Layla and Majnun: The Story, Characters and Meaning of Nizami’s Persian Love Poem

Layla and Majnun (لیلی و مجنون, leyli o majnun) is a love story about Qays, a young Arab poet, and Layla, the girl he loves from their school days. When her father refuses the match, Qays loses himself in love and wanders the desert, earning the name Majnun, “the madman.” The best-known version is the Persian poem by Nizami Ganjavi, finished in 1188.

Listen

The story began as scattered Arabic anecdotes about a real or half-real 7th-century poet. Nizami turned them into a full narrative poem of about 4,600 lines, and his version became the model for dozens of later poets in Persian, Turkish and Urdu. Below you will find the whole plot, the characters, what the story means, how it traveled from Arabia to Eric Clapton, four short lines from Nizami’s Persian with our own translations, and the Persian words you need to talk about it.

Layla and Majnun at a glance

Where the story comes from

Long before Nizami, Arab storytellers passed around short reports about a Bedouin poet named Qays ibn al-Mulawwah of the Banu Amir tribe, who lived in the second half of the 7th century in the Najd region of Arabia. He loved his cousin Layla, her family married her to someone else, and he went mad with grief. These reports were collected in Arabic books such as the Kitab al-Aghani (“Book of Songs”) of Abu al-Faraj al-Isfahani in the 10th century. Scholars still argue about whether Qays really existed or whether the poems were later gathered under one legendary name.

The Arabic material belongs to the tradition of ‘udhri love: chaste, faithful, hopeless love that ends in death. What it did not have was a plot. It was a pile of anecdotes and poems with no clear beginning, middle and end. Nizami gave it one.

Nizami and the Khamsa

Nizami Ganjavi (about 1141 to about 1209) spent his life in Ganja, a city in today’s Republic of Azerbaijan, and wrote in Persian. His five long poems, together called the Khamsa or پنج گنج (panj ganj, “Five Treasures”), are among the most copied and illustrated books in the Persian world:

1. مخزن‌الاسرار (makhzan-ol-asrâr), “The Treasury of Secrets”
2. خسرو و شیرین (khosrow o shirin), “Khosrow and Shirin”
3. لیلی و مجنون (leyli o majnun), “Layla and Majnun”
4. هفت‌پیکر (haft peykar), “The Seven Beauties”
5. اسکندرنامه (eskandar-nâme), “The Book of Alexander”

In the poem’s opening chapters Nizami says the Shirvanshah Akhsatan sent him a letter asking for the story of Layla and Majnun. Nizami hesitated: a tale of a ragged Arab boy in the desert, with no feasts or palaces, seemed a poor subject for a court poet. His son Mohammad persuaded him, and Nizami says he finished the poem in less than four months. The poem is written in a short, quick meter (a form of hazaj) that later poets kept when they wrote their own versions.

The story of Layla and Majnun: full plot summary

This summary follows the order of chapters in the text on Ganjoor, the standard online library of Persian poetry, where the poem has 46 sections. The first ten are praise of God, the Prophet and the patron; the story itself starts at section 11.

1. Love at school

Qays is the long-awaited son of a respected chief of the Banu Amir. At school he meets Layla, a girl of great beauty from another clan. The two children fall in love, and soon everyone can see it. Layla’s family, worried about gossip, keep her at home. Separated from her, Qays wanders the streets and the hills reciting poems about her, and people start calling him مجنون (majnun), “the madman.”

2. The proposal and the Kaaba

Majnun’s father goes with gifts to ask for Layla’s hand. Layla’s father refuses politely but firmly: he will not give his daughter to a boy the whole tribe calls mad. In despair, Majnun’s father takes his son on pilgrimage to the Kaaba in Mecca and tells him to pray to be freed from love. Majnun does the opposite: he grips the door of the Kaaba and prays to love Layla even more. This is one of the most quoted scenes in Persian literature, and you can read two of its lines below.

3. Nawfal’s war

Majnun now lives in the desert among wild animals. A generous Arab chieftain named Nawfal (نوفل, nowfal) meets him, is moved by his poems and promises to win Layla for him. He fights Layla’s tribe twice. The second time he wins, but Layla’s father says he would rather kill his daughter than give her to a madman, and Nawfal backs down. Majnun, who wanted Layla and not a victory over her people, reproaches him and goes back to the desert.

4. Gazelles, a raven and an old woman

A run of short, strange episodes follows. Majnun persuades a hunter to set free the gazelles he has trapped, because their eyes remind him of Layla’s. He pours out his heart to a raven. An old woman leads him, tied up like a beggar, to the tent of Layla’s family so he can catch a glimpse of her.

5. Layla’s marriage

Layla’s father gives her in marriage to a rich young nobleman, Ibn Salam (ابن‌سلام, ebn-e salâm). Layla obeys her father but refuses her husband; when he tries to approach her she strikes him, and he accepts a marriage in name only. When Majnun hears of the wedding, he pours out his grief in verse.

6. The deaths of his parents

Majnun’s father finds him in the wilderness and begs him to come home. Majnun cannot. The old man says goodbye and dies soon after, and Majnun mourns him bitterly. His uncle Salim Amiri and then his mother visit him; his mother, too, dies. From now on his only company is the animals of the desert, which in Nizami’s picture gather around him and guard him like a king’s army.

7. Letters and a meeting in a palm grove

Layla and Majnun exchange letters. In one of the most famous episodes, Layla arranges a meeting in a palm grove. Majnun comes, but he will not come close: he stays at a distance and recites love poems to her, and then runs back into the desert. A young man from Baghdad named Salam comes to learn his poetry and keeps him company for a while.

8. Autumn: Layla dies

Ibn Salam dies. Layla is now free, yet nothing changes. She mourns her husband in public and Majnun in private. When autumn comes she falls ill; before she dies she asks her mother to tell Majnun that she stayed faithful to him, and she is buried in her bridal clothes.

9. Majnun dies at her grave

Majnun comes to Layla’s grave, and dies there. His animals keep watch over his body for a long time, so no one dares come near. In the end the two lovers are buried side by side, and their grave becomes a place of pilgrimage. In a closing dream, a friend sees the two of them together in paradise.

The characters

Four lines from Nizami’s Persian

Many websites print “Layla and Majnun quotes” with no Persian behind them. These four come from the text of Nizami’s poem on Ganjoor, with the section number so you can read the whole passage. The translations are our own and stay close to the Persian.

The first line of the poem

ای نام تو بهترین سرآغاز / بی‌نام تو نامه کی کنم باز

ey nâm-e to behtarin sar-âghâz / bi nâm-e to nâme key konam bâz

“O You whose name is the best beginning, how could I open a book without Your name?” (section 1). Nizami opens, as Persian poets traditionally do, with praise of God. Notice the play on نام (nâm, “name”) and نامه (nâme, “letter, book”).

Listen

At the Kaaba: he weeps, then laughs

مجنون چو حدیث عشق بشنید / اول بگریست پس بخندید

majnun cho hadis-e ‘eshgh beshnid / avval begerist, pas bekhandid

“When Majnun heard talk of love, first he wept, then he laughed” (section 16). His father has just told him to pray to be cured of love. Majnun weeps at the idea, then laughs, because he has no wish to be cured.

Listen

If love dies, I die

من قوت ز عشق می‌پذیرم / گر میرد عشق من بمیرم

man ghut ze ‘eshgh mipaziram / gar mirad ‘eshgh, man bemiram

“I take my food from love; if love dies, I will die” (section 16). قوت (ghut) is an old word for “daily food, sustenance.”

Listen

Majnun’s prayer

یارب تو مرا به روی لیلی / هر لحظه بده زیاده میلی

yâ rab, to marâ be ruy-e leyli / har lahze bedeh ziyâde meyli

“Lord, for Layla’s face give me a greater longing every moment” (section 16). A few couplets later he asks God to take what is left of his own life and add it to Layla’s.

Listen

Classical Persian like this uses older verb forms (بگریست begerist, “wept”; میرد mirad, “dies”) and the short preposition ز (ze) for از (az, “from”). Our guide to the Persian past tense explains the modern forms, and our Persian poems section has more verse to practice with.

What the story means: main themes

Love as madness

The Arabic word majnun comes from the same root as jinn: literally “possessed by a jinn.” In the poem, Majnun’s “madness” is the opposite of foolishness. He sees one truth so clearly that everything else, from family to tribe to food, stops mattering. Society calls that insanity; the poem asks the reader whether it is really the lover who is mad.

Chaste, unfulfilled love

Majnun and Layla never live together, and even when they meet they keep apart. This is the old Arabic ideal of faithful, hopeless love, and Nizami keeps it. The tragedy comes from honor and family pressure: Layla’s father protects his family’s name, and Layla obeys him even while her heart belongs to Majnun.

Earthly love as a road to divine love

Persian mystical (Sufi) poets read Majnun as the perfect seeker: someone who has given up self, comfort and reputation for the Beloved. Rumi and Saadi both use him this way. In Saadi’s Bustan Majnun is asked why he no longer visits his tribe, and his answer shows that his love has left no room for anything else (read the Bustan story of Majnun’s love). Rumi’s Masnavi tells how a caliph saw Layla and wondered what all the fuss was about (read the Masnavi passage on the caliph and Layla).

Nature and solitude

Nizami fills the desert with life. Gazelles, a raven, lions and wolves become Majnun’s companions, and the seasons mirror the lovers: their meeting happens in spring, Layla’s death in autumn.

Later versions and influence

Nizami’s poem set off a long chain of imitations (نظیره, nazire, a “reply” poem in the same form). Some of the best known:

Researchers have counted dozens of such versions in Persian alone, besides many in Turkish, Urdu, Kurdish and other languages. The love story also became one of the favorite subjects of Persian and Mughal miniature painters: Majnun, thin as a stick, sitting among wild animals, is an image you will find in museums around the world.

In the modern era, Uzeyir Hajibeyov’s opera Leyli and Majnun, first staged in Baku in 1908, is often called the first opera of the Muslim world. In South Asia, “Laila Majnu” became a film title again and again from the 1920s on. In English, Lord Byron called the pair “the Romeo and Juliet of the East” in a note to his poem The Giaour (1813).

And yes, Eric Clapton’s “Layla” is connected. Clapton read an English translation of Nizami’s poem and saw his own hopeless love for Pattie Boyd, then married to his friend George Harrison, in Majnun’s. The result was the song “Layla,” released in 1970 by his band Derek and the Dominos on the album Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs.

Layla and Majnun in everyday Persian

For Iranians the story is not a museum piece. The names live on in ordinary speech:

• A couple who are crazy about each other are عین لیلی و مجنون (‘eyn-e leyli o majnun, spoken: “just like Layla and Majnun”). It can be sweet or teasing.
• مجنون on its own describes someone madly, helplessly in love. The everyday word for “crazy” is دیوانه (divâne), spoken دیوونه (divune).
• A well-known saying: لیلی را باید با چشم مجنون دید (leyli râ bâyad bâ cheshm-e majnun did), “You have to see Layla through Majnun’s eyes.” In other words, love sees beauty that outsiders miss.
• The heroine’s name is spelled لیلی (leyli) in the poem. The common modern girl’s name is usually spelled لیلا (leylâ), and both are written Leila, Layla or Leyla in English.

Listen

Persian words for talking about the story

Listen Listen Listen Listen Listen

For more love vocabulary you can use today, see how to say I love you in Persian. If you cannot read the script yet, start with our Persian alphabet guide.

How to read Layla and Majnun today

If you want the story in English, look for a complete translation of Nizami rather than a short retelling; Rudolf Gelpke’s English version (1966) is the one Clapton read, and older abridged verse translations by James Atkinson go back to 1836. If you are learning Persian, a parallel text with the Persian on one side and English on the other lets you check every line; our Layla and Majnun in Persian with English translation is made for that. Read a few couplets a day, say them aloud, and notice how often the same small set of words (عشق, دل del “heart”, غم gham “sorrow”) comes back.

Nizami is a natural next step after Hafez and Rumi. Compare him with Hafez’s most famous lines, Saadi’s quotes and real Rumi quotes in Persian, or with the heroes of Ferdowsi’s Shahnameh. When you are ready, test yourself with the Persian poetry quiz.

Common questions

What is the story of Layla and Majnun in short?

Qays and Layla fall in love as schoolchildren. Her father refuses to let them marry because people call Qays mad, so he becomes “Majnun,” wanders the desert and writes poems for her. Layla is married to another man but stays faithful. She dies of grief, Majnun dies on her grave, and they are buried together.

Is Layla and Majnun a true story?

Partly. It grew out of Arabic reports about a 7th-century Bedouin poet, Qays ibn al-Mulawwah of the Banu Amir, and his love for Layla. Whether he really lived is still debated, and the full plot that most people know was shaped by Nizami in 1188.

Who wrote Layla and Majnun?

The most famous version is by the Persian poet Nizami Ganjavi, who finished it in 1188 as the third poem of his Khamsa. Many later poets, including Amir Khusrow, Jami and Fuzuli, wrote their own versions.

What does “Majnun” mean in Persian?

مجنون (majnun) comes from Arabic and means “mad” or “possessed by a jinn.” In Persian it is used for someone madly in love, and a devoted couple may be called عین لیلی و مجنون, “just like Layla and Majnun.”

Is Layla and Majnun like Romeo and Juliet?

Both are stories of young lovers kept apart by family who die for love, and Byron called the pair “the Romeo and Juliet of the East.” But Layla and Majnun is more than four centuries older than Shakespeare’s play, the lovers never marry or run away together, and the story is often read as a mystical picture of the soul’s love for God.

Is Eric Clapton’s “Layla” about Layla and Majnun?

Yes, in part. Clapton read a translation of Nizami’s poem and saw his own love for Pattie Boyd in Majnun’s story. The song “Layla” came out in 1970 on the Derek and the Dominos album Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs.

Learn Persian with our bestseller

Study with the book

Learn Farsi in 100 Days: The Ultimate Crash Course to Learning Farsi Fast

PDF ebook, instant download. $26.99 Original price was: $26.99.$14.99Current price is: $14.99.

Add to cart See inside

Serious about Persian? Get all 30 of our Persian learning books for $199.99 (55% less than buying them one by one).

Browse all Persian learning books