Farzaneh Vaezi, Enayatolah Fatehi Nezhad, Seyed Babak Farzaneh,
Volume 5, Issue 2 (12-2023)
Abstract
In the late 20th century, new historicism based on the ideas of an American thinker Steven Greenbelt replaced the traditional critical approaches in literary studies. In new historicism, literary texts are treated as historical texts: if history is a kind of narrative, then narratives are the same kind of historical texts, hence it is referred to history text and text history. In new historicism, there is no boundary between history and literature, and readers can re-read the texts to discover the hidden layers behind the original text. Sometimes political and social restrictions deny the author the freedom of expression forcing him to use another way to express his intentions. Najib Mahfouz encoded language in his novels to express social realities and reinforce the spirit of anti-colonialism against the authoritarian policies of the rulers. In Aabaso Al-Aqdar, he used the ancient history of Egypt as a pretext to express nationalist and anti-colonial ideas. This study examines the hidden layers of the novel from a new historicist angle.
Phd Farzaneh Vaezi, Pdd Enayat Fatehinwejad,
Volume 6, Issue 3 (6-1983)
Abstract
The writing of novels and stories in a way stems from a history whose unpleasantness and harms people try to reject, transforming it into a more desirable form within stories to find solace. This way, a narrative emerges containing elements of historical and supra-historical/idealistic discourse. Such a study in the field of textual analysis of stories is conducted through the approach of New Historicism. New Historicists meticulously and critically explore literary texts to extract valuable historical data.
New Historicism is one of the latest literary criticism approaches that emerged under the influence of Michel Foucault's theories, generally addressing the relationship between literature and society. Naguib Mahfouz's works, due to their precision and keen insight in narrating events, are worthy of discussion and examination through the lens of New Historicism, as the oppression and disillusionment in Egyptian society during his era are significantly noteworthy. In this article, the author has attempted, using a descriptive-analytical method and the New Historicism approach, to examine the relationship of the novel "Kifah Tiba" with the events and discourses of the author's time. In other words, this research aims to investigate the conditions under which the text is formed and how it creates discourse either to reinforce the dominant discourse or to oppose and protest it. The results indicate that the novel "Kifah Tiba" is one of the successful and famous novels by this author, symbolically and metaphorically addressing the social crisis of his society. The title, characters, and setting of the story serve to advance the main idea of the story, which is anti-colonialism and nationalism
