The War Memoirs and Discourse

Author: Farhad Sassani
First Published: 2008

This time looking at War memoirs with focusing on the commemoration operators
(An introduction to the Book of “The War Memoirs and Discourse”)

When, in 1998, the 9th issue of Pajouhesh (research) yearly dedicated to the Sacred Defense was published in cooperation with “the Ministry of Islamic Culture and Guidance” and “the Research Center of Literature and Art for Defense”, any discussion on the weakness of studies and researches on the War and also the adherence and dependence of the research pseudo-movement on the powerful promotional-propagating-honorific movement of the War seemed too early and somehow untimely for some part to attract any attention. Even, one of the most profound articles published in the same issue named “the Tomb Secret”, dealing -in a semiological approach- with the importance of the tombs in the cultural studies, came into consideration of the authors and critics after many years.
However, it is undeniable that the 9th issue of Pajouhesh is different from all the issues published before and after due to a reason: before this issue, few compilations dedicated to the War can be found that having  successfully escaped relatively the dominance of the promotional movement and inclined toward research and thinking, incorporated articles in this regard. This reiterated the experience of the joint cooperation of the Ministry and the Research Center resulting in the publication of a book in 1380 titled “Namavard” (Something of a Celebrity). It was a collection of articles on the War. Although, the writers of those articles failed to accomplish the book complier’s goal completely; however, anyone with insight looking into its introduction would find that the compiler of those articles had tried to encourage his War-familiar and War-experienced society to put aside the conventional approaches in considering the War and remind them the necessity of paying attention to the ignored and less-explored aspects of the War. Among those aspects are memoirs, handwritings, diaries, biographies, memorials, letters and last wills which, before this book publication, nobody but few people had figured out their importance and the necessity of their exploration. On the other hand, these few people did not emphasize unanimously on the fact that this task would be fulfilled only upon the collaboration and cooperation of pundits on numerous disciplines of the humanities and social sciences.
In 1381, the publication of a book titled “Yad-e-Mana” (the everlasting commemoration) by the Research Center of Literature and Art for Defense concentrating on memoirs, memoirs writing and narrating, seriously introduced a new science of studying the memoirs or, at least, turned the spotlight on the inevitability of a systematic and well-organized research on memoirs-especially the War memoirs.

During the same year, by publication of “the War and Memoirs”, a book resulting from the close cooperation of this Center with the Social Sciences Faculty of Tehran University and the French Iranology Society in Iran, this proposition that the new science of studying memoirs is emerging came to be -at least- an arguable claim rather than a mere proud boast. On the other hand, this was promising a new viewpoint on the study of the War memoirs: the War memoirs themselves, memoirs writing and narrating are not only a discussion between the War memoirs diarist and his/her readers in any society and nation of any custom and religion, but also are of a thought-provoking rank. This, in turn, introduced a serious challenge on memoirs including the War memoirs, i.e. can we substantially consider something as the cause of insight while its theme comes from the author’s imagination and mentality and these two, are the flashlights on the view and thought of the narrator in narrating an event that has already happened in real?
It would be futile to claim that this looking deep into the memoirs (including the War memoirs) changed into a general and comprehensive one in parallel with the publication of the said book. Even, the same single interview, “Memoirs Writing as Knowledge and Methodology” was published in “Ketab-e-Mah-e-Honar” (the art book monthly) three years later in May and July 2005. Nevertheless, it is necessary to welcome the formation of this special view towards the memoirs issue, which is almost closer to the nature of epistemological discussions.
In “the War and Memoirs”, the term “cultural history” was used for the first time which –I dare say-it has never been known as the key word of the memoir literature before and even now nobody knows it that much; even though being unknown has helped it be protected against transformation and meaning degradation arising from frequent improper and inadmissible usage(s). This term applies to the cultural approaches of any society which they have experienced in life and also refers to different forms of demonstrating the reality of that experience. Therefore, needless to say, considering the War memoirs as different ragged images of a single experience, from the cultural history viewpoint and approach, to what extent is attractive and susceptible to comparative studies.
In consideration of the above explanation, the importance of “Ba Yad-e-Khatere” (with Reminder of Memoir) which has been published by the Research Center in 2005 reveals more than ever. Looking at the short, brief and hastily-prepared introductions to the book here and there -which are mostly written on the basis of the index of the book- quite indicates that the … of its author’s effort in communicating the concept to his readers -that they should interpret the memoirs on a particular subject or phenomenon as the human beings’ mental attitude record toward the same subject or phenomenon  and consequently they should arrange, with hesitation, understanding and wisdom, the collection, edition, correction, expurgation, compilation, re-creation, review and … of the memoirs -has been neglected which initiated the clumsily plagiarism of parts of this book and “the Everlasting Memoir” resulting in the formation of weak and shallow versions of these two books.
Nevertheless, what appeared more important than proving the weak and careless transcriptions of these versions as fake, was the continuation of a course of action which was gradually but powerfully going on and resulted in the publication of a series of articles in a book named “the War Discourse in Media and Literature” in 2005. Through releasing this book, the Research Center by adopting a discourse approach -as a cohesive agent of the articles in the book- in selecting and arranging the articles, tried to study the role of language and linguistic tricks in consolidating the War narrations and show that how a particular conception of the War is formed, through the language and within the framework of the memoirs and narrations, in the people’s mind, so that the contradictions and dissociations inherent in the events like the War would remain concealed.
In 1385 by publishing “In the Realm of Mourning and Memoir”, the Research Center not only completed the discourse discussions of “the War Discourse in Media and Literature” but also seriously reminded the application of the cultural history approach in looking at the War memoirs and by giving a pivotal role to matters on mourning, separation from loved ones and bereavement and also explaining the mechanism which leads to the memorizing or forgetting them, showed that how the memoirs give meaning to the people’s effort  in living with the War experience and furthermore how they interpret the War by creating a new language about the event.  
This brief history which is written on the occasion of the introduction of “The War Memoirs and Discourse” book should be considered as a new research and study approach and prospect on the War which is formed, grown up and developed gradually within years in the Research Center. Hence, without any intention of exaggerating the activities of this center, it has examined and reviewed the background which is substantially the cornerstone of the prevailing prospect and approach ending up with the publication of the same book.
It seems this technique in introducing a new work, i.e. bringing the reader’s mind closer to the background of the same work rather than introducing the writer(s) and his/her/their approaches to the subject matter and then different chapters of book, may help better the reader understand the keywords and consequently digest the contents of the book.  In “War Memoirs and Discourse”, some vocabularies such as “memoir”, “discourse” and “war discourse” are keywords which their full understanding, in consideration of the extensive matters discussed in the book,  is subject to the right comprehension of the eight groups of keywords mentioned in the previous works of the Research Center:

1- The history and its new derivatives in terms of the framework of cultural studies which has been adopted by this Center in looking at the War, including the backgrounds history, the people’s history, the social history, the commemoration history, the historical research and …;
2- The War and the fundamental position of the Center on it named “War Research”;
3- The memoire and its significant derivatives in terms of the said framework such as studying memories, the narrative memoire, the cultural memoire, the people’s memoire, the modern memoire and …;
4- The narrative and its derivatives like the historical narrative, the official narrative, the political narrative, the general narrative, the popular narrative, the narrator and …;
5- The language and whatever gets importance as the subsequent to it;
6- The culture and its derivatives including the cultural system, the cultural theory, the cultural interpretation, the War culture, the people’s culture, the commemoration culture and …;
7- The power and whatever gets importance as the subsequent to it such as the political structure, the political leadership, the political power and …;
8- The memory agent or operator and its derivatives such as the agency or operation, the human agent or operator, the commemorator or the commemoration operator, the War operator and …;

If the reader of “the War Memoires and Discourse” studies it with the help of the record in mind briefly mentioned, would find out better that the birth, appearance and outbreak of the modern memoirs of the War has never been sudden, unexpected and unprecedented; but if today the War memoirs are narrated in another language and somewhat different from the traditional sanctimonious language and he/she reads or hears some criticisms here and there on the necessity of emphasizing the hidden aspects of the War, disclosing its dimensions which one cannot confess, demonstrating the unseen physical and mental sufferings resulting from the War, all of which are skillfully decorated by the War history.

Of course, considering the above mentioned discussion, it is not supposed to honor any special person or entity for being pioneer in this respect, but the most important thing is to draw the attention of the readers of the book to the forming of a snail-like and hidden course of action which, in recording the events, concentrates mostly on the mental background of those events operators rather than on what really happened. Paying attention to the mental background of the operators in turn emphasizes the importance of attending the cultural appearances resulted from a historical experience like the War and since it seeks the cultural symbols of the historical experiences, it is directed at studying the event in the context of the public culture and the continuation of this trend creates the modern memoirs of the War: the memoirs which spring out of the lowest classes of the society towards the highest ones or among the masses and  show up and make us come across with an emerging phenomenon of “the people’s memoirs”.
Here, I would like to refer to the last link of this important chain of action to encourage the readers interested in the memoirs and particularly the War memoirs to study the book deeply: in continuation of signifying a discussion on the War memoir writing and narrating called “The War memoirs creators’ mental backgrounds” and considering these backgrounds as the cultural appearances of a society on the War and sedimentation of those cultural appearances in the form of the public culture and finally emerging of the phenomenon of the War memoirs, a very strategic possibility in the study of the cultural history of Iran-Iraq eight-year war is being developed, which is the possibility of comparative study of this War memoirs and other war-experienced countries.
T
he realization of this possibility means the release of Iran-Iraq War discussions from monopolistic viewpoints which some people, on the pretext of pretending it as distinctive, have always tried to keep it away from the reach of any systematic probe.  Moreover, the development of this possibility is an introduction to another happy event which is the regaining of the transnational characteristics and cultural convergence existing between our country and the rest of the world.

From a research-oriented point of view which explores the mind, language and inside of the memory operators (a term as used by Mr. Farhad Sassani) in any form of creation, re-creation, review, collecting, correction and compilation of the War memoirs, probably the memoirs language would by far be preferable to the diplomatic language and relations in showing the convergences and commonalities among the nations. Consequently, the War memoirs would be an opportunity for the nations dialog and the exchange of their life experiences of the different events. If this is achieved completely, it would pave the way for sympathy and intimacy among the nations on the occurrence of dramatics and tragic events.

Faranak Jamshidi
Translated by Morteza Yavarinia