A Comparative Study of Poetic Language in the Stories of Sadegh Hedayat, Nader Ebrahimi, and Bijan Najdi

Abstract

The present study aims to conduct a comparative examination of poetic language in the short stories of Sadegh Hedayat, Nader Ebrahimi, and Bijan Najdi. Using a documentary research method and library-based techniques, the study investigates the manifestations of poetic language in the narrative works of these three prominent Iranian writers. The findings indicate that all three authors employ poetic language in their stories; however, the extent and manner of this utilization differ significantly among them. Sadegh Hedayat’s stories are largely rooted in the power of his imagination. In his narratives, he frequently employs similes characterized by a high degree of deviation from conventional linguistic norms. One of the most significant forms of metaphor in Hedayat’s works is the implicit metaphor, often accompanied by the personification of natural phenomena in the surrounding world. His prose, particularly in The Blind Owl, Three Drops of Blood, and Buried Alive, is rich in similes, transferred epithets, symbolic metaphors, and paradoxical expressions. The use of foreign lexical items is also notable in these stories. Similarly, Nader Ebrahimi, through the selection of a soft, fluid, influential, and poetry-like language, creates remarkable expressive capacities within his narratives. Endowed with a vivid imagination and artistic sensibility, Ebrahimi employs various figures of speech, innovative imagery, verbal musicality, foregrounding techniques, and continuous defamiliarization. By distancing his language from ordinary, everyday, and automatic speech, he seeks to establish a new mode of expression that may be described as poetic language or, more precisely, the language of poetry. Bijan Najdi, likewise, is a writer who introduced a distinctive and highly original style through the publication of his short-story collections. In narrating his stories, he utilizes a unique poetic prose characterized by freshness and unconventionality. Najdi creates a special synthesis between poetic expression and narrative elements, producing texts that retain essential narrative features while simultaneously possessing substantial poetic capacities. This characteristic plays a decisive role in shaping the overall structure of his works and endows the elements of his stories with a distinctive organization and system. Simile, metaphor—particularly implicit metaphor—metonymy, paradox, and synesthetic imagery are among the most frequently employed literary devices in Najdi’s stories. All three authors make use of literary devices to enhance the impact of their ideas and artistic visions. Ebrahimi and Najdi, both of whom were also poets and lyricists, do not employ poetry and poetic language merely for the reader’s amusement; rather, poeticity constitutes a fundamental stylistic feature that permeates their entire body of narrative work. Nevertheless, in comparing the degree of poeticity in their stories, it can be argued that Najdi ranks first, Ebrahimi second, and Hedayat third. Overall, these three writers, by blending poetry and fiction, pioneered a new approach to storytelling. Through the creation of abstract imagery, the fusion of imagination and reality, the personification of objects, and at the same time adherence to the principles and elements of modern fiction, they not only revitalized the language of narrative literature but also elevated the status of language within the domain of fictional prose.