Music Produced by Repetition in Persian and Arabic Ornate Prose: With Emphasis on the Prose Works of al-Hariri, al-Saraqusti, Saadi, Hamidi, and Jami

Abstract

One of the most fundamental and effective categories of verbal rhetorical embellishment is the literary device of “repetition,” which creates internal musicality in both poetry and prose. In contrast to internal musicality, external musicality results from poetic meter and prosody. The significance of examining repetition in Persian and Arabic prose lies in the opportunity it provides for a comparative investigation of the techniques through which musicality is generated in Persian and Arabic prose. Accordingly, using a descriptive-analytical method, the present study re-examines selected Persian and Arabic prose works from this perspective and investigates their principal music-producing components, including phonemic and lexical repetition. The findings indicate that repetition in Persian and Arabic prose, in addition to being aesthetically pleasing and rhetorically acceptable within the disciplines of rhetoric and verbal embellishment, enhances the musical quality of discourse and facilitates the communication of the author’s intended meaning to the reader. By employing this technique, prose writers have succeeded in establishing an enduring and inseparable connection between their texts and their audiences.