SATIRE AND CENSORSHIP A CROSS CULTURAL REFFERENCE

By M. K. SADIGH

Satire is one of the oldest mediums for social and cultural education, which its significance realized by the ancient philosophers such as, Marcus Fabius Quintilianus. First century A.D. Roman rhetorician whose major work, the Institutio Oratorio, discusses the complete education and career of an orator. The followers of Quintilianus believed, he invented the satire, but the fact is long before him other thinkers such as, Aristophanes understood and contributed to the development of satire. The significance of Aristophanes was in his capacity to collect and bring together all the scattered sources, which contributed, to the satiric methods of expression as an effective instrument of literary expression. Aristophanes and all his predecessors brought to existence the comedy as an important part of Greek literature. This literary way of criticism prepared the base for satiric movement in generations to come.

The word satire generally means composed, amalgamation of variety of different events and incidents. This definition eventually was adopted by English culture and they called it, satyrs, which later on became satire. The writer who took his satiric writing serious and was considered the inventor of hexameters (eight part satiric poems) was the poet and writer, Lucilius, who had written in certain appropriate themes, and his works were characterized by a (Lucilian-Horatian tone). Even tough writers like him invented methods and styles of satiric literary expressions, but they all considered themselves, the followers of their predecessors such as Marcus Terentius Varro and his students Menipoos and Pertronious. What ever evolved and developed from the works of these comedy writers became known as, satire.

Satire generally referred to the writings and acting which were harsh, critical, outrageous, and sometimes insulting. The writers such as Joseph Hall from Elizabethan period in England, believed, satirist should be like a harsh porcupine, throwing his sharp needles to his audience, in order to wake them up, and makes them ashamed and sinful of their ignorance. In this period of satiric development there were so many definitions for satire, but none of them really could truly define its appropriation. Eventually in seventeen century the classical satirist, and writer such as, scholar Isaac Casaubon, created a logical structure for it, and from that period on, satire became a structured form of literary art with its own place in the world of international and specifically in English and French literatures. At the beginning, Isaac Casaubon, like roman Quintilians, faced confusion in defining his views, but later on more experiences brought him to a stabilized position. The acknowledgment of the merits of Roman satiric writers and their styles, gave him a secure ground and method to work appropriately.

He first created circumstances, describing an incident or event, and then during the construction of these events and incidents, he expressed his ideas, followed by conclusion he wanted to achieve. He admitted that he was not the first to venture into such creative procedure, before him Geoffrey Chaucer and John Skelton experimented this method. Having said that, he meant to say that what ever he and other writers produced as satiric works, were indeed imitation of their predecessors, going back to the Roman satiric writers, Quintilians, which were the bases for their inspiration.

The Seventeen-century English literature, witnessed a drastic development and changes. Satire in its matured capacity became a new and effective medium for expression of ideas and criticism. This condition came to existence, because the atmosphere of drastic social and political changes required another means of expression far more effective than the old one to be able to profess the new way of life. This was a new means of expression, which definitely was appropriate, to identify the different social and human behaviors created by the preparation for industrial revolution.

Beginning of the seventeen century started with the realistic comedy and developed to an extensive presentation of satiric manifestations of social changes. This new form of expression was based on the writer and satirist’s observation of ordinary elements of social amendments, which manifested the drastic revisions in human behaviors, socially and individually. The variety of the new social behaviors were the sources for artistic stimulations, varied from ethical to economical to traditional changes occurred within the social structures. A satirist was able to replenishe his motivational sources and create the work appropriated to the cultural needs. This, in deed was the reason for the extensive development of satire and comedy far more than before. Within such vast extension of satiric development there were leaders, such as, the writer and satirist Jonson Benjamin 1572-1637 known as English actor and writer. Among his major plays are Every Man in His Humour (1598) and Volpone (1606).

Ben Jonson was a leading figure, which concentrated on expressing the comical manifestation of social and human relations and attitudes. In his book Jonson resorts to the1599 Italian Renaissance satirist Cicero Who belied that “ a satirist should express the reality of human’s daily life and expose the concealed realities that were hidden for variety of reasons. He should display what ever is not ordinarily seen, or bypassed without noticed. He considered the satire as a mirror on front of nature, which expresses its reality. Such expression is in a manner of reminding those realities which for some reason forgotten, ignored, or deliberately concealed. It is by this exposition that the audience’s consciousness will be enhance the social enlightenment.

Based on this theory Jonson created most of his works such as: Volpone 1606, Piquant 1609 Alchemist 1610, and Bartolomofer 1614, which prepared the ground for the whole new satiric movement. He created the realistic image, characterized the reality of the life of London people, which their particular moods that present their behaviors, and attitudes. This peculiar characteristic represented those characters, which were looking for opportunity to manipulate every occasion and exploit every human being, only to achieve their goal. In Piquant, Jonson introduces a young man who inherited a fortune from his uncle and because of this opportunity, his whole personality had changed. Such drastic changes also reflected in his work called Bar to lomiofer, which described a person who trapped a widow by marrying her only to get his hands on her fortune. In his Alchemist Jonson introduced such characters as the chemist that his experiments did not come to conclusion, but in spite of this disappointment he did not stop his experimentation and continued his work and under estimated the intelligence of his victims, but eventually the victims were surrendered.

The seventeen-century’s English comedy and satiric writings were strongly influenced and based on Jonsonian thought. Jonson put a great emphasize on love and from there, expanded to other more complicated aspects of social life. His subjects ranged from: heroic, love relation, and some time even sexual affairs, covering a vast spectrum of social relations, Jonson’s intension was to stimulate the social consciousness of his audiences more than any thing else. Among the prominent seventeen-century English writers and their outstanding satiric works, we should mention in all these works the dramatic aspect of the realistic patterns of ordinary life are expressed.

Comedian must have extensive social awareness, consciousness, knowledge and great measure of sensitivity toward them, in order to be able to create his satire and criticism appropriately. A comedy or satire mostly concludes with a happy ending. In the greatest of the English comedies--Sir George Etherege's Man of Mode (1676), for example, or William Wycherley's Country-Wife (1675) or William Congreve's Way of the World (1700). These are the writers whose works are considered the foundation of what we have and call satire or comedy. The development of comedy and satiric works led to variety of methods which comprised of representation of nature, thymes about life, social entertainment which consist of satires, jokes, comical activities, and further more an amalgamation of these methods in a comical structure. What ever was created in seventeen century English literary consisted of; long satiric poems associated with melodies, époque, him nod, monody, parody, rhapsody, and tragedy.

A satirist who has been surrounded by superficiality of human life strives to bring the humanity to his senses, brings them back to the natural and logical being they meant to be. For this reason then he has to express every corner of life. He should be aware of the variety of human consciousness based on their level of tastes, desires, differences, and even their gender. The satirist with his comedy supposed to go beyond the social peripheral to the essence of the truth, at the same time he has to respect the social and ethical relations.

What ever was developed, as comedy in seventeen-century England in fact comprised of expressions, gestures, social and individual errors and mistakes. To great measures political activities, political elections were the most appropriate targets for satirist or comedians to produce their works. When a comedian or satirist tries to imitate a targeted character, indeed he has to be another person, being the targeted character, besides being him. It is in this situation that he faces a strange dualism, a double personality that is required for his profession to be in, this duality is essential for him to perform his art. There is a great similarity between satirist, restoration comics, and playwrights, which they share a common ethical interest in creating their works. This common ground brings a comedy to a close similarity to naturalistic comedy. Satire and comedy had a great impact on the philosophical views of seventeen century. The comedy with such impact was called restoration literature, or reconstructive literature.

Italian comedy, or comedy Italian, which French called it Italian comedian del arte was given the title in 1680. The French version of such comedy was simply called comedy Frances with a different style from Italian or any other cultures. In the sixteen-century the Italian comedia del Arte Company gained a lots of success among the French people, especially those who were familiar with the Italian language and were able to understand the expressions, jokes, satires, and pantomimes. In spite of this success Italian comedia del arte gradually lost its reputation among the French people, apparently due to the insulting nature of the contents used by Italian satirists. Before they lost their reputation, one of the highest figures of the group was permitted by the French high authorities to use French words in their comedies. Some times even the whole show was in French. This cultural interaction in general, stimulated the development and growth of French dramatic arts, and at the same time closer affiliation between the two cultures.

From this artistic development several styles of comedy evolved, which basically every one of them was a composition and adaptation of the two schools of comedy. Among the extended styles of comedies we can name, Ribaldry, which means insulting jokes. Drollery means strange jokes, Pantomime and a combination of all of these elements. Eventually the Italian comedy was completely replaced by the comedy Frances.

When satire as we define it now, distanced from its ancient traditional and magical identity, we can historically consider such changes as some kind of freedom. But this freedom occurred when the satire was absolutely free from any association with other elements of life, and only was responsive to them as a manifestation or expression of, what was magic without action. During the course of history from this kind of expressions many other styles of comedy and satires branched out rapidly. Such comedies were aimed at their targets, using mocking, laughing at, and clowning in order to express and criticize varieties of social aspects. Some time even making fun of some one such as philosopher Du Eskatoos, who was subjected to mockery in his time and his name used for satire with in a nation, or Dan Quill, Bush’s vice president was considered illiterate and not sharp, miss spelled potato, and therefore, his name and character was used for satire in variety of occasions. Many satiric works such as, satire against humanity, John Wilmot 1675, The Earl. F. Rochester, by Aromas, Travelers by Goliard were written to express and reflecte the social corruptions, hypocrisies, church’s conspiracies against its adversaries, and variety of human deficiencies and behavioral problems. In these works the forms and styles of satiric expressions were varied. Some of them simply were protestation to the suppression of the political or religious authorities, and some of them while were humorous and entertaining they were enlightening the public consciousness. One of the burlesque, which was humorously mocked a subject was written by Rabbles. Lawny Bruce wrote the black hummer. Pitro Artino Italian writer and satirist best known for his literary attacks on his wealthy and powerful contemporaries and for his six volumes of letters. He wrote la corility, and also flyblows, which were simply reflecting the practice of sodomy and social aggression, expressing a hammering method of satire and criticism in society. Mordancies were satire of rounding a person up by making fun of him, these kinds of satire were written by John Marston and Francs Gomez. Ben Jonson and Muller, called epigrams, wrote great masterpieces of short poems or Marty All also wrote very short sentences. Finally from all these development and growth the historical fictions such as the works by Gogol Nikolai Vasilievich 1809-1852 Russian writer, considered the founder of realism in Russian literature, and his works include the short stories “ Diary of a Madman ” (1835) and “ The Overcoat ” (1842) and the novel Dead Souls (1842). Günter Grass and utopias of Elgin zayatin and Aldus Haxlly, and Owl well came to existence.

The historical reference to these satiric and generally dramatic literatures are indicative of the significance of the role that satire plays in safeguarding the social order. It also demonstrates that the writers and artists who create these tremendous works are utterly sensitive and wittingly conscious of the evolution of social behaviors and changes. They are indeed the eyes and ears of their dormant nations. The interaction between prose fiction, which reflects the bitter and complex realities of life, and the satire that manifests its reality, helps to prepare the ground for writer and philosopher such as Thomas Moore to write his Eponymous utopia in 1516 as a satiric utopia fiction. Moore in his work used a combination of satire written by Harass, Juvenal and Lucian. Just like one of Horass’s poem his emphases was dialogue between two opponents, which he step by step clarify his views masterly with their dialogue. Moor’s utopia also was composed by dialogue, because, his intension was to express his opinion trough the conversation between two persons. In Anthrop Garden, in his utopist, structure, the dialogue commenced between two characters, Thomas Moore the historian, and a character of his fiction called Raphael Height Lodi. These two conducted a memorable dialogue. Moore as a counterpart to Raphael directed the argument to a point, to defend his communism (a concept which basically construct the structure of his utopia). Height Lodi explain why British people destroyed their lands, resorted to overeating, consume their means of survival and turn to thieves and plunderers of the cities to cultivate sheep for their values of wools which was in demand of the market at the time. In his conclusion More finally came to a point that every manifestation of life in such destructive society turned to a ground for cultivation of sheep, nothing maintained its stability, everything was destroyed, only churches remained, even the churches became stables for sheep.

Thomas Moore continued his discretion trough dialogue, and with his satiric representation of all manifestation of social life, he indeed shows the decadence of a society where the destruction directed to its banishment. The whole utopia is composed of variety of metaphors and symbols such as, wild sheep, fool people, thoughtless and scavengers, whose behaviors and actions like a destructive earth quick destroyed their lives. The passion for creating a utopia, which consist the very ideal of human community, gradually became a composition of satiric references which every one of them introduces a specific character or events. Basically in the creation of dualism in his dialectic structure, Moore masterly expressed the common and ordinary life of British people in particular, and the whole humanity in general. It should be maintained that Moore owed the richness of his utopia to the utopias written by some of his predecessors such as, lily pot and Brodingnack, and Hein homeland. The solidity of rich writings produced by writers such as Moore cultivated the powerful atmosphere of intellectual richness, helping satirist such as Jonathon Swift to recreate the richer works with stronger intellectual capacity for the people of their time. Jonathon Swift in his utopia sends Gulliver, the main character of his utopia to a different place than the one Moore send Height Lodi. Even where Gulliver goes he faces the fools and crooks, and scavengers. The similarity of structure and characters is in a manner that most critics believed these writers indeed carrying Moor’s message and delivering it across the world rather than introducing a different concept of their own. It is not surprising that the impotence of Moor’s idea stretched to the twentieth century writers such as Aldus Huxley who wrote brave new world, in 1932, which is a satiric work.

The satirists always faced the direct attack and encountering the authorities and their laws. In some cases their lives and livelihood of themselves and their publishers and supporters were threatened. Horass and Juvenal were forced to change the style and contents of their satire in such a way to not direct any attack on the authorities. Horass went even further to write only about dead people. He declared that from that moment on, he would never write satires about authorities, but in fact even writing about death was indirect satiric attack to the live people who imposed sanction upon their critics and persecute them for their satire. In 1599 the bishop of Canterbury and the bishop of London booth issued strict orders to prevent any kind of satiric works to be performed, and published by any satirist, especially those of Hall, John Marston, Thomas Nash.

Today in the totalitarian systems, such as Hitler’s and Saline’s dictatorial regimes social critics and satirists paid a big price to the extend of losing their lives and properties. For example, Joseph Mandstom sent up to Siberian concentration camp for the satiric poem he wrote about Stalin, and kept there, until he died there. A satirist usually expresses his feelings in variety of styles such as rhetoric, which is an indirect expression, irony, twisting and turning, dualism, burlesque which is overstatement about a person or subject, and parody which is mockery. Johnston believed, when the logical relation and mutual understanding between people do not exist, the only alternative remains would be satiric expression and mocking. It is for this reason that hummers, mocking, imitating and unpleasant jokes are the instrument of people’s enlightenment. In another word, prevention becomes the instrument of persuasion. Anthony Copper the third most important shaftsbury who had written about eighteen century, believed the more political and religious suppression imposed upon people, the more creative capacities of them produce sharper and more biter satires. The more slavery is dominating the social orders the more hummers and clownery increased. The more the dominant political power is organized, the execution of the laws become more difficult. In the contrary, satires in a democratic system become milder and quieter. Males Radine a native polish born American immigrant became one of the prominent world war two writer believed that during the world war two, some satirists tested the tolerance of the authority to see how far they target the dominant social powers such as Kaisers and not get in trouble. As Carl Gross who was leader of such group believed, satirists in deed were trying to create the most acceptable works, which could not be subjected to censorship.

The famous American critic in twentieth century Kenneth Burk believed, most of the creative satires came to existence when the satirist without fear, and bravely expressed his feelings. The outcome of such commitment either brings him fame and fortune or misery and punishment. In any case he would never be able to predict any of the outcome. The life and works of Voltaire is the best example of this condition, because, in spite of his out standing reputation, the more his satire were sharply attacked the targets, the more he was under the pressure. In fact, Artists and writers such as Voltaire, Cross, and V.U.E. Zamyatin attacked the evils who were occupying the supreme rolling powers and nobody and nothing could possibly oppose them. It was their courage and devotion, which put them in the leading position in human history.

The value of an effective satire will be acknowledged only when the measure of censorship and pressure due to their impact is increased. Almost all the satirists reflect some kind of apology whether in their writings, or performances, but the fact is they all mean well and expresses their sincerity to the people whom they serve and love. None of them mean to harm, or target maliciously the ordinary people. They always target the powers that they feel deviate from the truth. For example, notice the satires like the following which is attributed to highest church authority, (yes, I am proud, I should be proud, when I see the people are not afraid of God, but they are terrified of me).

The audiences of the satirist must intellectually and politically have common opinion and understanding, so they can agree on the content of satire and the subject being targeted. The best satire is written or performed when both, the satirist and his audience believed in certain ethical norms, It is only in such atmosphere of mutuality that the satire will posses its higher and forceful impact on the audiences. The new classic satirists used the metaphoric grounds of the classical periods, which their audiences appreciate and support it, The writers of nineteen and twentieth century did not have this opportunity, because, people expressed more enthusiasm about the satiric writings and performances. In our time satire gained more reputation and popularity because the complexity of human behavior requires more attention and expression, and satiric writings and performances can satisfy this need. For example the work of Joseph Hall catch 22 written in 1961 was a good sample, which expressed the complexity of American life especially the people’s life in New York.

Hummer or comedy of hummer refers to a style of expression rooted from the works of sixteen-century playwright Ben Jonson. Jonson was inspired from Latino word hummer meaning fluent, which is a reference to the basic substances of living world. Ancient Latino considered the human’s body and mind like other living being comprised of these elements, which will be balanced by hummer. Jonson in his book in 1599 explains that relevance of metaphoric energy of hummer as life energy could be transformed to human trough satiric experience. The characters created by Jonson represent symbolically the deficiency and discrepancies of social functions. One of these symbolic characters is the representation of human tendency to reach to the highest level of distinction and differentiate him self from the others. Doing that then he will distance himself from others. This characteristic will be reflected in varieties of ways, such as having the most expensive property, the highest social position, the most prosperous looking dresses, and putting himself in position where, others can not possibly reach to his level. The attitude of these kinds of people eventually will be so noticeably different that expressing them provides a satirist with a wealth of rich subjects to produce and perform his satire.

We discussed the historical development of satire, and its organic relation with other manifestation of life, concluded that satire bravely, and indiscriminately criticizes any social discrepancy, which threatened the social justice that deteriorated the human’s physical and mental balance. Such remedy for correction and improvement of human behavior started long time ago as a comedy originally by Aristophanes, which was called Aristophanic comedy. This comedy basically should be short, fluent, and simple and ends up with happiness, and generally was comprised of singing, dancing, clownery, and criticism, and mostly the target was splendid life styles and glamour. The targets of criticism were the political manners and even philosophical views and personalities. Generally they aimed at the most distinguished and powerful members of corrupted ruling power, which abused their authorities and created a system of favoritism. Obviously any criticism of such established power in any way was subjected to punishment and the writers, and specially, satirists were the first targets of hostility. It was this political encounter, which created censorship and forceful preventions.

Censorship came to existence when the impact of social criticism on awakening the social consciousness was realized. At the beginning censorship was a forceful activity and a governing mechanism for protecting the individual ruler. This mechanism eventually became a legitimate and accepted part of administration of social power. To expand and legitimized any cruelty associated with the censorship, they considered it as a mechanism of maintaining political and ethical order. No matter what definition or interpretation they had for censorship, it became a suppressive means of prevention of expression of any opposed opinion. For a long time censorship became a bitter fact of social life. This definition of censorship remained as a legitimate social practice until the structure of social relation completely changed. In spite of the fact that still censorship not only exist world - wide and practiced in variety of methods, however, they consider it as a remaindered of the old time. The ancient cultures such as Greek and Room believed that the personality and character of individuals of the society should be formed by the system governing his life. This clearly represents the lack of absolute personal freedom, a life pattern of such society, is our own fanatic and oppressive system in Iran with all back warded laws and social practices. In such system even the censorship does not satisfy the social order for the well being of individual’s life, but rather the forcefully imposed ideology. The kidnapping of writers, artists, and individuals is a savage method of censorship and prevention that even did not exist in the ancient systems.

Prosecution of Socrates in 299 BC was for his violation of the social laws that he him self was one of its founders. It was not related with any conspiracy, favoritism, or ideological advocacy. Plato Greek philosopher a follower of Socrates, he founded the Academy (386), where he taught and wrote for much of the rest of his life. Plato presented his ideas in the form of dramatic dialogues, as in The Republic. He strongly believed in censorship but as a mechanism of social order. In his book Republic he wrote a chapter on censorship, specifically in relation with the development of arts, which he believed are essential for regulation and reconstruction of social order and balance, describing its order, application, and its legitimacy. Plato’s reference to censorship was the kind of orders, which were common in the ancient Israel when every social and individual behavior was strictly monitored and controlled by authorities. Consequently suppressed people had to assigned Nathan a prophet during the reigns of David and Solomon. To mediate with the authorities in order to reduce their pressures on people, Following the people’s resistance such protestation against pressure and censorship spread from the Jews to other religions and communities and prepared the people to a greater task as defendence of universal human dignity verses the tyranny and oppression in its all kinds and shapes. The censorship has a long history among most religions particularly where the strict disciplines and control were the essential part of domination and no individual freedom of any measure was allowed.

Most of the far eastern and Asian cultures such as, Indian, Chinese, especially those of Islamic persuasion used extreme measures of censorship in their governing systems. China as one of the oldest of Asian continent had its own disciplinary censorship based on Confucius believes. He ordered the people to accept the full respect and obedience for those outstanding and selected authorities and ranks of society, which he considered them as worthiest and qualified to be distinguished and selected. To Confucius they were the ones who set the rules, establish the paradigms, and they should execute them any way they wish. Based on these established authority, they were the one who wrote the standard, and formed the political and educational systems and eventually the outcome of such selective system only benefited the selective rank of society causing a vast spectrum of hostility and resistance. It is obvious from this vast historical ground which encompasses great variety of responses will flourish a great deal of satire, and critical writings and undoubtedly tremendous numbers of suppressions and persecutions of all kinds.

The worst methods of censorship appeared in catholic-Christianity called, librorom prohibit rum, which strongly continued for centuries. This method required every Christian to confess to his sins, which could be anything deviated from the main catholic ideological paradigms. This requirement called, Nicene Crete. It was proposed and established by Nikkei in 325, AD. The result of such restriction was the persecution of John du arc 1431, Thomas Moore 1525. These two outstanding historic figures laid down the ground for the resistance and struggles of eighteen century and followed by the resistance of Johan Hamilton, which in his book called it, aria ou paji tika, published 1644. Hamilton in this book condemned the authority of the government in determining the rights or wrongs in individuals and public. The continuation of his struggle stimulated the basic human rights, which reflected in the American-constitution of 1787 guaranteeing the freedom of the press, which lasted up to the present time. Such prevision of law mostly materialized in English speaking world, England and United States, more that any other modern or totalitarian countries. In totalitarian systems they use the censorship as an excuses for maintaining the social order which in reality repeating the dictatorial principals of condemnation of human freedom.

We discussed the mechanism of criticism and the significance of dramatic arts, especially satire. We referred to censorship as a mechanism of confinement and prevention. This historic reference demonstrated the fact that whenever the social order faced crises due to abuses of the power, the forces of evils tried to maintain their positions by suppressions and oppositions. The mechanism of satire was a strong means of exposition of the truth whether against religions or political powers. During any performance and exposure of the facts, so many satirists and writers were severely prosecuted and prevented of telling and exposing the truth. To clarify the historical fact our reference was basically the development of satire and censorship in general historical reference. Our Iranian history witnessed tremendous fluctuations, and every invasion ended up with almost complete destruction of our culture. But we survived all those blows, because the impotence of our developed and advanced culture was not based only on the peripheral level, it was deep rooted and strongly penetrated in the heart of human culture. Who ever wanted to destroy us he would have to destroy his own roots, and that was not affordable risk to take.

The whole Iranian cultural history is filled with means of expression, for the manifestation of truth. Going way back to the declarations of the Avesta, a body of ancient Persian writings comprised of a sacred text of Zoroastrianism [Middle Persian apast³k the basic (text) apast³k the (hymns of) praise] which setting the ground rolls for distinguishing the right from wrong. These basic texts are not impositions, but enhancement of consciousness. During the course of history many thinkers, philosophers, poets, politicians and musicians replenished the lost portion of invasions. They added the rich and fertile cultural ground already enriched the human culture. The whole history of Islamic music does not mean anything without the vast and profound contribution of Iranian scientist and master musicians whom happened to be the slaves of Umayyad, The first dynasty of Arab caliphs (661-750). Its capital was Damascus.

. Scanning trough the history whether is entertainment or satire or even political strategy, we can clearly sea our bright image. The richness of poems, narratives, factual or fictional master-works, their messages deeply understood and splendidly expressed, and the satiric work whether is parts of the writtings, or poems or exclusively written always contributed the pleasure of seeing our real, selves, whether addressing the kings or awakening the beggars.

Today we are in one of those moments of history detained, but not defeated, invaded but not crushed. The language of harsh satiric expression dominated our ordinary lives. Were ever you go, some one comes up with a new joke freshly produced to subdue the rage of my people against the back-warded tyranny, against the hegemony of ignorance and evils. We have many satirists; I should say many master satirists. There should be, because the language of mockery or drollery will be used, when the rationality is entirely suppressed, it was true in ancient Greek and Room, it was true in the Judaism, and Christianity and it is true in Islam, especially in the present fanatic system which there is no rational interaction between dominant power and people, but rather forceful impositions which eventually ends up with so many disappearances of writers, intellectuals, detaining and torturing the innocents, and suppressing any oppositions. The satirist language as the only weapon remained for our people to declare their dignity that had been subdued but not crushed. Trough the satiric language people will attack the atrocities committed by the force of fenaticism. Satire is a powerful language, which awakens, enlightens, and opposes, apparently in the peripheral level but penetrate deep into the heart of the targets as well as the mind of the audiences. Satire makes you laugh and shows you what you passed it by and did not see it, makes you hear what you hear it but did not make anything of what you heard.

I visited a friend in Montreal; he took me to satiric performance of one of the most beloved Iranian master satirist, Hadi Khorsandi. This true artist was one of those artistic figures that I had known and respected him for a long time. He is not only a great satirist of high artistic capacity, but also a knowledgeable person who has extensive capability in analyzing and judgment in practically all the manifestations of Iranian culture and the life of Iranian people especially in exile and abroad. Such capacity achieved only by a person who loves humanity in general and his people and his culture in particular. This master of hummer indeed was a magician, using only the words, bodily gestures as his instruments of expression. In his execution of words, he reminded me of those artist such as Cézanne who meticulously and carefully used every struck of brushes to express a meaning. Practically every issue he raised was the most common and familiar subject that immediately the audiences felt at home.

He started with the most established taboos, whether it was historical, political, or traditional and ripped them into the boons and shredded them in pieces so we, the audience could clearly see with our own eyes how far we are persuaded, convinced, or even brain washed to accept any impositions as unquestionable facts. His whole process of satiric performance hilariously made his audiences laughing, while waking them up from mind stagnation. Hadi’s performance looked and sounded preconceived as if a magician has to have certain arrangement to perform his magical act. But he really did every thing spontaneously and creatively. He simply could take a piece of real state newspaper’s add and read the content of it and turn it to a hilarious performance. Such unpredictability is indeed the essence of art, because in an artistic creation, the artist expresses his subliminal feeling unconsciously without any prearrangement. That is the reason his artistic production is not like mass production of crafts. The artist such as Hadi should really posses a profound reservoir of subliminal knowledge to be capable of such masterly performance. In a period of almost four hours Hadi fascinated his audience to an extend that magnified them greatly.

M. K. SADIGH

New York, March 19, 2001

Notes: From

Encyclopedia Britannica, CD. 1999

The American Heritage Dictionary CD. 1999