فصلنامه نقد ادبی
پیاپی 53 (بهار 1400)

The attempt to ‘post-modernize’ Iranian writers sometimes goes so far that the critic, without adequate justification, considers outstanding Iranian works which are rooted in the culture and tradition of this land to originate in and serve the same function and purpose as their Western counterparts. In this research, the authors unravel these Eurocentric interpretations in the case of Bahram Beyzaie’s Death of Yazdgerd. Meanwhile, the goal is not to introduce Beyzaie as an exclusively Iranian playwright and overlook his cosmopolitan bent. More specifically, Beyzaie’s Death of Yazdgerd will be explored in terms of Bertolt Brecht’s epic theater. Thereby, Beyzaie’s twofold accomplishment in tailoring Brecht for the Iranian context and drawing on indigenous traditions of performative arts will be elaborated. Out of the vast body of Brecht’s method, this study focuses on his approach to history and his conviction in the contingency of the status quo and, hence, the possibility for change and reform even at the bleakest moments. The second line of this study concerns the parallel usage of certain techniques by Brecht and Beyzaie to achieve the so-called “distancing effect.” Given the multiple and occasionally incompatible readings put forth regarding Brechtchr('39')s drama, the authors have adopted the holistic approach of Fredric Jameson to the subject matter.

Numerous studies in the last decade that have investigated the stylistic features of literary works in morphological layer do not help much in advancing stylistic studies and historical behavior of Persian language. In the present study, which evaluates the literature of stylistics in morphological layer, twenty-seven research papers and dissertations written in the Iranian departments of Persian language and literature of academia have been reviewed and critiqued. Numerous studies in the last decade that have investigated the stylistic features of literary works in morphological layer do not help much in advancing stylistic studies and historical behavior of Persian language. In the present study, which evaluates the literature of stylistics in morphological layer, twenty-seven research papers and dissertations written in the departments of Persian language and literature in Iran have been reviewed and critiqued. The findings indicate that these studies suffer several shortcomings, including: misunderstanding the basic morphological concepts, defining overlapping morphological categories, misreading texts and misidentifying the grammatical role of words, neglecting the diachronic behavior of Persian language, confusing research strategies and introducing unnecessary and redundant models and some other common mistakes. These problems are serious hurdles in the way of stylistic studies in morphological layer and also understanding Persian language changes. Finally, some suggestions have been made to address the aforementioned problems.

One of the tricks of childrenchr('39')s stories to objectify abstract relationships is employing the metaphor of "color". On the one hand, the metaphor of "color change" in the three stories of "Red: The Story of a Candle" (Hall, 2015), "The Day the Crayons Quit" (Daywalt, 2013), and "Purple Pencil" (Ghazaleh Bigdelou, 2012)  refers to the "identity revolution" and on the other, the first two stories are American and the story of "Purple Pencil" is Iranian, so this article has selected the mentioned stories to compare the views of the two mentioned cultural discourses in terms of the meaning of "ideal identity". In this regard, it intends to answer three questions in a descriptive-analytical way, within the framework of Landowski semantic systems: How has ideal self been interpreted in each text, given that these three texts encourage the child to identify? How does each text invite the child to socialize? The hidden ideology in every text creates alienation and de-alienation, which institutions are related to subjectivity? From a cultural semiotic point of view, every text is a culture. The present study examines the paradigm of identification in childrenchr('39')s stories. Since identity is a construct of discourse, it translates the ideology embedded in the identity-making discourse from the sphere of origin to the sphere of destination.

The nihilistic transition in Akhavanchr('39')s poetry is the main focus of this research. Akhavanchr('39')s poetry, with its modern philosophical background, contains profound meanings that make it worthy of analysis beyond the ordinary. One of the most obvious of these meanings is the dialectic of hope and despair. Akhavanchr('39')s acquaintance with the ideas of modern Europe, like for instance, the philosophical ideas of Friedrich Nietzsche, led us to analyze the tendencies of the nihilistic transition of his poetry considering Nietzschechr('39')s "transition from passive nihilism to active nihilism”. Upon analysis it became clear that Akhavanchr('39')s poetic thought reflects Nietzschean nihilism, as it can be traced in his views such as denying the metaphysical tendency and relying on the human will of elitism, specific views of morality, becoming, and also eternal return, considered as the way to create the superman. Thus, the results of the research showed that Akhavanchr('39')s poetry, seemingly is a reflection of a kind of passive imagery. However, with a closer look, it became clear that his poems have specific formal and semantic features based on which the emotion of despair and nihilistic thought became active rather than being passive. The method of the current study was qualitative and the approach to analysis was a philosophical critique approach and it also adopted a descriptive approach.

Reading the critical views of poets with the aim of classifying and analyzing their approaches to literary criticism, while identifying their evaluation criteria in literary criticism, can be used as a criterion for evaluating their works. In addition to being a poet, Akhavān-Sāles had critical views in the field of literary criticism. The authors of this article, due to the special position of Akhavān-Sāles as a poet-critic, have classified and analyzed his theories based on Jacobson chr('39')s theory. Then the approaches and characteristics of criticism were discussed, regarding in his views. In expressing his critical views, Akhavān-Sāles emphasized the four elements of sender, receiver, context, and message. He considered successful poetry to be a poem arising from the poetchr('39')s feeling (emotive function), of social and human subject (referential function), with literary language (poetic function) and the power to influence a wide range of receivers (conative function). In his critical views, Akhavān-Sāles has not fallen into the trap of pure formalism, nor has accepted non-literary poetry. As a result, it can be said that his thorough knowledge of the subject is positive and his subjectivity in criticism could be considered as a negative aspect of approach

The aim of this study was to identify the effect of oral storytelling and reading on the characteristics of narratives of preschool girl children. For this purpose, 24 pre-school girl students were selected as the sample of the study using a pretest-posttest research design with unequal groups. The subjects were randomly assigned into two groups through TOLD (Hamil & Newcomer, 1997): For the first group, the folk tale "Crow and the Farmer", from the series of Mohtadi Morning Tales (2008), was presented orally and for the second group, the same story was presented in the form of Parde-khani [illustrated storytelling]. In the post-test phase, each childchr('39')s recounted narratives were recorded and transcribed. Narratives in both groups were analyzed based on the frequency of story elements, the sequence of these elements, the relative frequency of the grammatical elements, the length of the narrative in terms of number of sentences and words, as well as the consistency of the narratives with the main narrative in three dimensions: deletion, addition, and inaccuracy. Based on the results of the content analysis, the lengths of narratives (number of words and sentences) and relative frequency of grammatical elements in the recounted narratives of children were significantly higher in the oral storytelling group than the reading group. But the frequency and sequence of story elements and narrative adaptation were not significantly different.