Mahmud Gami

Mahmud Ga¯mi stands out among the Kashmiri poets as a pioneer in introducing the Persian genres of the ghazal, nazm, masnavi and na¯t into Kashmiri. Not only is he the first truly prolific poet of the language, but much of his poetry is also remarkable for its beauty of expression and depth of thought. His vatsuns (lyrical poems) and masnavis (narrative poems) such as ‘Yusuf Zulaykha’, ‘Khusrau Shi¯ri¯n’, ‘Layla Majnun’ and ‘Sheikh San’a¯n’ have rightly been acclaimed as significant contributions to Kashmiri poetry.