Research in Contemporary World Literature
Year:2018 | Volume:22 | Issue:2 |Papers Count:15

Nowadays, children's literature regarding the concept of childhood, has a special place in the humanities. Children's poetry is also a branch of this kind. Reading lyrics might be useful for children's poets and a valuable help to improve the quality of the genre. This paper explores children's poetry of Hughes and Yaminisharif. Their similarities in the use of naturalistic themes, especially the use of animal characters, are the reasons for such a choice. The present study has two parts: the theoretical section that is based on the ideas of the theorists of the American doctrine of comparative literature, and the applied section, which includes an analysis of these tow poet's works. Since, according to the American approach, the mere existence of similarities can be the context of a comparative study and American comparative literature is a kind of cultural study, the paper also aimed at the recognition of similarities, and achieving a perspective on children’s poetry, especially in animal themes of Iranian and English works.

The present essay attempted to consider Ahmad Mahmoud’s The Neighbors in the light of Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak’s concept of Subaltern, who is known as one of the three "Holy Trinity" critics of Post-colonial theory. The economic and cultural as well as the military interventions of the colonizing powers were present during previous centuries. Colonization then changed its path more toward the cultural and economic rather than the military domain. This novel is regarded as Post-colonial text, and attempts are made to investigate and prove the claim that the main characters of the novel under scrutiny experience subalternity and that their survival depends on the resistance of the committed intellectuals. Mahmoud depicted societies where the intellectuals have the major role in resisting colonization. However, the results of their attitude towards their society in different cultures are not the same. The protagonists of the novel under the cultural and economic pressures coming from the colonizers and colonizing agents face many predicaments and their life circumstances become more and more difficult, until they leave the country or are imprisoned. Some intellectuals understood the circumstances of their society, and because of their commitment, helped their people out of trouble. On the contrary, some intellectuals preferred to leave the country in the hands of the dictators, and consequently the processes of Othering and Worlding of their society persisted. In the light of Spivak’s ideas, this study attempted to indicate that the conditions of impossibility, the hopeless and negative feeling for the Subaltern (that nothing will change for the marginalized into a condition of possibility) can be transformed on condition that the Subaltern is represented by native and committed intellectuals.

Diyet by the Turkish writer Omer Seyfettin, is an instructive story and highly valued by the next generation. One can not hope to grasp a deeper and newer perspective of the work without paying close attention to its structure and component elements.Although personality and characterization are more related to the novel, and in the short story, there is no leisure for character development, they are among the features worth considering in the structure of the short story of Diyet. This article attempted to analyze the narrative element of personality and characterization in Diyet story in various dimensions. The author has used a variety of styles and types of narrative characters to create and polish characters. According to the studies and due to the fact that the story belongs to the novelette realm, Omer Seyfettin paid much attention to the quality of the elements of the story and its coherence when writing the story of Diyet, which is more pronounced in the characters section.

The impact of the Persian writers upon the literary style and tradition of the World`s prominent poets and writers could serve as an interesting and overwhelming subject for comparative studies. Saadi’s Golestan has been a great source of inspiration for many writers around world. This book has served as a source of wisdom and understanding for many writers. His notions of justice, moderation, rationality and humanism have been widely used in the narratives of poetic works of many writers.In his works, Saadi with a special artfulness and deep sensibility, portrays the vicious and virtuous dimensions of human race, and in a witty and skillful manner, in his prose and poetry, demonstrates the behavioral characteristics of all classes of society. The present research attempts to present a brief overview of the Europeans' understanding of the practical dimensions of Saadi’s philosophy, outlook and social morality presented in Golestan. Furthermore, it attempted to analyze the explicit and implicit similarities between the literary features used by German classic writers and Saadi.

New Novel (or nouveau roman) resulting from a society’s desires and expectations in mid-20th century, first rose in France, and then extended to other countries, including Iran. Hence, novelists like Hushang Golshiri (1938-2000) and Bahram Sadeqi (1937-1984) joined the New Novel current. Sadeqi wrote his short stories between 1956 and 1971, and his The Trench and the Empty Canteens (1970) is a typical example of New Novel in Persian literature. The book includes twenty-four short stories, from which A Gloomy Verse for a Moonless Night was selected to be reviewed based on Formalist and Structuralist approaches. There are some major reasons for this choice, one being the short length of the story which is suitable for a Formalist explication, and the other being the idiosyncratic language of the fiction, like the numerated episodes in the story and also the form and features of the text. Some anti-traditional narratives and techniques used in this work are: "Defamiliarization", "Distance", "Foregrounding", "Backgrounding", "Aljebrization", and "The Dominant". This research aimed at disclosing some linguistic and narrative features of Bahram Sadeghi’s texts in order to reveal first the New Novelists’ techniques, and then to discuss this so-called new style of Persian prose in the 20th century. Hence, based on these approaches, this article attempted to discover some narrative techniques and also to show how the Structuralist approaches might open the texts and present the inner linguistic phenomena of these texts.

Although Bertolt Brecht's dramas with the non-Aristotelian characteristics represented him mainly as a pioneer playwright rather than a romantic poet in German and world literature, his poems also content richness and such a literacy that need a precise attention and more consideration. Brecht's poems as like as his dramas are reflections of the political, social, and economical issues of the time which can be regarded as a proof of his political aspects of view that make readers challenge with political, economic and social circumstances of the specific era. Instead of phantasy elements represent Brecht’s poems social and political issues of the day with a rude, more and less aggressive and even obscene ton. Analyzing Bertolt Brecht's poems reflects the way and method of his thinking which express his early poems are criticizing vigorously the chaotic, political and social conditions of early years after the First World War and revolts against the ruling bourgeoisie system.

Nowadays, some authors retell the old myths, are inspired by them, deform them and mix them with other myths, and even create new myths. Such a phenomenon has also occurred in the works of some Iranian novelists. This study aimed to consider the reasons behind the use of myth and its transformation in Persian novels with the use of content- analysis method. According to the findings of this research, the most important reasons behind the changes in structure and usage of myths in new Persian novels are criticism of the metaphysical values, opposition to the dominant political discourse, individualism and struggle with the mythic thoughts in the society. Authors of these novels have tried to challenge some political and cultural beliefs of Iran contemporary society through the deformation of myths.

This article focuses on the notion of "life narrative" in Sasson’s American Chick in Saudi Arabia (2012) and tries to elaborate the relationships between the cultural, political discourses after 9.11 and the re-emergence of "life narratives" through the postcolonial perspectives of Edward Said and Sidonie Smith. To this end, notions like "identity" and "gender" are studied. It is argued that the re-emergence of "life narratives" in the multicultural era, despite its re-defined notion of the "self," can only be traced back to prevalent neo-imperialist and Islamophobic inclinations in the West after 9.11. In other words, through foregrounding the hierarchy of "us versus them", such works perpetuate the recent neo-imperialist leanings in the West. However, the article’s attempt to disclose the effect of such works on the recent dissemination of Islamophobia in the West is complicated by the fact that even though Sasson’s "representation" of Saudi women would be considered to be affected by the neo-imperialist discourse, the fact, still, remains that they have been victimized by the suppressing Saudi regime.

The novel Rood-e Ravi is created through the application of an intertextual method. Quran, Islamic thoughts, Arabic treatise about cards per object form its chains of speech. Basically, it describes the creation of the world and the role of evil from the perspective of symbolic sect of Meftahiyeh of which the intellectual-ideological representation is the mythical character of Aboudajaneh. Similarly, Aboutorab Khosravi recreated the myth of eternal chaos, pain, suffering, sickness, and death. He has also written books including "Rood-e Ravi" by recognizing the divine nature of "word" (Esme Azam, Greate Name, mythical word of "the world’s creator") and skillfully using its material/concrete form. Due to the atmosphere and familiar Boofe-kooresque elements in Rood-e Ravi, such as dance, the dancers from India and Lahore, the ethereal woman, it is evident that his works are written under the influencing of Boof-e-koor esque literature. the current paper, specifically, extracts and analyzes the mythological motifs of this novel by applying a descriptive method.

Naturalism is one of the most important literary school of 19th century in Europe. The principles of this school are based on naturalism and scientism. In Iran, this school was introduced to Iranian literary society by Chubak and Hedayat. Although in our literary works, some of the western principles of this school do not seem to be present, both Iran and Europe consider some common principles like: determinism, class conflict, social and political protests, and exaggeration of ugliness. These principles exist in most of the literary works of Ali Ashraf Darvishian, Iranian story writer of the 40s. Therefore, this articale attempted to analyze two crucial books of this writer according to naturalistic principals to see the extent to which the thoughts of this writer were influenced by naturalistic writers, specially Zola.

Proverbs are literary pieces constituting the bulk of nations' language and culture. They reflect people's views toward different issues thereby playing a decisive role in the cultural identity of each nation. The present study aims at comparing women’s status in Iranian culture with that in Italian culture. To do so, the woman-associated proverbs of the two languages were contrastively analyzed. The following steps determined the sequence of the study: collecting 1384 Italian and Iranian proverbs on women; translating the Italian proverbs into Persian; discussing cross- cultural issues; categorizing the subjects of the proverbs; and determining the correspondences and the discrepancies among the samples. The results demonstrated that the two cultures exhibit cultural compatibility while diverge strikingly in some important respects. In particular, the Iranian culture was found to be stronger than the Italian culture with respect to two opposite issues, that is, women’s humiliation and dignity.

This article attempted to investigate the notion of identity. It is a study of the temporal and spatial possibility of fashioning Canadian identity in a postcolonial context. Literature, novel in particular, has always been an appropriate text for such an investigation. Therefore, Margaret Atwood’s third novel, Lady Oracle, (1976) is examined here. Atwood, the most recognized Canadian writer in the world of literature publicly and academically, wrote this novel when the question of identity was not only the current problem of Canadian writers and scholars but also the main concern of Canadian government and people. Like her first two novels, Lady Oracle also questions Canadian identity as a borderline case between apparently dominant British and American identities on the one hand, and as an independently voiced one in the world on the other. Following the main character’s textual footprints from her abandonment, concealment, and multiple identities to her revelation and unified identity, the study revisits one of the ways of fashioning identity in general and Canadian identity in particular.

Nostalgia is one of the hot- debated issues in critical psychology which has been translated as the yearning or gloom in Persian. It is defined as the regret for the sweet past and the contrast of the present with the past. The feeling of alienation and being far from home, remembering death, childhood and youth regrets, separation from the beloved, remembering the glorious era of history, desire for the ancient times, and the hope for Utopia are considered as its components. Fadwa Tuqan, a contemporary poet of Arabic literature, depicted some shapes and dimensions of sympathy, regret and anguish in her poetry. Utilizing a nostalgic approach to the past, this study reflected upon the concepts of love, being away from homeland, death, patriotism, hope for Utopia and mythology and aimed at explaining each one's manifestations through a comparative perspective.

The Earthquake in Chile, a novella, not only represents the worldview, but also depicts the defeat and disability of individuals in the face of social constitutions, destiny and natural disasters. From Kleist’s points of view, reaching the fact in his life is his life’s priority. He does not believe in revolutions. Rather he believes in a deep social change which might be possible through providing education by the society. In The Earthquake in Chile, Kleist postulates that the world is unrestrained. He also adds that disappointment, lack of reliance, social injustice, destruction of human values, and so on are rooted in lay people’s weakness, and inappropriate purposeful activities by the powers. Kleist also harshly criticizes the powers responsible for human rights violations, and humans and world’s annihilation. Cosmology, thoughts and divine justice from Kleist’s insight are mostly compiled from John Jacque Rousse, Kant, Voltaire, and Leibnizs works. Through Kleist’s masterpiece, deep social background changes appear in the audience’s mind through images and memories.

Different theories of western intellectuals about language and literature have made provided opportunities for new analysis of literary texts and language. One literary schools developed in the twentyth century is post-structuralism. Post-structuralists consider a sign in new ways. Julia Krista is one of Post- Structuralists whose ideas about literary texts caught attentions. Because of complexity and being blended with philosophy, her ideas are rarely used in Persian literature. Some parts of her theories deal with symbolism and semiotics in language. In her belief, language cannot be only signs or symbols and is a combination of both. As a result each one of them modify the other and the meaning is a product of their combination. This paper attempted to analyze symbolism and semiotics in the poem Ghesseye Shahre Sangestan(the story of stone city) of Akhavan which is one of the most prominent work of contemporary literature and to provide new interpretation for it. It can also serve as a sample to help understand the meaning of unreadable texts.