How to understand time-space (Look at the blind owl of Sadegh Hedayat)

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

1 Doctoral Student, Department of Anthropology, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran

2 Associate Professor, Department of Anthropology, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran

10.22059/ijar.2024.359604.459815

Abstract

Purpose-By studying the literature of each society, we approach the question of how the discrete human experience becomes meaningful in the narrative. The writer is required to have an understanding of the structures of mental cognition of the people of the society or at least his own mind in order to communicate with the other and the world. Since the most important principle in narration, to make human experience meaningful, is to deal with the matter of time. Otherwise, the author cannot create a narrative in the sense of defining the genre of the novel and may only pay attention to the adventures, actions and feelings of the characters. When the author tries to make the human experience meaningful by understanding the matter of time, whether he likes it or not, he also shapes the social spaces, the mental space of his society. So, by studying the literature and understanding the author's understanding of time-space, we come close to understanding the structure of cognition and the life spaces of the author's society.
Methodology-In order to get closer to the understanding of Sadiq Hedayat's understanding of time-space, first we tried to have an analysis of the writer's society in which he lived, and then, using the methodology of content analysis, the themes of the narrative in relation to how the writer understands the matter of time and life spaces to be extracted. In order to extract the themes of the narrative towards the purpose of the study, it is important that the author considers the meaning of the characters' position or considers their actions and feelings and imposes his mental concepts on them. Then an attempt is made to analyze the relationship between the analytical concepts of the author's society and the themes of the author's narrative. Then an attempt is made to analyze the relationship between the analytical concepts of the author's society and the themes of the author's narrative.
Findings-In the history of the author's life (constitutional period), Iranian society has undergone extensive and sudden changes from above by the government in the form of changes in living spaces. These spatial changes have made people cognitively and spatially disconnected from the past. It is natural for the understanding of time to suffer in this situation, because on the one hand, due to spatial changes, people could not easily consider themselves to belong to the past, and on the other hand, the society was not able to understand the scientific methodology of Western societies to understand the progress in the future. From there, people could not easily engage in economic production to live their daily lives. In the situation of Iranian society, the government wanted to build a nation-state by selling natural resources and importing modernity from above, and Iranian intellectuals, including literary writers, wanted the rule of law along with political and individual freedoms. Here, a writer like Hedayat, who wants to understand the position of the character in his story, shows him suspended in a vast space that prefers the eternal present to the understanding of the past and future. He does not seek to define time through religious concepts, nor daily life concepts based on cultural roles, nor based on cognitive senses. As a result, when the character is suspended in a vast space and the eternal present, in this space the character prefers to indulge in his feelings, enjoy or suffer

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Iranian Journal of Anthropological Research
Volume 14, Issue 1
Indexing Databases
June 2024
Pages 1-22

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