From Embodiment to Shadow: A Novel Analytical Framework for Reading The Blind Owl

This study analyzes the conceptualization of death in Sadegh Hedayat's The Blind Owl through the lens of radial categorization within cognitive semantics. It argues that death is not presented as a monolithic concept, but as a dynamic, radially organized semantic network. The core of this network is unutterable purgatorial suffering, radiating outwards into six conceptual clusters shaped by metaphorical, virtual, and gestalt extensions: disease/decay, barrier/separation, dead space/tomb, artistic subject, toxic inheritance, and destructive union. Employing qualitative content analysis and a descriptive-interpretive approach, the research systematically identifies and categorizes conceptual metaphors and image schemas related to death. The findings suggest this radial network functions not merely as a literary device, but as the narrator's cognitive framework and worldview. Further, applying Jungian archetypal theory, the study proposes this structure represents the cognitive process of the Shadow overcoming the Ego. Ultimately, The Blind Owl is reinterpreted not as a nihilistic philosophy, but as a cognitive phenomenology of collapse, where language simultaneously reflects pathology and actively constructs the protagonist's subjective reality.

کلیدواژه ها:

conceptualization ، polysemy ، radial category theory ، semantic extension ، shadow ، the blind owl