The Analysis of Grotesque Body in Dābbat al-Arḍ Figures of Falnama Based on Bakhtin’s Approach

Problem statement: 

Grotesque is one of the presentations used in art to manifest different figures compared to the usual ones. It tries to depict fear and humor together by creating monstrous content by distorting the truth and disfiguring it. According to metaphysical thinking, the ideal body is a healthy organization, while the grotesque style challenges, disturbs, and sometimes reconstructs the rules of such a physical structure. The grotesque body is one of the main concepts proposed by Mikhail Bakhtin; he believes it is an unfinished body that is constantly in the act of turning and becoming; It is a concept arising from the carnival and grotesque realism; A novel and renewed event that takes place in association with these two concepts. In the illustrated horoscopes (Falnama/ Falnameh), there is an image with the theme of the ‘Dābbat al-Arḍ ’ (Beast of Earth). This painting has special visual features that match the characteristics of the grotesque and can be analyzed based on Bakhtin’s opinions in this regard.

The present research, by applying the characteristics of the grotesque in the image of Dābbat al-Arḍ  in Falnama books, analyzes the characteristics proposed by Bakhtin with regards to the carnival and the grotesque body in the figure of Dābbat al-Arḍ .

It is a qualitative study attempting to match grotesque’s characteristics to the image of Dābbat al-Arḍ . In the next step, based on the mentioned theory, the figure of Dābbat al-Arḍ was analyzed based on Bakhtin’s views on the grotesque body. Data was collected from the library and documentary resources.

The research findings have shown that a number of grotesque features such as terrifying, hilarious, exaggerated, unusual and nonuniformity aspects all are detectable in the image of Dābbat al-Arḍ . Moreover, the characteristics such as incompleteness, sense of death, mask (distortion), contradiction and duality, entanglement, and amputation, which were proposed by Bakhtin in relation to the carnival and the grotesque body, can similarly be observed in the figures of Dābbat al-Arḍ .