Literary Arts (Jul 2014)

Methods of Cinematic Narrative in Today’s Ghazal

  • Mohsen Mohammadi fesharaki,
  • Pante'a Safaee

Journal volume & issue
Vol. 6, no. 1
pp. 115 – 130

Abstract

Read online

 Abstract With Highlighted presence of video m edia in society, its impact on other branches of art and poetry is seen more than before. At the beginning of being familiar with movie in Iran's traditional society, the subject was somehow a taboo and there was no trace of its influence on literature. Due to their poets' worldview, Nimaian poetry and subsequently blank verse reconciled with cinema earlier than classical poetry , but after Iran revolution and deep transformations resulting from war, Ghazal considered cinema and methods of narrative in cinema with a new look. This process is clearly evident in the lyric poets of the post- revolution.  Narrative  "In the simplest sense, narrative is a story that occurs during time and the narrator is one who narrates the story" (Khalil, 1383: p 107). Better expressed, "The story is what is said and narration is how to say it" (Afkhami, 1382: p 59). One of the main concerns of Nima is entering narrative element as an effective actor in poetry, but perhaps as intensely as contemporary poets of Ghazal have noticed to this Nima's advice, today his followers do not.  Narrative in Persian poetry  Narratives form a large part of Persian literature . Narrative poem dates back to the first versified epics . In Persian , narrative poetry is often versified in the form of couplet-poem and in two meter of Motaghareb and Hazaj as follows :  1 - " national epic narratives  2 - historical narratives  3 - love and public narratives  4 - allegorical or moral narratives "( Dad, 13 80: narrative poetry entry )  Characteristics of narrative Ghazal  1- The first outcome of narrative Ghazal is the strength of its vertical axis . This artistically makes Ghazal a systematic and coherent structure in which verse or hemistich is no more a semantic unit , but all parts of poem carries the burden of meaning of the poem , so verses can no longer move or change .  2-Translatability is the other results of narrative entrance into Ghazal. To understand the lyric narrative and to achieve the artistic experience that makes it up, it is sufficient to trace the narrative. Although sometimes, knowing allusions and metaphors in Persian language makes most of the audiences enjoy poetry, but instead, loss of pleasure in understanding this lyric narrative is not due to ironic and metaphorical decoding.  3- Narrative in lyric helps Ghazal to consider details instead of general and diverse subjects, and u sing this purposeful ordering of the details, it goes to the state of general issues. Since the details of each poet’s mind are different, this consideration makes a distinction in today's Ghazals.  4- Considering limitations of rhyme and rows that tie poet's hands and feet, addressing narrative in a closed form such as Ghazal is not an easy task so sometimes pursuing a narrative will force the poet to neglect rhyme or rows and make changes in the structure of Ghazal.  5- Entrance of words, new combinations and non-poetic terms into Ghazal is another consequence of becoming Ghazal a narrative.  6-The language of Ghazal went towards spoken language so that some lines of poetry accorded exactly with syntax and nature of people's everyday conversations.  Poetic narrative and fictional narrative  Narrative is an essential requirement of the story, but it has option to accept or reject the narrative poem. Poetic narrative is not as naked as fictional narrative. Entrance of narrative in poem not only creates a harmonious narrative, but also assists the creation of imagination and poetic speech. Therefore the poet is not bounded by a specific point of view, and doesn't need to persue the logic of the story.  In poetry, the word has all of its features and capabilities, and a good poet is someone who knows the value of words and makes use of all its functions, but because the storywriter has not such al limitation on the structure, he doesn’t have to notice all capacities of the word. One of them is visual function and the other is word's phonetic capacity. The advantage that a poet can take from word's sound and form of writing to increase the dramatic richness of Ghazal in the story is by no means available.  Differences between narrative Ghazal and cinematic narrative  1- From the viewpoint of power of play, perhaps the major advantage the literature has over films is that a poem does not need any facilities except words to make up atmosphere and design the scene. This advantage makes poetry capable to image surreal spaces that film can not show .  2- In Ghazal, just the special signs that poet wanted is conveyed to the audience namely the author's control is more. So whenever he wants, makes the audience to focus his attention on the text or, on the contrary, divert attention away from.  Similarities between narrative Ghazal and cinematic narrative  1- Sometimes, sense and experience that the sequence of short words and phrases of Ghazal suggest to audience is the same as experience the serial of film shots convey.  2- The reader of story - even a short story– has opportunity as well as possibility to read and review each part of the story he prefers , but the movie spectator does not . Considering this, Ghazal is closer to cinema than story. Because, Ghazal is a poem to be read rather than listened , and due to the brevity prevailing over the space of poetry and Ghazal's structural limitations, poet has little opportunity to convey a sense and to present an artistic experience .  3-Today poetry uses the pattern of stanza in its formal system , like plan and shot employed in cinema. This more than verse and hemistich shows temporal and spatial distances , events and sections in the vertical axis of poetry. Such a way that each stanza expresses one temporal and spatial feature of the detached narration , whereas the sections and components of ancient poetry in the lines of verses is cluttered and the process and movement of poem are not known ( Arji, 1390: p 38).  4-Escaping from linear narrative came into the world of cinema firstly from literature. Surrealism was of those schools that were put in a place against Real and somehow separated the time and fixed and tangible position from the story. But change of narrative is the trace of film in Ghazal and that is not applicable in the story.  5-This change in narrative which is accompanied by change in the form from Ghazal to couplet-poem and again to Ghazal is a way in which the poet can freely continue narration , and the audience - who is usually a listener , not a reader - won't feel fatigued , and makes up the prevailing sense and tone of the narrative as the author wants. 6- All of these uses, in addition to the presence of words, phrases, and names which are familiar to a public audience - whose most confrontation with the art is through the cinema and television - are of the reasons that today's Ghazal is more successful than blank verse in attracting attentions

Keywords