The award committee of the Mahmud Afshar Foundation has selected Gilbert Lazard as the laureate of the 24th edition of the award this year.
The award, including a medal and a Persian carpet bearing the French Iranologist’s name, will be presented to him during a ceremony at Iran’s Cultural Center in Paris on July 4.
The 97-year old Lazard is the author of Grammaire du Persan Contemporain (A Grammar of Contemporary Persian, 1957) and the Persian-French dictionary (1990).
Lazard became a professor of Persian at the Institut National des Langues et Civilisations Orientales (INALCO) from 1958 to 1966, and was as in charge of the Iranian civilization course at the Sorbonne from 1951 to 1969. Lazard’s works on Persian language and literature have had a very strong influence on Persian studies in France.
Since 1989, the Mahmud Afshar Foundation has been annually giving literary awards to praiseworthy figures for their contributions to Iranian studies and Persian language and literature. The 23rd edition of the Award honored Iranian poet Houshang Ebtehaj.
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