Does “Forgetting” have a Structure?

این مقاله یک نقد ساختار گرایی است که روی رمان "از یاد رفتن" نوشته ی محمد حسین محمدی اعمال شده است

Forgetting is a novel by Mohammed Hossein Mohammedi published in 2008 in Iran. The language is Farsi Dari that is one of the dialects of Farsi. The novel is based on one day of the protagonist’s life. Started from morning till night. And the date is also clear: 2001-09-13 (two days after 9/11). The chapters of the book indicate the exact hours. For example chapter 1: ‘A quarter to six in the morning.’(P. 7) This way we are confronted with the flow of time that is chronological. Also, in each point in the novel we are reminded about the time by looking at the sky. The point of view is omniscient third-person which focuses on Sayed Mirak Sha Agha. The protagonist –Sayed Mirak Sha Agha- is concretised for us by making everything documented, even his going to bathroom twice is fully described, once at ‘a quarter to six in the morning’(P. 13) and the other at ‘eighteen to six in the afternoon’(P. 76) in front of the dormitories of Balkh University. The narrator just describes about the deserted and destroyed university. It’s so empty that he can use it as a private toilet.

As Ferdinand de Saussure has put it for us, not even language but everything has a structure that is fabricated by signs and binary oppositions. The binary oppositions are abound in the novel. The most prominent one is present/past. Despite his forgetfulness he remembers the far past and always compares it to the present time. The narrator shows us the opposition of past and present situations. The glorious past of Afghanistan versus the war and destruction of presence. At ‘eleven to nine’ in the morning on his way to city he went to Anvar Kerachi Van’s house. He wanted Anvar to collect his wheat, take it to mill and bring back the flour for him.

“He is walking beside the half-destryed walls trying to walk in the shadow of the walls. But they have been so much demolished and shortened that there’s no shade to walk in. He must get to the fallen part of the wall to enter Haji Barat’s garden. He used to say garden. Even now that there aren’t any trees. Even there are no weed.” (P. 32)

Another opposition contributing to the meaning of the novel is awareness versus ignorance. The whole journey of the day was to aquire batteries for his radio in order to listen to VOA Persian and BBC Persian Service. He wanted to be aware of what has happened in the last two days when his radio was out of order. Lots of things has happened in the world, but he was in complete ignorance and happiness. Maybe you object to my word of happiness. Ok. Let’s change it. What about relaxation? He was in complete ignorance and relaxation. His awareness is ironic! Because he wants to know what’s happening in the world and especially in Afghanistan. Are Talibs moving away? Have they been killed by a god-sent-angel. But he just serves as an inactive character in the scene. Just sitting and listening. His awareness is useless but he insists on being aware. Maybe that’s the way he wants to fight. Because physically he is not able to do anything and all the Afghans are limited, so he can just know and eat from the tree of knowledge. Another important factor in here is that his wife and daughter are in complete ignorance and neither he guide them to fight in his own way, nor they want to eat this forbidden apple.

Iran/Afghanistan: If there weren’t any Iran, then Afghans didn’t have to compare themselves with their neighbours and damn their lives one hundred times every day.

“In these dark years he made his daughter to go to the basement full of insects and told everyone she has gone to Iran with his brother.” (P. 15)

The other opposition is between the Talibs and the Afghan people. Talibs are Afghan and part of the Afghan population. But these two groups are really enemies. When they see a Talib, they just escape. In the morning at ‘eleven to nine’ when Seyed Mirak Sha Agh went out of the house and saw two Talibs, he was horrified:

“When he put his feet out of the yard, he saw three men under a fruit tree beside the stream. They get up and go behind the wall. The dog on the roof barkes at them. Seyed Mirak Sha Agha goes under the trees to check whether they left or not. When he sees they’ve gone far, he felt relieved. From their guns, he understands that they must be Talibs.” (P. 25-26)  

Or near the city people are afraid even to look at Talibs. Why is it so? Don’t they have the same culture and language? Don’t they have the same religion? Yeah, they have. Talibs tried hard to make the environment completely homogenous but through this novel we hear the suppressed words of the oppositions. But Talibs were also part of the community. They were not Americans or Africans! The novel doesn’t give us any information about Talibs and indirectly takes side with the other. Here the binary opposition of self/other appears. The Afghan people assume themselves apart from Taliban. And all the literature about Afghanistan advertises their hatred towards Taliban. But where’s a word of the other?  

The novel makes it possible for us to look through the grammatical eye of structuralism. You can find the six actants and six narratology relations of A. J. Greimas:

1. You may argue that the hero is Seyed Mirak Sha Agha, but he is too much for a hero. I even think we can’t say he is a subject in search of an object. He is the object himself. He is the representative of the whole Afghan nation who have been robbed and colonized throughout histry. Who have been killed and has been the object of various crucial deeds.

2. The hero is lacking in the story. You feel the void of a helper. Maybe that’s Allah. But where is he? Does he come to help? And does he try to unknot the plot and brings through a happy ending? Of course not.

3. The subject is quite absent as well. It’s hard to recognise it with his new disguised face in each chapter. I think it’s better to say that the subject, the villain and the opposer are one. This is neither Allah nor Talibs. It is certainly the destiny. The fate that people are far less powerful to change and to do something about that. It just deprives people of everything. Of all the ectasy that is hidden to be found. What a pity!

4. The order of events in the novel do seem chronological but the order of narration is full of flash backs. The duration of fiction is always less than the duration of real life. But in this novel I feel the pace of a day from morning till night is really slow.

5. The narrator is heterodiegetic that is external from the world of novel. It means that the narrator is not present in the novel and not part of the world of the novel. In all places you feel that the point of view is outside of the novel and the reader also feels being put outside. Maybe that’s the reason that we feel safe and doesn’t get involved in the story. And no identification occurs.

And to put the work in more fixed structures let’s look through Claude Bremond’s eye and summarise these almost 100 pages in three phrases:

A.   Virtualization: The early morning and his turning on the radio. The discovery that the radio is out of order.

B.    Actualization: His journey to the city to buy batteries.

C.    Realization: His return and turning on the radio. Listening to radio.

Aren’t you fed up with all this grammar? Ok. I know. Let’s turn back to the other oppositions and find the more hidden ones.

West/East: Actually in the time of the novel U.S. troops haven’t invaded Afghanistan yet, but at the end we have a foreshadow of their coming. At the beginnig of the novel at ‘fifteen to seven in the morning’ he is very much annoyed not having said prayers in the due time. But at the end at ‘fifteen to eight’ in the evening. He doesn’t care about his prayers. He just wanted to listen to VOA and not to BBC. So, what do you think? Is the anti-religion culture of west starting to influence this traditional country?

And the Americans are coming just for an excuse and not with bicycles and cars and motorcycles for transportation, but with tanks. They’re not bringing new sement benches for the urban parks. And they’re not making the fear fade away. This is the fate of the poor! You are doomed to SUFFER.