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The Impact of the Modernity Discourse on Persian Fiction

Honarmand, Saeed

Abstract Details

2011, Doctor of Philosophy, Ohio State University, Comparative Studies.
Modern Persian literature has created a number of remarkable works that have had great influence on most middle class people in Iran. Further, it has had representation of individuals in a political context. Coming out of a political and discursive break in the late nineteenth century, modern literature began to adopt European genres, styles and techniques. Avoiding the traditional discourses, then, became one of the primary characteristics of modern Persian literature; as such, it became closely tied to political ideologies. Remarking itself by the political agendas, modern literature in Iran hence became less an artistic source of expression and more as an interpretation of political situations. Moreover, engaging with the political discourse caused the literature to disconnect itself from old discourses, namely Islamism and nationalism, and from people with dissimilar beliefs. Disconnectedness was already part of Iranian culture, politics, discourses and, therefore, literature. However, instead of helping society to create a meta-narrative that would embrace all discourses within one national image, modern literature produced more gaps. Historically, there had been three literary movements before the modernization process began in the late nineteenth century. Each of these movements had its own separate discourse and historiography, failing altogether to provide people with one single image of a nation. Throughout the centuries, people of this land have called themselves Iranian; however, the image that they conjured from this word has never been the same. The various images have had social aspects as well that all together have created several layers of disconnectedness. Modern literature, as the fourth movement, borrowed its discourse from Europeans. The historiography that it offered was also adopted from the European discourse of modernity. Unable to compromise with others, or to create an Iranian discourse of modernity, the modern movement eventually added yet another layer of disconnectedness. By contradicting other narratives, modern literature reflects a new narrative identity that, by distorting the historical knowledge, tries to refigure the history of Iran through a so called universal history borrowed from Europeans. This narrative in every respect is speculative and without inquiry into the conditions of possibility. What is important here is the paradigm of universal time under the European historiography that refers back to the universe of narrative structure, or rather part of the universe that depicts ‘us’ – Iranians- as a backward country or culture. The modern Persian narrative identity then is confused, because it denies the past and wants to refigure the future based on the European past. Narrative time, under this situation, could not match with historical time and old narrative identities, which were also broken in turn. With disconnectedness and the broken narrative identity, modern Persian literature has created novels that have been written in a political framework with particular motifs. Some writers and critics have mentioned these problems; however they have rarely attempted to examine the discourses in which these works are formed. This dissertation attempts to analyze the problematic aspects of the discourse of modern Persian literature, and the disconnectedness that was added to Iranian culture by its influence.
Richard Davis, PhD (Advisor)
Margaret Mills, PhD (Committee Member)
Philip Armstrong, PhD (Committee Member)
357 p.

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Honarmand, S. (2011). The Impact of the Modernity Discourse on Persian Fiction [Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1321977419

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Honarmand, Saeed. The Impact of the Modernity Discourse on Persian Fiction. 2011. Ohio State University, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1321977419.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Honarmand, Saeed. "The Impact of the Modernity Discourse on Persian Fiction." Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University, 2011. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1321977419

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)