Dialog and cultural interaction were the main goal of Goethe's West-Eastern Divan, said Anke Bosse on Saturday on the 200th anniversary of West-Eastern Divan creation by Goethe.

The book contains 200 poems and is the largest work by Goethe, Bosse said about her four decades of research on Goethe and Hafez.
Goethe came across a translation of Hafez when he was about 65 years old, which changed his life. Hafez, as the biggest Iranian poet, had a great impact on Goethe's life, she said.
Goethe could establish an image of the mystic terms and language of Hafez. His understating of Hafez made him compose 15 new pieces in a week. Goethe composed Western poetry with Eastern content, she added.
She said that he interwove Eastern literature and the Old Testament to make it fathomable for the people of the West, though the book had an Easter theme.
Later, he got interested in other elements of the Persian Literature. He even tried to copy the Perso-Arabic script from Eastern books, Professor Bosse said.
In the West-Eastern Divan Goethe tries to make the understanding of the two people closer to each other and show that man should develop his nature.
Two hundred years ago, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832) – German poet and philosopher – released the West-Eastern Divan which is a collection of poems in Persian style with inspirations from Hafez, the great Iranian poet who was living in Shiraz, southern Iranian province of Fars, in 14th century.

Divan-e Hafez is the greatest and most professional work of the Iranian poet.
Many cultural figures involved in studies in the Iranian and German literature will be present in Germany's Cultural Week to speak about strong tie among the two poets after many years.
It was two centuries ago that Goethe wrote his West-Eastern Divan (West–östlicher Divan in German language) to build inseparable ties between West and East civilizations.
Germany's Cultural Week is being held under the German Embassy's plan and hosted by Shiraz in cooperation with the city's municipality to mark the anniversary of publishing Goethe's Divan.
What draws attention to this cultural event is the mixture of West and East cultures made by Goethe's realization from Hafez.
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