his lifetime affection for animals, plants, trees and plain people of countryside.
From the Age of five he was sent to school and Maktab (one-teacher-one-class system based on religious contents and traditional learning methods) and experienced the rough and unpleasant environment in those children’s education centers. He often talked about the extent of violence and cruelty that he had witnessed in school and Maktab and regretted the long lasting effects of that system, which he thought had set the base for the present temperaments and behaviors of the children of those days. In such environment, only the rhythm of words and sentences that were expressed in recitals of complex texts and poems, aroused excitement in him. The importance that he gave to the rhythm and rhyme in children’s poetry originated from such joy he experienced in his otherwise harsh childhood. He composed his first poems when he was in the 5th grade in elementary school and was often encouraged by his teachers.
In 1938 he entered the Basic Science Institute and took advantage of the free room and board program that was offered to students who majored in teaching. In the Institute’s library he found some foreign children books and for the first time saw books with beautiful pictures and interesting subjects in simple language for children. From then on he set out to make similar books for Iranian children in Farsi and started his mission by translating books from English and composing children poetry for publication.
In 1941 for the first time one of his poems was published in a magazine named Nonahalan (Sprouts) and soon more poems were published in other publications thereafter. Encouragements from his college teachers and publication of his poems started a burning desire and passion in him for children’s literary work. Children’s literature became a field for his unrelenting endeavor.
In 1943 the first issue of Baziye Koodakan (Children’s Games), one of the first children’s magazines in Iran, was published. Publication of that magazine was first proposed by Ebrahim Baniahmad, Yamini Sharif’s college teacher and later his lifetime friend. Baniahmad obtained the publication license and Yamini Sharif became its chief editor. In 1944 Yamini Sharif’s poems were published in elementary school books in Arak (a city and province in central Iran) and soon after all over Iran.
In 1953 Yamini Sharif received a local government grant, supported by Fullbright Scholorship Program for one-year postgraduate study in Colombia University in the USA. He completed this program and became one of the first Iranians who received MA degree in Early Childhood Education. In his studies he came to believe in the necessity for a drastic change of methods used in education systems in Iran and persistently pursued this important goal. He authored a 1st grade elementary school textbook, known as “Dara and Azar” that was selected as national 1st grade textbook for years. He also authored a literacy textbook for adults for the national Fight Against Illiteracy program.
Literacy was one of his main interests for which he never stopped working. For 22 years he dedicated his time to the children’s schools he founded and took every opportunity to personally teach children in classes. One year before his death he wrote his last tutorial book for Iranian children residing in English speaking countries.
In 1955 he founded Ravesheno Schools and with his wife, Touran Moghavemi Tehrani, managed the schools until 1980 when the schools had grown to a multi level educational center from kindergarten to the Junior high school. During this period thousands of Iranian children entered higher level of education from the school he founded and managed.
In 1956 Yamini Sharif and Jafar Badiei proposed publication of Kayhan Bacheha Magazine (Kayhan for Children) to Kayhan Establisment, the major Iranian daily newspaper and periodical publishers. Jafar Badiei became the licensee and Yamini Sharif remained the chief editor until 1980. Many other publications used his poems and stories as well.
Yamini Sharif poetry and stories for children have been published in numerous books and and have made him one of the world’s most written children’s writer and poets. His first book of poetry named “Songs of Angles” was published in 1946. In his book named “Half a Century in the Garden of Children’s Poetry” that was published in 1987 he has listed 27 books. Since then other books have been published such as “Struggle in Mount Towchal” and “Farsi, the language of Iran”, “ City of Invisibles”, “Garden of Friendship”, “ Arrogant Leopard”. The list of his published books for children exceed 30 titles, some of which have been printed several times and some are rare to find. Books such as “Trumpet Playing Cats”, “Two Elder Men”, “Playing with Alphabet”, “Feri Flies in the Sky”, “Call of Blooms”, “In the Clouds”, “Different Flowers”, “O’ Beloved Iran”, “Poetry with Alphabet”, “Baba Ali’s House”, “Farsi, the Language of Iran” are some of his well known books.
Abbas Yamini Sharif wrote and worked for children until his last days of life and never knew better time than when he wrote for or talked about them. Several of his books received national and international awards but no award was more valuable to him than watching the children’s face or listening to their voices when they read his poetry and stories.
For more than half a century millions of Iranian children have read Yamini Sharif’s poems and stories in the schools and at home; went to sleep with them and registered them in their minds. Some of his poems have become so well known among generations of Iranian children that have survived as few of their only memories of childhood poems. Poems such as:
“Clouds are now broken to pieces
Twinkle my star
You made me happy again,
Started to shine again
You saw that I love you
You pointed at me,
Twinkle my star
Clouds are now broken to pieces”
Some other of his poetry have become the anthems for children’s events and programs:
We are the smiling flowers,
Children of Iran
Dear as our lives
We take our divine Iran
We must be smart,
Vigilant and watchful
Able we must be,
In order to guard Iran
Be prosperous, Iran
Be free, Iran
From us, your children,
Be happy at heart, Iran.
In spring of 1989 Yamini Sharif visited the USA for the last time for medical treatment and soon it became clear to him that there was no cure for his illness. He accepted that fact peacefully and calmly and continued his work. In short times when dreadful pains subsided, he would kneel down on the floor and work on the bed pushing his pen on the paper. The scenes of this great man working in the last hours of his life were indeed the scenes of epic human struggle, resistance and passion. Thus he finished his last storybook, “ City of Invisibles” just few days before he left for Iran forever but did not have enough time left to see it published.
Those who knew him closely where moved by his modesty at the time of fame, his strong spirit at the times of great disappointments and his perseverance when working had become torturously difficult. He had a great sense of humor that derived from his philosophical view of life. When physicians broke the disappointing news about his health he responded humorously and smiled.
When found his death to be near he decided to return to Iran and in response to his friends who pleaded with him to stay and to enjoy available medical care outside Iran he said: “ I am the child of that land, I must be buried at the foot hills of Alborz (great mountain range north of Iran) in the land of Ray (an ancient city in the southern outskirts of Tehran)” and so he was.
In every moment of his lifetime, with his eyes, ears and all senses, he had engraved his love for Iran in his mind. In his writings and poems he thought children to love their homeland and to make effort to preserve and improve it.
O’ beloved Iran
The golden land
Planted on its chest, your soil holds red roses
Red roses at which smiles
At its rise and its set,
Loaf of sun
His writings and words focused on three subjects only, Iran, children and nature. He did not enjoy talking about or listening to anything else.
Although he had become an old man living in the city and knew a lot about the world, but in him always lived an Iranian village boy, who still suffered from the cruelty and ignorance of the world of grown ups, still was fascinated by the trees and birds, mountains and plains and still ran through fields, in the roads and narrow alleys between the gardens.
In his farewell poem composed for engraving on his grave he last said:
“I am children’s song writer
from their love is my soul in peace
I am Abbas Yamini Sharif
from children seek my trace”
May his memory be cherished and his soul be in peace.