The Mongol Invasion in Iranian Drama: The Case of Bahram Beyzaie

Abstract

New Historicists view history as a text through whose discontinuities and breaks the repressed and suppressed voices find ways of articulation. Likewise, a literary text, in its underlying layers, alludes to the historical conditions at the time of its production. In some cases, as in Bahram Beyzaie's works, however, the author intentionally uses the past to reread the present. He recreates history as a text in which the voices repressed in the classified history are heard. As the Mongols played an important role in the history of Iran, some of Beyzaie's works pay particular attention to them. This paper analyzes some of Beyzaie's plays and screenplays to investigate the presentation of the Mongols in his fictional worlds.

Notes

¹Soshanan Felman, Testimony: Crisis of Witnessing in Literature, Psychoanalysis and History (London and New York, 1992), 93–111, 93; quoted in Martin McQuillan, The Narrative Reader (London, 2000), 262.

²Charles E. Bressler, Literary Criticism: An Introduction to Theory and Practice (Upper Saddle River, NJ, 2007), 214.

³Bressler, Literary Criticism, 214.

⁵M.H. Abrams, A Glossary of Literary Terms, 10th ed. (Boston, 2009), 219–20.

⁴Louis Montrose, “Professing the Renaissance: The Poetics and Politics of Culture,” in The New Historicism, ed. H. Adam Veeser (New York and London, 1989), 20.

⁶Abrams, A Glossary, 220.

⁷Bahram Beyzaie, Namayesh dar Iran (Tehran, 2010), 17.

⁹Tahami-Nezhad, “Beyzaie va Tarikh,” 28.

⁸See Mohammad Tahami-Nezhad, “Beyzaie va Tarikh,” in Sar Zadan be Khaneh-ye Pedari, ed. Jaber Tavazo'i (Tehran, 2004), 30.

¹⁰Tahami-Nezhad, “Beyzaie va Tarikh,” 28.

¹²Beyzaie, Namayesh dar Iran. 16.

¹¹Nushabeh Amiri, Jedal ba Jahl (Tehran, 2009), 25–6.

¹³David Morgan, The Mongols (Oxford, 2007), 65.

¹⁴Abbas Eqbal Ashtiyani, Tarikh-e Moqhol (Tehran, 2000), 21–3.

¹⁵Morgan, The Mongols, 84.

¹⁶Bahram Beyzaie, Tarajnameh (Tehran, 2011), 49.

¹⁷Ata Malek Joveyni, Tarikh-e Jahangosha-ye Joveyni, ed. Mohammad Qazvini (Tehran, 1991), 79–81.

¹⁸Eqbal Ashtiyani, Tarikh-e Moghol, 23.

²⁰Hassan Ghazi Moradi, Estebdad dar Iran (Tehran, 2010), 241.

²³Bahram Beyzaie, Tarikh-e Serri-ye Sultan dar Abskun (Tehran, 2008), 41–2.

²⁴Beyzaie, Tarikh-e, 50–51.

²⁶Beyzaie, Tarikh-e, 43.

¹⁹Joveini, Tarikh-e, 134.

²¹Ghazi Moradi, Estebdad, 64.

²²As Abrams defines it, “This literary mode parallels the flouting of authority and the temporary inversion of social hierarchies that, in many cultures, are permitted during a season of carnival. The literary work does so by introducing a mingling of voices from diverse social levels that are free to mock and subvert authority, to flout social norms.” See Abrams, A Glossary, 77–8.

²⁵Eqbal Ashtiyani, Tarikh-e Moqhol, 10.

²⁷Beyzaie, Tarikh-e, 10.

²⁸Beyzaie, Tarikh-e, 37.

²⁹Beyzaie, Tarikh-e, 48.

³⁰Morgan, The Mongols, 47.

³¹Beyzaie, Tarikh-e, 24–5.

³³Homa Katouzian, Tazzad-e Dolat va Mellat, Nazariyeh-ye Tarikh va Siasat dar Iran (Tehran, 2002), 89.

³²Ghazi Moradi, Estebdad, 27.

³⁵See Homa Katouzian, Noh Maqaleh dar Jame'eh-shenasi-ye Tarikhi-ye (Tehran, 1998), 72–82.

³⁴Katouzian, Tazzad-e Dolat, 101.

³⁶Eqbal Ashtiani, Tarikh-e Moqhol, 26.

³⁷Beyzaie, Tarikh-e, 43.

³⁹Beyzaie, Tarikh-e, 43.

³⁸Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince, trans. George Bull (London, 1999), 51.

⁴⁰Beyzaie, Tarikh-e, 6.

⁴¹Morgan, The Mongols, 47.

⁴³Amiri, Jedal ba Jahl, 36.

⁴²Bressler, Literary Criticism, 46.

⁴⁴Amiri, Jedal ba Jahl, 37.

⁴⁶Beyzaie, Tarajnameh, 41.

⁴⁵Beyzaie, Tarikh-e, 5.

⁴⁷Beyzaie, Tarajnameh, 5.

⁴⁸Beyzaie, Tarajnameh, 25.

⁴⁹Beyzaie, Tarajnameh, 9.

⁵⁰Beyzaie, Tarajnameh, 7–8.

⁵¹Beyzaie, Namayesh dar Iran, 17.

⁵³Beyzaie, Tarajnameh, 9.

⁵⁴Bahram Beyzaie, Qesseh-ha-ye Mir-e Kafanpush (Tehran, 2001), 34.

⁵²Sadeq Zibakalam, Ma Cheguneh Ma Shodim? (Tehran, 2008), 177.

⁵⁵Beyzaie, Namayesh dar Iran, 17.

⁵⁶Beyzaie, Tarajnameh, 13.

⁵⁷Beyzaie, Tarajnameh, 45.

⁵⁸Ghazi Moradi, Estebdad, 192.

⁵⁹Beyzaie, Namayesh dar Iran, 17.

⁶⁰Beyzaie, Tarajnameh, 13.

⁶¹Beyzaie, Tarajnameh, 51.

⁶²Beyzaie, Qesseh-ha-ye, 61.

⁶³Bahram Beyzaie, Aiyar-e Tanha (Tehran, 1389), 65.

⁶⁴Beyzaie, Aiyar-e Tanha, 18.

⁶⁵Shirin Bayani, Din va Dolat dar Ahd-e Moqol (Tehran, 1992), 753. Khanqah is a center of religious practice for some of the mystic denominations of Islam in Iran.

⁶⁶Beyzaie, Qesseh-ha-ye, 66.

⁶⁷Amiri, Jedal ba Jahl, 27.

⁶⁸Amiri, Jedal ba Jahl, 30.

⁶⁹Beyzaie, Tarajnameh, 96.

⁷⁰Jalal. Sattari, Hovviat e Melli va Hovviat-e Farhangi (Tehran, 2001), 96.

⁷¹Beyzaie, Aiyar-e Tanha, 72.

⁷³Beyzaie, Tarajnameh, 57.

⁷⁴Beyzaie, Tarajnameh, 40.

⁷⁶Beyzaie, Tarajnameh, 13.

⁷⁷Beyzaie, Aiyar-e Tanha, 67–8.

⁷²Zibakalam, Ma Cheguneh, 36.

⁷⁵Beyzaie, Namayesh dar Iran, 17.

⁷⁸Joveini, Tarikh-e, 13 and 86.

⁷⁹See Bayani, Din va Dowlat, 730–37.

⁸⁰Bahram Beyzaie, Aiyarnameh (Tehran, 2007), 15.

⁸²Beyzaie, Qesseh-ha-ye, 75.

⁸³Bahram Beyzaie, Fathnameh- ye Kallat (Tehran, 1983), 42.

⁸⁴Beyzaie, Qesseh-ha-ye, 19.

⁸⁵Beyzaie, Aiyar-e Tanha, 7 and 9.

⁸⁷Beyzaie, Qesseh-ha-ye, 72.

⁸¹Bayani, Din va Dowlat, 755.

⁸⁶Amiri, Jedal ba Jahl, 28.

⁸⁸Beyzaie, Qesseh-ha-ye, 95.

⁸⁹Beyzaie, Qesseh-ha-ye, 91.

⁹⁰Beyzaie, Tarajnameh, 10.

⁹¹See Joveini, Tarikh-e, 68, 84, 98, 103, 128.

⁹²Zibakalam, Ma Cheguneh, 161.

⁹³Beyzaie, Aiyar-e Tanha, 64.

⁹⁴Beyzaie, Tarajnameh, 75.

⁹⁵Beyzaie, Aiyar-e Tanha, 59

⁹⁷Beyzaie, Aiyarnameh, 45.

⁹⁹Beyzaie, Tarajnameh, 66.

⁹⁶Zibakalam, Ma Cheguneh, 26, 53, 142.

⁹⁸Morgan, The Mongols, 65.

¹⁰⁰Bahram Beyzaie, Ahoo, Selandar, Talhak va Digaran (Tehran, 2010), 29.

¹⁰¹Bahram Beyzaie, Fathnameh- ye Kallat (Tehran, 1983), 143–4.

¹⁰²Zabihollah Safa, Tarikh e Adabiyat-e Iran, Jeld-e Sevvom (Tehran, 1972), 308.

¹⁰³Beyzaie, Tarajnameh, 42.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Behrooz Mahmoodi-Bakhtiari

Behrooz Mahmoodi-Bakhtiari is an Associate Professor at the Department of Theatre, University of Tehran.

Mahsa Manavi

Mahsa Manavi is an MA graduate of English Literature, University of Tarbiat Moallem (Tehran). This essay has been reconstructed and in some parts retranslated for publication by Saeed Talajooy.