Calling Shahnameh characters in Welcome To Hades Novel; An action to weaken the discourse of the eighties

Calling the characters of the Shahnameh into the novel “Welcome to Hades”; an action to weaken the discourse of the eighties

Azam Nikkhah Fardaghi (PhD in Persian language and literature, Ferdowsi University of Mashhad, Correspounding Author[1])

Samira Bameshki (Assistant Professor of Ferdowsi University of Mashhad)

Introduction

Literary genres in any period can have a direct link with the socio-political context of their society. The novel is one of these genres that, as one of the common literary genres in the contemporary period, shows this connection well. In recent decades, novelists have tended to use epic and mythological elements in their works. In fact they show their position in favor or against the hypertext context in this way and by using the action of highlighting or marginalization. In the 1370s and 1380s (solar system), the conflict between different political discourses intensified in the country. Each of these discourses by using their intellectual foundations tries to delegitimize the rival discourse and make their own intellectual foundations legitimate and prominent. In this period, the woman and her position also become one of the topics on which the dominant discourses differ. According to this issue, some novelists create works centered on women, and each of them, under the influence of the dominant discourses of society, calls epic characters to their novel with a different approach; Some of these writers bring the passive female actors in the Shahnameh to their work by creating aspects and by highlighting her actions as a mother and wife, they strengthen the intellectual foundations of the traditionalist discourse about women. It turns out that the dominant discourses differ on it. According to this issue, some novelists create works centered on women, and each of them, under the influence of the dominant discourses of society, calls epic characters to their novel with a different approach; Some of these writers bring the passive female actors in the Shahnameh to their work by creating aspects and by highlighting her actions as a mother and wife, they strengthen the intellectual foundations of the traditionalist discourse about women. In this period, the woman and her position also become one of the topics on which the dominant discourses differ. According to this issue, some novelists create works centered on women, and each of them, under the influence of the dominant discourses of society, calls epic characters to their novel with a different approach; Some of these writers bring the passive female actors in the Shahnameh with some transformations to their work and by highlighting their actions as a mother and wife strengthen the intellectual foundations of the traditionalist discourse about women. Some others turn the passive female activists of Shahnameh into dynamic activists in order to highlight the role and social activity of women as one of the intellectual foundations of reform discourse. Meanwhile, the opposite of this issue is also true; in other words, some of these writers try to marginalize and weaken the dominant discourse of their society by making active female activists of Shahnameh passive and creating twists in their actions.

Purpose

Belqis Soleimani is one of the novelists who by representing different actions for them, brings the activists of Shahnameh to her works. In the novel "Welcome to Hades", she calls some characters of Shahnameh; including Rudabeh; one of the tradition-breaking activists into her novel. The purpose of the current research is to answer the question: Why and how did Belqis Soleimani call the characters of the Shahnameh into the novel “Welcome to Hades”?

Method of Study

To answer the question of the present research, we first examine the political-social context of the time of writing the novel (1380s solar system). Then, by using the method of qualitative content analysis and from the perspective of political sociology, we will clarify the position of the author in favor or against her hypertext. We also use the 2020 version of MAXQDA software to analyze and extract the graph, in order to show the positive or negative position of the author of “Welcome to Hades” to the context of text production.

Conclusion

One of the reasons why novelists add epic and mythological elements to their works is their impressibility by the context of text production. Some writers also call epic characters to the novel in order to highlight or marginalize some intellectual bases of the dominant discourses in their society through dynamization or passivation of these activists. Women and their position, which is one of the controversial issues between traditionalist and reformist political currents, caused some writers to show their support or opposition to the dominant discourse of the text production community by calling for epic characters and the centrality of women. The findings of this research show that Belqis Soleimani, by calling the active and norm-breaking activist Rudabah of Shahnameh to her novel and making her passive against the norms of the patriarchy, as well as showing the negative consequences of these norms for Rudabah as a representative of women, is trying to represent and weaken the discourse of patriarchy through creating the association of the conflict between the actions of Rudabeh in pre-text and Rudabeh in hypertext. She brings the Rudabeh of Shahnameh to a modern society and puts complete examples in patriarchy on her way and by calling the epic Rudabeh provides a context of association for the audience to compare the actions of this passive and powerless Rudabeh against her patriarchal society with the tradition-breaking and rebellious Rudabeh in Shahnameh. Although Soleimani could have represented this opposition better by dynamizing the actions of the novel's main protagonist instead of making her passive. Other characters of Shahnameh such as Tahmineh, Farank, Sindokht, Esfandiarkhan, Siavash, etc. are also mentioned in this novel; but their actions is accompanied by a complete transformation compared to the actions of the activists of the pretext. In fact, the author considering central role of Rudabeh the victim in the representation of the patriarchal society, has consciously placed other characters as secondary characters on the sidelines.

Bibliography

Ayatolahi, Zahra, (2012) Brief description of the Charter of Women's Rights and Responsibilities. Tehran: Socio-cultural council of women and family.

Abbott, Pamela & Wallace Claire, (2002), An Introduction to Sociology: Feminist Perspectives, trans. By: Maryam Khorasani, Hamid Ahmadi, 2^nd ed., Tehran: Mother’s World.

[1]