Special Compounds in Bidele’s Ghazal

The fundamental basis of speech is the “word” and studying the structure of words is a window into the thought sphere and intellectual premises of eloquent speakers. One of the ways to reveal the latent meanings and observations is to create compound phrases. Compared to other languages in the world, with regards to compound creation, Persian is one of the most powerful languages with a very high level of potential. Producing specific compound phrases is one of the crafts many poets have tried their hands on and in the “Indian style” of poetry, the high frequency of compound phrases is a stylistic characteristic (Shafiei Kadkani, 2005: 64). In grammatical textbooks of Persian language, the result of the process of combination, i.e. the creation of a compound word, is discussed in detail. A compound word consists of at least two independent words, which creates an independent lexical unit with a separate record on lexical textbooks and dictionaries (Tabatabaei, 2016: 9). In order to describe compound words, the latent relations in the deep structure of these compounds must be considered. Chomsky believes that if grammar is to be able to describe the linguistic facts and explain the relations between sentences, it is not sufficient to only deal with explicit symbols and relations; rather, it should try to uncover implicit relations present at the deep structure of concrete sentences (Bateni, 1987: 114). Bidel Dehlavi is a poet with an extraordinary talent in reviving words. He has created exceptional compounds in his poetry, and this is one of the most important factors of implicit meaning in his sonnets. Investigating these specific compounds can be a great tool for understanding the aesthetic value of his poetry and thought. This study is a descriptive analytic study which relies on scientific resources of linguistics and grammar. The statistical population of the study is the book of sonnets by Bidel Dehlavi, edited by Akbar Behdarvand in two volumes. First, we will identify the specific compounds in Bidel’s sonnets which are structured as compound words and then, based on their semantic core, they will be divided into endocentric and exocentric compound words. Finally, the grammatical relations among the constituent parts of individual compounds are discussed. More than anything, poetry is a play with words. The eccentricity and peculiarity of poetic language causes each poem to become a unique creation and in this process, various linguistic tools such as the order and connotation of words and lexical innovation will help the poet (Ahmadi, 2016: 59). Bidel Dehlavi is the perfect epitome and embodiment of the Indian style of poetry. His sonnets are reflections of ambitious thoughts and eccentric fantasies. In order to voice new thoughts and dabble in intellectual creativities, he would create novel compounds, emphasizing the verbal significance of meaning. In order to appreciate the latent thoughts in the deep structure of these compounds and to discover his colorful fantasy world and poetic depictions, the first step is to evaluate these exceptional compound lexicons. On the concrete and surface level, these compounds are built by putting those words together that for those unfamiliar with Bidel’s style are not related to each other at all; however, this mysterious and enigmatic combination indicates the deep structure, processing and appreciating it will pave the way for understanding the message the poet intended. In fact, the deep structure will determine the semantic and logical relationships among the parts of the sentence and through transformational rules, such as deletion, replacement, insertion, or reordering, deep structure relations are converted into surface structure relations (Bateni, 1987: 114). For instance, we will discuss the compound phrase, “parishan jelveh” (disheveled /face) and its deep structure sentence. The deep structure sentence for this compound can be as follows:“Ou (An) jelveh-ash parishan ast) (His [Its] face is disheveled)
First transformation: the elimination of the subject of the deep structure sentence: “Jelveh-ash parishan ast”
Second transformation: eliminating the verb of the deep structure sentence: “Jelveh-ash parishan”
Third transformation: elimination of attached pronoun: “Jelveh parishan”
Fourth transformation: repordering the remaining parts: “Parishan Jelveh”
In Bidel’s poetry, there is this compound phrase “Hosn Parishan Jelveh” (disheveled face of a beauty), where the compound “Parishan Jelveh” is in fact an adjective describing the noun:  a beauty and magnificence whose face is disheveled.
Describing and explaining exceptional compounds requires much more effort in cases where the compound has a metaphorical or virtual meaning since besides discovering the deep structure sentence and its grammatical relations, understanding the semantic network of the words and their literary and artistic functions is also of utmost importance. With regards to compound words, it is worth mentioning that the meaning of the compound phrase is not always a sum of the individual meanings of its constituent parts. Accordingly, from a semantic standpoint, compound words are divided into the two groups of endocentric and exocentric compound words. With regards to the surface structure, compound words or exceptional combinations in Bidel’s sonnets have been created based on compound word creation patterns in Persian language and they are applied in terms of “nouns, adjectives, and adverbs”. Generally, these words are divided into two categories, the verb-based words (containing the infinitive) and non-verb-based words (lacking the infinitive). The current study investigates the grammatical relations and the semantic cores of these compound words and phrases and it aims to study deep structure sentences in order to discover latent relations in these compounds. With regards to semantic core, these compounds are divided into endocentric and exocentric types. In their deep structures, exocentric compound words contain complete sentences with various grammatical relations such as predicate, complement, subjective, objective, and adverbial relations. Endocentric compounds are divided into adjective compounds and genitive compounds with grammatical relations of description and possession. These relations are illuminated using a number of examples from the sonnets of Bidel Dehlavi.