Persian Poetry Analysis

In contrary, modernists articulated the concept of poetic modernity primarily in terms of an oppositional political stance. They talked about the necessity of a literary change, or even revolution, in order to bring harmony between Persian poetry and contemporary social and political issues. They argued that they could not use the old vehicles for carrying the new concepts. In this regard, according to Karimi-Hakkak, “[T]he new poetry is said to differ from the old in that it no longer follows the rigid formal rules and generic divisions of the classical poetry or of the contemporary practice modeled on it,” (Recasting Persian Poetry 3). Breaking from the formal rules of poetry began in the dawn of the twentieth century by some of the poets …show more content…
Interaction between new ways of literary creativity and the sources of modern Persian literature has led to a number of authors whose works are totally different from the past. In addition to these innovations, what helps us to define contemporary Persian literature is ideology or discourse. In the first chapter of Recasting Persian Poetry, “A Rhetoric of Subversion,” Ahmad Karimi-Hakkak pays attention to the cultural and social context of modernism in Persia poetry. He believes that the critique of the Literary Return Movement - and its symbol and pioneer, Qa’ani – played an essential role in constructing a new discourse and opening a path for modernism in Persian poetry (Recasting 25). Later, he explains the mechanism of the emergence of a new poetic culture:
First, the literary historical view initiated and advanced through the Literary Return Movement is solidified and inscribed on the cultural space: Persian poetry is seen as having gone through a golden age followed by a period of decline and decadence. Second, this perception is combined with the one initiated and advanced by the new intellectuals, namely, that in Europe literature has played an important part in the steady march of modern civilization. The contrast that thus emerges provides …show more content…
Each ideological paradigm has, in its own way, influenced the form, characterization, and figurative language of literary texts. It has set the criteria for indigenous literary criticism and has determined which issues related to politics, religion, or culture are to be the focus of literary journals (3). Talattof’s analysis of the characteristics of modern Persian literature is ultimately based on ideological and discursive changes. In contrary, some structuralist critics like Christophe Balay stresses on internal aspects of modern literary works.
Using the ideas of Jolles, Tomachevski, Cheovski, and Eikhenbaum, Balay tries to study Dehkhoda’s Charand o Parand founded on a formalism and structuralism (78). He cannot categorize Dehkhoda’s works as Persian tale (hikayat) nor as western short story (82), but locates them somewhere between traditional Iranian and Western literary genres. Briefly, Balay searches the sources of Persian short story and finds them more within Persian traditions of narration and less in the western imported