Literary Arts (Apr 2017)
Characterization and Moral Theme in Varavini’s Marzbanname and La Fontaine’s Fables
Abstract
Didactic literature is a literary genre in which the writer contrasts between the good and the evil, and indirectly tries to teach the moral lessons of world’s classical literature. These lessons are generally expressed by animals and are in the form of advice. There are some common concepts in the didactic literature of Iran and France. Some of these similarities could be found by considering the moral works of authors such as Sa'ad ad-Din Varavini and Jean de La Fontaine. Varavini’s Marzbannameh and La Fontaine’s Fables are valuable works which deal with the political and social issues of their time by expressing the ideas of their authors. These advices which are expressed by jinns, humans, inanimate objects, animals, and plants offer a type of moral writing called fable to their literary, political, and social community. This genre has been one of the most prominent and popular literary genres that was common in times when the pressure of the kings made it impossible for writers to directly criticize the oppression. By using this genre, writers tried to avoid the wrath of kings. In Western literature, this genre was started by the Greek fabulist, Aesop. Horace, the Roman poet, was inspired by Aesop and composed great fables. However, Jean de La Fontaine, the French poet and fabulist, is known as the most prominent Western fabulist who composed his own fables by following Aesop. He is the most famous French story writer whose reputation is largely due to composing a book called Fables. In this book, he has expressed concepts such as the criticism of the court, the king, the church, and the bourgeoisie. La Fontaine has criticized Louis XIV in many of his fables. He represents the king as lion and the courtiers as dogs, monkeys, wolves, and foxes and criticizes them. La Fontaine, thus, reflects the internal characteristics and personality of human beings in the form of animals and each animal reflects a part of the human society in the age of the author. Fables of La Fontaine are, in fact, a description of the social and political situation of 17th century French and contain an indirect political and social criticism expressed by animals. In Persian literature, works such as Shahnameh, Kelile and Demni, Marzbannameh, Siyasatnameh, and Golestan are written in this literary genre. Marzbannameh along with Kelile and Demni which is one of the great Persian fables, is a book originally written in Tabari by Ispahbod Marzban Ibn Rustam Ibn Shahriar Ibn Shervin. This book was later translated to Dari Persian by Sa'ad ad-Din Varavini. More specifically, Marzbannameh was rendered from Ancient Tabari to Dari Persian in the early seventh century from year 617 to 622. The author of this book, as La Fontaine did, has considered the king his primary audience and has tried to guide him in governance, political, and social matters by offering him advices. In these stories, the author refers to political, social, judiciary, and economic affairs and concerns behavior towards others, especially towards enemies and strangers. There also appear moral lessons and virtues in the stories which revolve around social matters. In many stories of Marzbannameh, like the Fables of La Fontaine, the characters are animals who play the social and political roles of their own time. A comparative study of the characters of these two books helps us to better understand the characterization method of the two authors. Since these two writers have had an effective role in the moral and didactic literature of their own countries, the present study attempts to conduct a comparative study to investigate the characterization and the expression of didactic concepts in Varavini’s Marzbannameh and La Fontaine’s Fables which are, respectively, the representatives of classical didactic literature of Iran and France. Despite the similarities in the moral teachings of the two works, it could be concluded that Varavini’s work has focused more on moral content while La Fontaine’s work has been more concerned with form. This comparative study mentions some stories of the two books and discusses their characters and persona. Moreover, the current study investigates the moral messages that these two writers have mentioned in their works for their audience.
