COMPLIT 238A  Uneasy Modernity: 20th Century Persian Poetry and the Specter of Tradition

Drawing on poems, theoretical texts, and audio-visual materials, this course seeks to retrace the struggle for a modern poetic language in Iran from the time of the Constitutional Revolution (1905/6) to the Islamic Revolution (1979), and beyond. Topics include: the unresolved relationship between tradition and modernity; poetry as a vehicle of enlightenment and revolution; the quest for a new poetic expression of love; the construction of historical memory through literature; responses to the experience of modern alienation; the figure of the poet as dissident; and the subversive force of poetic form itself. Poets include: Iraj Mirzā, Mohammad Taqi Bahār, Nimā Yushij, Ahmad Shāmlu, Sohrāb Sepehri, Mehdi Akhavān Sāles, Forugh Farrokhzād, and Esmā'il Kho'i. Secondary readings include texts by Theodor W. Adorno, Mikhail Bakhtin, Emile Benveniste, Maurice Blanchot, Michel de Certeau, Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe, and Paul Ricœur. Taught in English.