A Comparative Study of the Compound Metamorphosis Myths in Bahram Beyzai's Plays with respect to Gérard Genette's Theory of Hypertextuality

The purpose of this paper is the hypertextual study of the compound metamorphosis myths in Bahram Beyzai's plays based on the theory of Gérard Genette. Hypertextuality is one of the types of Genette' transtextuality, which represents the connection between two texts. This theory expresses the effectiveness and derivation of the hypotext on the hypertext and includes two basic types, imitation and transformation. The compound metamorphosis myths are considered to be one of the most important surprising elements in the literature. In metamorphosis, creatures transform from one form to another and in the combined structure, creatures are represented as a composite of humans, animals, etc. Literature is considered as the origin of the presence of myths which both impress mutually on each other. This connection provides an opportunity to study them with respect to the theory of hypertextuality. The results of this study reveal that these creatures exist in eighteen plays written by Beyzai, and their existence is inspired by mythological literature, folk tales and heroic poems. In the process of turning mythological narratives into plays, Beyzai has been loyal to the main themes and has often used them directly. The methodology of this paper is descriptive-analytical, and based on the qualitative content analysis, the features of the compound metamorphosis creatures have been identified in Beyzai's plays and according to the theory of hypertextuality, the interactions of the plays with ancient literature have been studied.