Narguess Farzad was born in Tehran, Iran, in 1960 and graduated with a degree in Persian Studies from SOAS, University of London. Aft er an early career at the Persian Section of the BBC World Service, and then as a civil servant, she returned to SOAS, where, as the Senior Fellow in Persian, she teaches Persian language and poetry. Her publications include Grammar of Modern Persian (Hodder), ‘Qeysar Aminpur and the Persian Poetry of Sacred Defence’ (British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies), Poems of Farzaneh Khojandi (Enitharmon), introductory chapters for the series Rumi’s Little Book of Life: The Garden of the Soul, the Heart and the Spirit; A Little Book of Mystical Secrets: Rumi, Shams of Tabriz, and the Path of Ecstasy and Little Book of Rumi, Stories of the Masnavi (Red Wheel Weiser). She regularly contributes to cultural programmes on BBC Radio 3 and Radio 4 and is on the editorial board of the Middle East in London.