HISTORY OF LITERATURE (JOURNAL OF HUMAN SCIENCES)
Year:2013 | Volume:- | Issue:72/3|Papers Count:12

The evolution of knowledge and literature in Khorasan and Transoxiana was stopped after the overthrow of the Sassanid dynasty until the rise of Iranian governments. In Taheri and Safari periods, Persian language and literature improved again and firm steps were taken towards cultural and scientific advancement. The Saffaris were the first native dynasty under whose reign Persian language replaced Arabic. During their reign in Khorasan philosophers and scholars started anew and the cultural stagnancy of the previous years came to an end. Improvements in science resulted in some calling the fourth century the age of the “Islamic Renaissance”. The 3rd- 5th centuries are the most cultural periods of history in Iran. Therefore, it is necessary to study the factors that led to the rise and decline of thought and culture in these periods and the degree to which these factors were influenced by the state. A study of the attitudes of Ghaznavi and Samani Kings towards scholars sheds light on the quality of schools and the importance of local dynasties.

One of the prominent examples of religious epic in Persian literature is Khavarannamah mathnavi, that of Ibn-e-Hosam Khusafi versified in ninth century with the subject of explaining Islam army wars with the commandership of Hazrat-e-Ali (peace be upon him) in Khavaran, Ghahreman, Sahelzamin and Gham areas.In the present research, we have first discussed about epic, religious epic and it’s examples and appearance reasons, and also about Ibn-e- Hosam Khusafi’s biography and works; then after brief introduction of Khavarannamah, it’s epical aspects and other noticeable points, and it’s defects and stylistic characteristics have been enumerated expansively; Finally, it has been tried to present a perspective of the most important characteristics of this religious epic based on the mentioned matters and evidences.In this book, the epic-making elements such as storical form, making heroes, war, and supernatural components and powers have appeared clearly and Ibn-e-Hosam’s complete imitation from Ferdowsi’s Shahnama in words and composing way, and contetnt areas can be seen obviously. Other remarkable aspects of this work are: satirical statement, appearing lyric literary genre, religious prejudices and the poet’s beautiful prayers. The most important defects of this epical poem are: problems in making story, pleonasm, defects in the rhythm and rhyme of some verses, and problems in syntax and images. Since Khavarannamah has been composed in imintation of Shahnanma, there are no effects from poetic style fashionable in the ninth century in this book and in contrast, signs of language oldness is clear in it.

Margeh Rang Sepehri's selection of poems was composed in a special political and social atmosphere, which sets the ground for determining changes for Iranians. Understanding such historical changes and political atmosphere during Sepehri's time helps to better appreciate the symbols in Margeh Rang. Such symbols come to light when used along with words such as darkness, loneliness, destruction, wreckage, and obscurity. The reader's mind can better understand the atmosphere in the author's life when the atmosphere of the society and the historical background are provided. Wilhelm Dilthey's hermeneutic theory is based on appreciation of literary works on the basis of their historical background. In line with the theory of historicity, Dilthey believes that it is not possible to appreciate a work without scrutinizing the historical atmosphere in which that work has been produced. Thus appreciation occurs as a result of the mental transfer of the reader from his/her own era to the author's era. Accordingly this study attempts to analyze Sepehri's discourse in his Margeh Rang based on Dilthey' s hermeneutic principles of historicity.

In this article I look at meanings and archetypes in the images of the Story of Siavash to discover its underlying semantic structure and the outline of its plot. This study is based on the theories of Northrop Frye. First, by examining the meanings of these images and the associations they create in the minds of the people, the role these images have played in our literary tradition will be studied. Later, the archetypes behind the narrative images of this story will be analyzed. It should be noted that the images have been categorized into heaven, hell and deductive so that the most ancient forms of this story in myths can be accessed. In the end, I will determine the main plot of the narrative via what Frye calls distancing oneself from the work.

The Masnavi includes different anecdotes on the Rashidun Caliphs. What Molavi illustrates about these people has some similarities to and differences with what the history shows about them. The present study provides a comparative investigation of principles and issues mentioned in the Masnavi with historical narrations. It also aims at approving the point that the Masnavi’s language, from the beginning to the end, has a mystic tone and a specific semantic construction. One of the effective tools in such language is making use of allegory and symbols in a non-historical way that has a powerful capability in expressing different aspects. Mowlavi, in his historical stories and anecdotes, especially those related to the Rashedin Caliphs, is mostly after generalizing mystic-ethical codes rather than just stating the historical events in a hierarchical order. These anecdotes sometimes do not have historical roots and, if they do, there is a critical distance between them and the event itself regarding human, temporal and spatial elements. To put it another way, Mowlavi has mainly put emphasis on the hidden and inner-side of the anecdotes, not their real and historical context of occurrence. This article aims to answer two fundamental questions:1- What is the relationship between the subjects and themes dealt with in Masnavi Manavi and traditions and original historical narratives?2- What was the influence of such an application of history in the sphere of literary mysticism in the historical understanding of people of the periods before their time?

It seems that the most important female poet after Foroogh Farokhzad is Tahereh Safarzadeh. Although her first work was published in the early 1340s, her poetry technically blossomed during the 1350s. Her three poetry collections - Resonance in the Delta (1349), The Dam and the Arms (1350), and The Fifth Journey (1356) - quickly made her popular among readers and critics. The current research aims to investigate her poetic style and analyze her viewpoints on poetry in general. This paper makes use of a descriptive-analytical approach, which is essentially a library and documentary type of research in analyzing her poems. The present paper will also initially present a short introduction about her importance as a contemporary poet and will then investigate her theory of poetry.

The Thousand and One Nights includes heroic tales, didactic literature, beast fables, legends through which the world is known, literary debates and an array of poems. The narratee gets to know a large number of characters in a short time and after learning about their past, present and future moves on to another tale with another set of characters. Scheherazade narrates these tales night after night to escape death. When the tales get to their end, she will see what life has in store for her. Her haste is transferred to the narratee through her omission of many minor events and through brief character sketches. To familiarize the narratee with major and minor characters, she makes use of both direct and indirect characterization methods. Characters are described only as much as they are relevant to the events of the stories. Their characteristics, inner feelings and thoughts are rarely explicitly mentioned.

Persian language and literature as the second language of Islamic civilization and one of the most influential languages in Arabic has always been at the center of the attention of Arab society in general and Arab scholars in particular. Renewed familiarity of the Arab world with Persian language and literature traces back to late 19th and the beginning of 20th centuries. Arab researchers and scholars have attempted to introduce Arab language and literature into their world, and each has expressed his/her own view about the importance and position of the language. The outlook of Arab writers about Persian language is an interesting point which the present study has attempted to look at by historical and descriptive methods, and taking into account the Arab writers’ attitudes in the recent decades. The study shows that although the study of Persian language does not have a long history in the Arab world, Arab scholars have gained the knowledge of its importance and the necessity of learning it. They believe that the learning of Persian is needed for the sake of studies on Arab language and Islamic civilization and culture. In the same vein they suppose that Persian language has a specific literary semantic structure which makes it close to world literature.

Novel writing in the Persian literature was a new literary type which has arisen in constitutional era. This literary type was formed in Iran as entering into social modern era and attention to social content is one of the main themes. Realistic novel in Iran is always in relation with social institutions due to its importance and special performance. Expressing social realities has been considered as the authors’ mission.One of the social concepts in the Persian novels is the family concept. Family concept in most of the Iranian novels is the key point and the main character is always introduced in the family. On the other hand dealing with humans roles in the family reflects the existing realities in the society.The main purpose of this research is the manner of recreating the family relationships in the Persian novel from the beginning until the 50s which analyses the picture recreated in the literature from this social institute (family) within the general processes form of the realistic fiction.Because of social and political conditions dominated on each era, the manner of attention to this issue is different and the authors’ distress to reflect the family problems is fully in conformity with the social status of such era. In more cases the authors show unlimited social picture within the limited family relations and use the relationships between the family members as a sample to represent social macro-problems to be recognized as a pattern from the social macro-relationships by engaging in details of the close members’ relations.

The 17-18th centuries can be considered as a stormy period for Persian poets. Throughout this period, the Safavid dynasty, which ruled the country, did not pay enough heed to poetry, eulogy, and sonnet for the reason that the governors were engaged in reconstructing social, political, and cultural identities, and they also were involved in various wars. These factors made sonneteers and panegyric poets, who had got used to ancient courts’ structures, seek immigrate to the Gurkanian court in India for patronage. The present article aims at presenting the reasons of the Safavids’ heedlessness to sonnet and eulogy, the poets’ immigrations and, at the same time, the attitudes of poets, who viewed India as the Noah’s ark in those stormy days.

This article is going to study different meaning of the word “carpet” (farš) in Attâr-e Neišâbouri, Sâe’b-e Tabrizi and Bidel-e Dehlavi’s poems, and wants to answer these two questions: 1- Why among whole of Iranian poets after Islam these three poets are more important than others for this research? 2- How their fields and ages effect their poetry system and word-choosing, individually “Carpet” (farš)? Because of this, from first essay until third one we analyse meaning domain of the word “carpet” (farš) in Sâe’b and Bidel’s poems and explain what was the reason of their attention and their considered meaning of this word and show the word “carpet” (farš) and its different combinical and verbical structures in poem extent help these two poets in bombastic Indian Style artistic taste and owend various and new meanings. In fourth essay, individually Attâr-e Neišâbouri’s poems is considered in point of view of contrast which he purposely made between the word “heaven” (‘arš) and “carpet” (farš) and gnostic meanings wanted from. An introduction and a preface are entries for main discussion that is discussed in four essays.

Moses is one of the characters of the Bible, the Qur’an and historical books such as the Tarikh al-Tabari. Followers of Semitic religions (Christianity, Judaism and Islam) consider him a great prophet. According to traditional narratives of these religions, it was Moses who led the Children of Israel out of Egypt. Moses was son of Amram, son of Kehath, son of Levi, son of Jacob, son of Issac, son of Abraham. His mother was Jochebed and his sister was Miriam. His older brother was called Aaron. Based on the Old Testament, the Qur’an and Tarikh al-Tabari, Jochebed put the baby Moses in a basket and set him afloat on the Nile. Later on, Asiya, wife of the Pharaoh found Moses on the river and convinced her husband to adopt the baby Moses as their own. Moses grew up in the Pharaoh’s court, but was prosecuted for killing an Egyptian and went to Midian. There, he served a priest called Shuayb, in the Islamic tradition, for eight years. Moses then married the priest’s daughter Zipporah. Jews, Christians and Muslims believe that on his way back from Midian, Moses was addressed by God and chosen as the prophet of the Children of Israel. This article discusses the characteristics and the status of the Prophet Moses in Tarikh al-Tabari to provide a better understanding of him and highlight the importance of his presence in history and his status among other prophets.