Different Appearances and Usages of Archaism and Sabzevari Dialect in Mahmoud Dowlat Abadi's Kelidar

Introduction Mahmoud DowlatAbadi, the author of the famous novel of Kelidar, is one of the style owner artists of Iran; for him the elevated ways of how to say has constantly been of high importance; thus, he has always been yearning to procure a path for how to say, how to say better, more profoundly and more precisely, how to say more engagingly and more effectively, and made an attempt to attain the best way to express in the most beautiful way possible. Hence, to gain this aim, along with the employment of other writing techniques, he has always paid close attention to two aspects of deviation from the norm and de-familiarization: a tendency towards the languages in the past, through studying and exploring ancient texts, which ultimately has displayed itself as archaism, and the other one is making use of his mother tongue dialect, Sabzevari dialect. This approach in DowlatAbadi’s works and among them in his work, Kelidar, captures the reader’s attention in such a way that the reader has no option but to ponder over this matter whether the words and grammar structures of the text can be attributed to ancient poetry and prose texts and indeed as symbols of archaism, and which ones have been derived from Sabzevari dialect. It is at this point that the reader, depending on his awareness and knowledge of the two mentioned sources would make a classification and would assign his attributions.
Methodology In the present study to answer the before mentioned question, by delving into the novel Kelidar, numerous examples of deviation from the norm and de-familiarization has been compiled, then by classifying these examples in three sections of words, conjugation, and syntactic structures for clarifying the origin and source, examples of gauging and an investigation of ancient Persian poetry and prose as well as Persian glossaries have been provided by interviewing those who were speaking Sabzevari dialect. Afterwards, there has been an attempt to distinguish a clear boundary between the examples of these two approaches. Applying this method, in addition to shedding light on the boundary between the instances related to archaism and Sabzevari dialect (and certainly sometimes the commonality of the two), also has another benefit which is assorting a number of instances that have been the creation of DowlatAbadi’s mind and pen.
Discussion The instances of archaism in Kelidar based on their source can be classified into two common groups (Sabzevari dialect and ancient Persian) and another group related to the old Persian. The common group are those words related to the overall essence of DowlatAbadi’s works among which Kelidar is a regional literature; when Dowlat Abadi picks up his pen and aims to depict the rural life in Khorasan and particularly the land of Sabzevar and as a matter of fact to write about the worldview, thought, livelihood, culture and social life and etc. of rural people (and even urban people of a city like Sabzevar), he has no option but to make use of words which are common in the dialect of the region to portray a real and complete picture of these affairs; words that are not being used even in the environment and atmosphere of the story in which they are happening. However, they have been used during centuries in language and texts. But another group of archaism instances are those words which are not used in Sabzevari dialect and one should seek their origin in ancient texts, dictionaries, and other dialects. Unlike the latter group, the third group are related to Sabzevari dialect; words which have not been recorded in ancient poetry and prose texts and only they can be found in this dialect and sometimes other dialects in Khorasan and outside Khorasan and thus are outside of the archaism category. In analyzing the application of this series of words, we can refer to reasons that were stated in using and the frequency of the common group. In another level of archaism, that is the conjugation level, the instances, like the archaism examples are divided into two common categories which are related to old Persian and the frequency of these two groups is sometimes very vast. In this level of study, various types of changes, other phonological variations, and all the instances of archaism are divided into two common groups between dialect and old Persian or only old Persian. But when it comes to studying the simple verbs which have always been diminished during the history, the investigations show that there are many instances of simple verbs in Kelidar which are examples of archaism (common) and in rare cases related to the dialect. The prefix verbs in Kelidar are almost similar to simple verbs, and the condition of using decorative B, the instances are that of the common group and in the various applications of Nafy and Nahy which are very common in Kelider and can see many examples of them, the instances are common and sometimes are unique to old Persian. In the third level of archaism, that of syntax, the placement variation of linking pronouns and especially objective pronouns cause a deviation of norms and de-familiarization and lead to coming of linking pronoun before the prefix of the verb (related to old Persian), coming of the linking pronoun after the noun affix of the verb (related to Sabzavari dialect), the coming of linking pronoun after the main verb (at the end of verbal phrases or verbs), (common), and also coming of the linking pronouns after words like Agar, Hich, Chenin, And Chandan (related to old Persian) in Kelidar. About the case of making intransitive verbs intransitive (making transitive verbs again transitive) (constructed by the author) some instances have been recorded. And about making passive voice verbs, DowlatAbadi in Kelidar makes use of two types of transitive and intransitive verbs that are seen only in old Persian. In using different applications of prepositions, conjunctions, inflection (to, with), the instances are mostly related to old Persian and they are common only in using the preposition to instead of with.
The other different instances in Kelidar are making use of Bas as an adverb, and with the meaning of enough which one should seek its origin in old Persian and just in cases that Bas has been used with the meaning of (just, only, not only) whose use is very frequent and we can find the traces in the mind and pen of DowlatAbadi.
Conclusion By analyzing examples of words and different conjugation and syntactic structures in Kelidar, the researcher has found out that these variations and differences are the outcome of the approach and attitude of the writer to use abilities and facilities of old Persian poetry and prose texts and Sabzevari dialect; in addition to this, the researcher has been able to gain marvelous and special structures by using the results of exploring these two sources. By this way, DowlatAbadi in Kelidar, has used different and various words and conjugation and syntactic structures to convey the meaning a group of which is associated to archaism and merely a production of old Persian poetry and prose texts (while are not in all cases like the main pattern); but in another group, the remaining characteristics of old Persian in dialect and in fact in the language of characters that DowlatAbadi has tried to depict their life and world, made him feel the necessity and other benefits in employing these ancient elements. Thus, one should divide the ancient words and conjugation and syntactic structures in Kelidar into two common sections (between old texts and Sabzevari dialect) and merely a production of old texts. Another group of these various and different examples, given the exploration of people speaking the dialect of Persian and investigation of old texts and Persian dictionaries are outside of the category of archaism and in fact can be considered a derivation of Sabzevari dialect. And we must consider the fourth group as the creation of the mind and pen of the writer.