Document Type : Original Research
Author
Assistant Professor of Persian Language and Literature, University of Guilan
Abstract
Recreation is the most innovative possibility in the field of adaptation: the way and the material of confrontation, digestion, transformation and appropriation of the great and previous text(s) by the author or creator allows a divergent and different creation. In this respect, the recreated text is secondary, but not second-rate. It embodies repetition and otherness at the same time. By presenting definitions, capabilities, and possibilities of new creation, this study analyzes the reasons for stagnation, inertia, and the limitation of new creation in children's and young adult literature in Iran. It shows that the perception of tradition as something outdated, the didactic-moral orientation in the creation of texts, the ignoring of various philosophical, mythological, religious, and historical texts, etc., the ignorance of the importance of the story/novel in transforming experiences, enjoyment and improving creative thinking of children and young people, and the consideration of the audience as an object of the generation, i.e. the consideration of the audience as passive and inactive, which has reduced recreation in Iran to changing the point of view, characters, place and time, tone, ending, etc. After analyzing the reasons for this stagnation and time marking, this study shows the expansion, capacity, multi-layered (nested) and eclectically intertwined aspects of western youth novels by comparing Iranian and non-Iranian youth novels. These novels have benefited from various intellectual, epistemological, and artistic texts and sources as well as from one statement, allegory, idea, or main theme.
Extended Abstract
Children's and youth literature in its modern sense, as a youthful phenomenon, is on its way to replace hidden/implicit knowledge with explicit knowledge. A concept that has moved and developed with acceleration, momentum and inertia due to the void and lack of theoretical background in Iran in a field of limitations, dos and don'ts. The writer/poet's lived experience, diversity and understanding of different and contradictory worlds and her studies and epistemological sources, in addition to her positioning towards children and adolescents as a generational object or conscious/creative subject and her reading of children's and teenager literature, its nature and function as an educational or pleasurable text, have a fundamental impact on the potential and possibility or repetition and stagnation of literary creation and recreation, which is the problem of the present study. From a certain perspective, everything that happens within the framework of art and literature, whether consciously or unconsciously, entails a type and level of adaptation and intertextuality, in other words, we do not have an independent, self-sufficient, newly discovered text. Every text is a texture and a compilation of pre-writings and pre-readings but from another point of view in the field of definitions and forms, adaptation includes different levels and various degrees of dialogue, imitation, repetition, selected writing, summary, borrowing, shortening, transformation, revision, rewriting, re-creation, open, free and content adaptation, and provides the audience and the critic with a benchmark and standard for whether it is imitation and repetition or creativity and creation. The nature of definitions and categorization of adaptation and re-creation in Iran is limited to open/free and closed/loyal adaptations, as well as borrowing and loaning. While imitation as a possibility within the framework of art in general, and in children's and young adult literature in particular, is the expression of any artist's or writer's dialogue, reception, and method of encounter with tradition and yesterday. In the reflections of many Western philosophers, sociologists and thinkers (Gadamer, Benjamin, Ricoeur, Heidegger, Derrida, etc.) tradition is called the/ or flowing current and present, a past that is in the now and in the future. Neither can the tradition be erased, nor does it have a decorative, particular and mechanical function, it is rather a text that is in dialogue, in deconstruction, in effort, in engagement, in positioning and in possession.In traditional thinking and considering tradition as a historical and closed matter, recreations in Iran are reduced to repetition, imitation and summary due to moral, educational and didactic necessities and merely to familiarize children and teenager with the identity and culture of the past and to pass on these concepts. In addition to the fundamental role of the writer/recreator's encounter with tradition, her approach and orientation towards children's and teenager literature and the concept of adaptation presents recreation as possibility and opening, or as limitation and stagnation. Classification, one-dimensional focus, and confrontational attitude toward statements such as "child as goal" or "child as instrument" exclude the process of adaptation, sociability or creativity, innocence or experience, and thus the growing and creating space in this field. The scholastic approach and the authoritarianism of formal teaching and education view the child as an instrument. The romantic approach sees the child as the goal and both approaches therefore resort to excessive measures. Recreation is the most diverse and creative possibility in the field of adaptation, which is not bound by any limits. In adaptation, it is the thought that consciously chooses, engages with the text, establishes dialogue, and, in the Ricoeurian sense, makes the text its own, exploring infinite possibilities of openness, innovation, otherness, and independence. Recreation as possibility is repetition that is different. A considerable number of rewritings and recreations in children's and teenager literature come from classic or contemporary literary texts. This pattern is found in novels and children's and teenager stories as well as in movies, plays, and computer games, which is good on some level, but the remarkable point is why the existing potential and capacity of mythological, historical, religious, philosophical, folklore literature, etc. Sources and texts in this field are not used. One of the visible and fundamental gaps in children's and teenager literature, especially in novels and recreations is the lack of attention and neglect of philosophical insight and critical thinking. The need and importance of philosophy for children and teenagers / Fabak, is the need to teach children and adolescents to think and not simply present the views and thoughts of philosophers. It is the need to pay attention to the development of intellectual skills, reflection, creative thinking, the desire and practice of listening, enduring, questioning, critical faculties, willingness to compromise, analysis of values, classification of data, boldness of expression of views and beliefs, mention of reasons and arguments, fault-finding, etc. To pay attention. From this point of view, children's and young people's literature is not only a carrier of philosophical concepts and problems of understanding and cognition, but it is highly philosophical in its essence.
Many statements, concepts, and orientations have affected the study of recreation in Iran, turning the presentation into a repetitive and limited inquiry. In the Iranian pattern and in a mindset and attitude that considers tradition as something finished, recreation is defined as a duty, obligation and responsibility instead of dialogue, deconstruction, interpretation, interaction with texts and traditional sources and in the historicist encounter. The goal of recreation is merely the preservation of past texts and the transmission of concepts and moral maxims, didactic/educational discussions to shape national identity and emotions of children and teenagers. It ignores the fundamental necessities of recreation such as creating pleasure, entertainment, dreaming and growing intellectual skills and considers its audience mainly as clueless, passive. Thus, recreation is reduced to changing titles and characters, language, space, place, and ending, which is a very limited and small section in this field compared to what is seen in the Western recreation corpus. Creative recreation, like the familiar Western examples, has several aspects: They are not limited to one text, but have benefited simultaneously from artistic and intellectual-epistemological sources and texts (eclectic entanglement). A recreated novel cannot be reduced to a particular theme or dimension. A very important point is that the recreated text is so multilayered and labyrinthine that it maps the transformation and digestion of statements, allegories, and various texts in the writer's soul and mind (owning him). If Iranian writers change their attitude towards tradition and children and teenager audience and understand the importance of children and teenager literature, especially the novel, could turn recreation into a possibility and release it from simplification, and stagnation.
Keywords
Subjects
Literary Criticism
