Children Characters in Rumi’s Masnavi

Abstract

In this paper we focus on the stories of Masnavi in which the children have the main role. The aim is to consider children’s attitudes as the elements of the story. The subjects we are going to work on are as follows: To consider carefully the apparent, spiritual, mental and environmental connections, to identify the static and dynamic character, and the protagonist and antagonist of mentioned children. Rumi has selected child character in 26 stories in Masnavi. All children are described based on gender, name, age and social class. The characters in Masnavi can be divided in two groups as human (men, women, and children) and non-human (God, angels, fairies, animals and etc.) characters.  

Almost all of the characters in Rumi’s stories do not have a special name and they are called with words that determine their gender or age. Gender is an important feature in characters especially in babies. Of course spiritual and mental features and the environment where they have been grown are mentioned and the words are coordinated with mental and social levels. Rumi’s skill is consistency between characters and environment. Babies’ character has consistency with their environment. All these factors will show the mature period, and need behaviors. There descriptions help the reader for deep understanding.