Analysis of the short story Fi Janazati by Ghassan Kanfani based on the theory of Eileen Baldshuiler

The contemporary world is the world of domination and the importance of short stories over other literary genres. Contemporary man rarely has the taste and leisure to read long multi-volume novels, and that is why research in this field is of importance. In the short story, the character has already evolved and is in front of the waiting reader, engaged in something that has reached its critical moment or is in the process of something that has already happened but has not come to a result. In the short story, the author chooses a slice of the protagonist's life and a point from it that must reach a critical stage. It is a window that briefly acquaints the reader with the life of the protagonist or the other characters and allows looking at what is happening through this window. There are different types of short stories. One of them is lyrical short story, which is distinguished by the dominance of the element of "feeling and emotion" over other elements. In 1969, a critic named Eileen Baldshuiler explained and analyzed the lyrical short story in an article entitled "A History of Lyrical Short Story". In this article, he suggests that the narrative is of two forms, epic or lyrical. Epic means the prominence of actions and the importance of external narratives. According to Baldshuiler, in lyrical stories, the goal is the thoughts and feelings of the character (Mastoor, 1379, 34). In this regard, all characters are analyzed in terms of the structure of the elements of the story and take the structure of the story based on their performance. In Bald Schuiler's lyrical story, the reader marks the story to discover the end. Also, the narrator refers to certain signs in addition to the definitions he gives of his life path. Baldshuiller points out that the lyrical short story has all the elements that should be present in all stories, but, in his view, the traditional plot style is the least important element of the lyrical story, which can basically be in one paragraph or a few sentences.

In his view, the conventional plot is a believable plot formed on the basis of a very clear cause-and-effect relationship. However, the unconventional plot expresses the complex and contradictory feelings of the characters in the process of storytelling in a symbolic way and sometimes without precedence and latency. This creates a lot of interest in the story and the reader can follow it from somewhere in the text and sometimes play the role of the author for the characters of the story and sometimes end the story according to their mental structure. Another feature of the lyrical story that Baldshuiler mentions is the "emotional curve" that the character creates throughout the story. This refers to the changes that the character makes as a result of the course of events and what is left of that character in the end. A lyrical short story such as Ghasan Kanfani's Fi Janazati tries to examine the invisible dimension of reality. Therefore, in the short story, as in the poem, what is more important is not explicitly mentioned.The present study uses the descriptive-analytical method to analyzes the short story Fi Janazati by Ghassan Kanfani based on the components of the short story from the point of view of Eileen Baldshuiler. It examines the elements of the short story and   the author’s writing skills.  An analysis is also performed based on new literary studies such as Eileen Baldchuiller's theory.

The components of Eileen Bald-Schuyler's theory for lyrical short story are aphasia, subjectivism, emotion and imagination, open end, symbol. The timing of the apocalypse in the story of "Fi Janazi" is well illustrated in this story, the present is not dynamic and has no external movement and action. This indicates the anonymity of the present. Anonymity manifests itself in being mental and lacking dynamism and action. Perhaps, that is why the title of the story is "Fi Janazati" (at my funeral) which refers to the time of the narrator's death, and it is natural that, after death, man is not bound by time. The story of Fi Janazi has been narrated at two levels of time. The first level is the past tense, which is dynamic and objective, and the second level is the present tense, which is mental and immobile.
The second component of the lyrical short story is subjectivism, which means that the story takes place and progresses in the mental space of the characters, and the role of the external world is small. This can be clearly seen in Fi Janazaii by Ghassan Kanfani. In this story, the narrator returns to the past, but external events are not described much. The text begins with the narrator's fear and hope, and the narrator's childhood feelings are expressed, all of which are mental. Noting that the child's family surrendered to working to pay for the house, the space becomes a bit objective, but, in the following sentences, there are items that express the narrator's view of responsibility and life. Therefore, where external events are narrated, they still have a presence in the mental space. The story flows in a mixture of reality and mind. The third component of the lyrical short story, according to Bald Schuyler, is emotion and imagination; In the examined story, all the words, sentences, similes and metaphors give a completely hopeless and dark atmosphere to the text. In this respect, the text is very effective and emotional. The open end is another component that the author did not use in this story.And the last component is the symbol. The main symbol of this story is the spiritual and psychological interactions in the life of two couples, which takes place in the form of the title Fi Janazati.

Baldeshwiler’s quintuple principles in the story Fi Janazati by Ghassan Kanfani have been analyzed. The results show that, among those principles, the elements of anachronism, imagination and subjectivism are salient and can be considered as the source of real experiences of individual and social life and a reflection of reader’s self. Therefore, the story Fi Janazati can be considered as one of the perfect lyrical short stories.