Analyzing the Linguistic Features of Masnavi Shekarbagh by Nateq Nili

Shekarbagh, one of the two existing writings of Seyyed Reza Bakhsh Mousavi (Natiq Nili), is composed of more than three thousand verses. In terms of the meter, it is similar to Nizami’s Khosrow and Shirin and Jami’s Yusuf and Zulikhai. The main subject of this masnavi is the romantic relationship between the poet and a lady named Nesagol. Besides this, other topics such as eulogy, praise, complaint, love, giving advice to the ruler, and social, cultural, and political issues dominant in the society are reflected throughout the poem and adorned with rhetorical elements. This study aims to investigate the linguistic features of Shekarbagh. There are differences in collocation-making and highlighting at the vocabulary level, which is different both in terms of combination and in terms of meaning from what is recorded in dictionaries. In some cases, the differences have dialect characteristics; moreover, the deletion and transfer of sentence components and compound verbs have fluctuations. On the other hand, in some verses, heavy caesuras and defective rhymes can be seen. This is the characteristic of the poet's style and language resulting from his attention to images, sometimes it is due to the poet’s disability to provide sound meter, and in some cases, it is due to the carelessness of the scribes. Keywords: Natiq Nili, Shekarbagh, Linguistic and Stylistic Features. IntroductionSeyyed Reza Bakhsh Mousavi, known as Natiq Nili, was born in Afghanistan in 1228 A.H. The date of his death is not known for certain, but his tomb is considered to be located in Mashhad. Two of his remaining works, Shakarbagh and Tofan al-Mosiba, are poems. Shekarbagh is a verse love story between a poet and a lady named Nesagol, which took place in Hazarjat, Afghanistan. Tofan al-Mosiba is a religious and panegyric poem.Although Nayel (2000, 2016), among others, in two of his books, Essays and Notes on the Land and the People of Hazarjat, gives information about Natiq and his works. But due to the fact that Natiq was not one of the leading poets of Afghanistan, and because of the social problems of that country, no specific research has been conducted on the topic under discussion.In this research, the authors try to answer this research question: What are the outstanding linguistic and stylistic features of Shekarbagh by Natiq? It seems that although Natiq’s language in this work is simple and fluent, it is not homogeneous. He has used a special style and method by foregrounding and developing the language by means of collocating, changing word order, altering the grammatical form of phrasal verbs, etc. Materials and MethodsThis study has been carried out using a descriptive-analytical method with an emphasis on qualitative analysis. After examining the text of Shekarbagh, the linguistic and stylistic features of the verses have been extracted and analyzed. Research FindingsThe linguistic and stylistic features of Shekarbagh have been briefly analyzed and evaluated in two parts. In the first part, there is an emphasis on the foregrounding and linguistic features including collocations, displacements of word order, deleting part of a sentence, using words and combinations derived from the local dialect, etc. In the second part, there is a critical look at heavy caesuras and the drawbacks of rhymes in some lines, as well as the miswriting and misspelling of the scribes.The findings of the study are summarized as follows:In Shekarbagh, the attention to all types of adjectives is remarkable.Pronoun displacement in Shekarbagh is significant. These displacements are sometimes due to poetical necessities and sometimes arise from the poet's attention to aesthetical purposes.The use of reduced infinitives and ‘ra’ which are used to separate noun combinations is one of the most frequently linguistic features used by Natiq.In some cases, instead of nouns and adjectives, the poet has made a compound verb from the past participle and the present participle.The frequency of creative words and combinations is abundant in Shekarbagh, and some of these differences in structure and meaning are influenced by the Hazargi dialect.Omission of the prepositions and connectors is evident in many of Shekarbagh's verses due to poetical necessities.In some lines of Shekarbagh, caesuras or disharmonious rhythm can be seen, which are either caused by the carelessness of the scribes or a blur created in the poet's manuscript. Discussion of Results and ConclusionsShekarbagh is a love story by Natiq Nili, which is composed in the form of Masnavi and in Bahre Hazaje Mosaddas, with more than 3,050 verses. The overall structure and developing method of the work show that the poet paid more attention to Jami’s Yusuf and Zulikha. Natiq’s language has creative combinations and the poet acts assertively in composition. If a combination causes a caesura in the rhythm, he innovates another combination that is completely new. In addition, he feels no restrictions in describing, sometimes the adjectives are used before nouns and sometimes after them, and if there are several adjectives, some are given before nouns and some after them. Some words and collocations in Shekarbagh are used with a different meaning than what is recorded in dictionaries, which sometimes has a dialect characteristic.