DUSHANBE, September 10, 2008, Asia-Plus  -- The main celebrations to mark the 1,150 birthday anniversary of founder of Tajik-Persian classical literature Abu Abdullo Roudaki started in his native village of Panjroud, Sughd’s Panjakent district today.  

Akabarali Sattorov, chairman of Tajik Journalists’ Union, told Asia-Plus by phone from Panjroud that President Emomali Rahmon, members of the government, parliamentarians as well as representative of Tajik intelligentsia and members of the Forum of Persian-speaking of the World and representatives of a number of diplomatic missions accredited in Tajikistan are participating in the event. 

A statue to the great poet will be unveiled in Panjroud on sidelines of the event today.  

Abu Abdullo Roudaki, (858-941) was a Tajik-Persian poet, and is regarded as the first great literary genius of the modern Persian language, who composed in the Perso-Arabic alphabet or new “New Persian” script.  Roudaki is considered a founder of Tajik-Persian classical literature.  

 He was born in 858 in Roudak (Panjroud), a village then in Khorasan, Persia, and now located in Panjakent, Tajikistan.  Most of his biographers assert that he was totally blind, but the accurate knowledge of colors, as evident in his poetry, renders this assertion very doubtful.  He was court poet to the Samanid ruler Nasr II (914-943) in Bukhara, but he eventually fell out of favor and ended his life in poverty.