PERSIAN LANGUAGE STUDIES QUARTERLY (SHAFA –E- DEL)
Year:2021 | Volume:4 | Issue:7|Papers Count:12

Alongside the Iranian Constitutional Revolution and its social and political upheavals, magazines and newspapers were recognized as the most important media among both the general public and the intellectuals. Newspaper satire became widespread; so that satire journalists of this era, began to criticize political and social issues in order to make intimate contact with regular people. One of the most important publications in the Constitutional era is Nasim-e-Shomal newspaper in which Seyed Ashrafedin Gilani’ s satirical poems and writings were published. Due to its specific type of satire, Nasim-e-Shomal attained unique reception from the general public. In this article, we have studied Seyed Ashraf’ s literary satire tricks in his poems and anecdotes. The results show that among satire-making mechanisms in his works, there are several important features; 1) Using fable or identification with animals which is a symbolic-narrative type. 2) Using ignorance via which everything is changed to its opposite. 3) Playing with symbols’ meanings which relate to religious and superstitious beliefs. 4) Using allegory for presenting serious messages beyond figurative elements of artificial narratives. 5) Intentional benefitting from inner-textual paradoxes that fills poems or writings with political and social ironies. Moreover, nonsense writing is done through a type of satirical writing strategy via presenting irrelevant content.

Minooye Kherad is a consultative text in Middle Persian including questions and replies to which an imaginary character named “ Dana” asks Minooye Kherad and he replies to them. Gulistan is a prose including an introduction and eight chapters written by Saadi. The present study has been done with a descriptive-analytical approach and compares conceptual metaphor of animosity in Minooye Kherad and Gulistan. Animosity is a common moral abomination of the two texts and its happening in Minooye Kherad and Gulistan was 5 and 4, respectively. After derivation of all animosity metaphors in both texts, four metaphors were found regarding conception of animosity namely as: object, action, device, status. Even though with a difference in frequency, object and action were common in both texts. The most frequent metaphor is “ Animosity is an action. ” which was observed in Minooye Kherad and Gulistan with occurrence of 40% and 75%, respectively. “ Animosity is a device. ” and “ Animosity is an action. ” were only observed in Minooye Kherad that may imply on the fact that even though the writer or writers of Minooye Kherad believed that animosity can be an action, it can also be a device and a status which was not observed in Gulistan. 75% occurrence of “ Animosity is an action” , in Gulistan may imply on the writer as a pragmatic one that recognizes animosity as an action more than anything else.

Nowadays feminism and views on women are key issues regarding social sciences as well as other various cultural subjects. This matter is considered prominent in literary fiction, especially in female writers’ works. Zoya Pirzad is one of the most successful figures in literary fiction. She has contemplated women as a key axiom in her two novels and has written about women’ s world with feminine thoughts, ideologies and styles to represent different features of womanhood. The main goal in this article is to study women’ s identity and feminine features in Pirzad’ s novels of “ We Will Get Used to It” and “ Things We Left Unsaid” . The writer has investigated woman and her identity in the aforementioned novels through library research and investigating sociology and other interdisciplinary sciences. The results show that Pirzad has illustrated women’ s identity based on various dimensions of feminine features in her two novels. Women of these two novels are examples of regular women in the community that are to find their own identities and their different feminine features in order to improve and transform their characteristics.

The richest of Persian epic poems can be found in fourth, fifth and the beginning of sixth century. The reason to this lies within the dominant political and social atmosphere in the society. This glorious era starts with prose shahnamehs and ends with works such as Borzu nama and Shahriyarnameh. One of the best ways to more meaningful recognition of epic works is to pay attention to the criteria through which a work can be considered as epic. However, not every epic work can be named as national. Researchers have mentioned numerous criteria to recognize epic works. Provided that a number of these criteria are found, the work can be recognized as epic. Nevertheless, if many of the criteria are found in a work, it can be recognized as a true and unique piece of work that is based on legendary infrastructures. The most prominence of a national epic work is nationalism and possession of national goals, concerns and heroes. This study has been done via a descriptive-analytical approach and the results show that the only national epic work that is thoroughly worth recognition is Ferdowsi’ s Shahnameh. Other epics of the same era are considered as natural since they have not regarded nationalism extensively. It is said that several of such works are as a part of Shahnameh through which reading them can reflect only a continuation of a single story of Shahnameh.

Contemporary literature is considered as the reflection of intellectual trends in the society. Although numerous types of contemporary literature exist all around the world and they all influence one another, the role of native trends in Eastern colonized countries should not be neglected; societies that have elapsed colonization era and have entered post-colonialism stages. The present article intends to study Jalal Al-e-Ahmad’ s critical post-colonialism perspectives-including a collection of theories regarding cultural heritage of colonialism-in his book, “ Khasi Dar Mighat” based on Frantz Fanon’ s theories. This study has been done with a descriptive-analytical methodology. After analyzing theories by these two critics and writers, it could be said that Jalal Al-e-Ahmad and Frantz Fanon both have common thoughts in that they do not limit their post-colonialism studies only to the west, but they believe one’ s criticism of their own image should also be considered as a part of their studies.

Since poems regarding one’ s geography and motherland is considered as a constituent of a community or a nation, poem contents of patriotic poets concern topics in regard with geographical elements. During various eras, poets have always created numerous poetry expressing their love and passion towards their motherlands that are extremely noticeable. This study has intended how to consider reflection of geographical elements in several poets’ poetic literature with an emphasis on a number of classical and contemporary poets especially those who express love towards their homeland. The results show that Nasir Khusraw, Saadi, Hafez as classical poets and Manouchehr Atashi, Akhavan-Sales, Ali Moalem and Shahriar as contemporary poets have mentioned the geography of Iran in their poetry from diverse angles. The reason to this remembrance towards homeland and geographical elements resembles their true love for their motherland. The aforementioned geographical elements are such as: homeland, geographical identity, geographical location and motherland. Amongst these elements, geographical names such as: Caspian Sea, Mazandaran, Khorasan, Shiraz, South and Azerbaijan are more frequently used.

Among both Iranian and Arab countries, there have consistently been poets who have tried assiduously for their homeland’ s glory and freedom and have dedicated their poems so as to liberate their nations. Amongst these patriotic poems, Mirzadeh Eshghi, Miqati Al Tranblusi and Saati Al Mesri can be mentioned. They have intended to enlighten general public’ s thoughts and to be the voice of their nation against outsiders or corrupt governments. Mirzadeh Eshghi as one of the poets and journalists of the Constitutional Era in Iran, was a revolutionary who utilized his poems as a sharp weapon to express his perspectives and used his poems, writings as well as his language to serve political purposes of his homeland. Miqati and Saati were 19th century poets whose works are considered to reflect their homeland’ s illustrations more than any other poets. This study has been done with a descriptive-analytical approach and has benefitted from various books and articles for two main goals: To find common grounds in these poets’ works and to explain their differences in terms of imaginative styles and thoughts and their expressing of patriotic emotions. The results show emergence of people’ s spirit from homeland description, modern imagination and differences among the three poems regarding their homeland’ s illustrations.

Since the ancient times up until now, regimes have intended to exploit humanity through establishing bases and expanding their cultures beyond their own borders. An issue in contemporary literature is resistance literature that is anti-exploitation in which poets encourage the general public to stand against anti-freedom or against their authoritarian rulers. According to Fromm, authoritarians and exploiters are able to succeed in dominating humans and communities, however, they cannot hinder emerging resistance against their inhumane behaviors; therefore, general public’ s reaction can lead to the exploiters’ downfall. Simin Behbahani, as a contemporary poet, cannot be silent against Pahlavi’ s dictatorship and uses her poems to stand against them. This study is an attempt to analyze sociology of exploitation in Simin Behbahani’ s poems based on Eric Fromm’ s theories. Methodology in this research is descriptive-analytical. The results show that there are numerous common grounds between Fromm’ s theory and Behbahani’ s poems. Behbahani from Resurrection (1974) onward, intends to criticize Pahlavi’ s System. She has a special attention towards disorders in the community which has been caused by the regime’ s exploitation.

Sentences are divided into four different kinds of how to deliver a message; declarative, interrogative, imperative and exclamatory. The essence of a declarative sentence is to achieve information, however, we could infer other secondary meanings from it. This study has been done with an analytical-descriptive method and intends to analyze interrogative sentences of Iraj Mirza’ s “ Zohre and Manuchehr” and Ghasem Labon’ s “ Iraj and Hoobare” which are considered as the last lyrical poems of classic literature in Persian. This study is an approach to discover in what sentences are secondary meanings more significant and what the cause of this significance is. The results show that the frequency of interrogative sentences in dialogs to other types of sentences in “ Iraj and Hoobare” is more than “ Zohreh and Manuchehr” . The frequency of exclamatory, rhetorical and impatience statements, are the reasons why dialogs in Larbon’ s “ Iraj and Hoobare” are considered as artistic and outstanding. The frequency of exclamation and reprimand in interrogative sentences are used to approach Zohre to what her heart demands. Nevertheless, the frequency of exclamatory sentences in “ Iraj and Hoobare”-due to its lyrical aspect-is caused by love. In addition, dubiousness in times of danger and impinging to one’ s homeland-due to its being an epic poem-is shocking. Rhetorical questions used in in Larbon’ s lyrical poems show purpose and confirm language and impatience. They are influenced by being apart or away from true love. This trend cannot be found in “ Zohre and Manuchehr” .

Norman Fairclough’ s Critical Discourse Theory is considered as one of the key theories regarding literary texts, especially in fiction literature and it plays an important role in identifying social and cultural changes of the society. Fairclough is one of the scholars who studied literary works with an approach to criticize capitalism in society in terms of critical discourse with a view on relations between power and ideology and intended to study this matter in three stages of: description, interpretation and clarification. This study has investigated the story of ‘ The Children of Carpet-Weaving House’ by Houshang Moradi Kermani based on Norman Fairclough’ s Critical Discourse Theory with a descriptive-analytical methodology. Moradi Kermani has narrated awful condition of exploited working children and the hegemony of suppressers over the suppressed based on relations between power and ideology. To do so, he has recounted his ideology in a symbolic background through repeating characters’ names, using specific vocabulary, meaning coverage of words, combining native, informal and literary language as well as language of satire in the stage of description. The stage of interpretation is done via various spectrums of discourses by creating assumptions in similar situations and inter-textual and situational satire. At the stage of clarification, the most prominent issue is the issue of child abuse and ignoring children’ s rights. Moreover, emotional crisis, interaction of poverty and capitalism, hope and hopelessness, battle and surrender, religion and atheism, has put the story in a bitter and sorrowful atmosphere.

Symbolic language is considered as a type of literary school. This language in literature is not only used to escape realism, but it is also used as a facilitating means to achieve realities of the cosmos. Since symbols determine humans’ special mental states, they lead to recognize poets’ or authors’ ideologies through interpreting literary works. Saghinameh Zohoori Torshizi and Sadatnameh Nezamoddin Asterabadi are examples of works that are not yet studied upon sufficiently; thus, many of their valuable features are still unknown. This study intended to investigate animal symbolism in both of the aforementioned works. After studying and analysis, findings show that Astarabadi and Zohoori possessed a deep and precise knowledge of archetypes especially symbolic archetypes and had used them through elements of imagination in their poems in a special way. It seems meanings in these two works are very close to each other. The results are presented via library research and analytical-descriptive methodology.

Practice of religious Jurisprudence (Ijtihad) is not merely knowledge or a profession, but an art. Ijtihad is a queen to which enables its owner to infer Sharia law from its sources. One cannot be appointed as a mujtahid by mere practice and assiduity; In addition to these two, mujtahid need to possess the required passion and talent of Ijtihad. Therefore, prior to becoming a mujtahid, the talented one needs to learn a great deal of knowledge to be assisted in this path. Since the most prominent source of inference for a Mujtahid is Quran and Hadith of Masoomeen(AS) and understanding them is directly relevant to literature, it can be said that literature is considered as one of the most essential and salient antecedents to Ijtihad; thus, it can be concluded that a mujtahid can never be able to Ijtihad unless he learns principles of literature. How can one ignore the eminent role of literature in Ijtihad?; Whereas in Quran, literary devices such as: brachylogy, implicit metaphor and simile, allusion, metaphor, allegory, etc., are frequently seen in every verse and many narratives. This study has attempted to identify the role of literary principles in Ijtihad and to investigate its impact. Data show that without learning literature, the art of Ijtihad is not obtainable.