An analysis of Attar’s Mosibatnameh based on the play theory and from the perspective of Bakhtin

In Bakhtin’s opinion, the term ‘play’ is the suspense of everything in a hierarchical structure and addresses all the forms of terror, reverence, piety, and etiquette connected with that structure. Although the Attar's works are closed-off discourse in the form of monologues and his words expect no answer, by the use of play element, one may detect instances of polyphony in those works. With irony, Socratic dialogue, Menippean satire and parody, Attar trespasses the level of monologues and projects himself as a social and religious authority. The Mosibatnameh is fraught with such play features as free and familiar contacts, sublime and cheap as well as serious and comic utterances, carnivalistic mésalliances, naked posing of ultimate questions on life and death, profanation (playing with the symbols of higher authority), mock crowning and subsequent decrowning, inappropriate speeches and performances, and so on. Using a descriptive-analytical method and according to Bakhtins opinions, this study analyzes the various features of play in Mosibatnameh.