Abstract
Issue 19 of Tabl Magazine was published in March 2025 featuring ten pieces across various fields, including nine articles and one interview. This issue continues the discussion on “The Death of the Hero”, examining different dimensions of this concept in literature, history, art, and philosophy.
The first article, “Being and Non-being in Popular Culture” by Mohammad Asadian explores cultural beliefs and rituals related to death among various ethnic groups in Iran. The author demonstrates how oral and mythological narratives portray death as an integral part of the life cycle.
The second article, “Zahhak’s Name Reduced to Dust” by Mehrak Ali Sabounchi, analyses the deaths of antiheroes in Iranian mythological narratives, particularly focusing on Zahhak’s death in the Shahnameh and Zoroastrian texts, examining how he became a symbol of eternal evil.
The third piece, “The Hero is Dead!” is an interview with the contemporary writer, Hossein Atashparvar, conducted by Mohammad Ali Moradzadeh. This interview explores the role of heroes in contemporary Iranian fiction and how the concept of the hero has evolved in modern literary narratives.
The fourth piece, “The Final Act” by Saman Sedighzadeh, analyses the deaths of heroic characters in tragic plays and their impact on dramatic storytelling.
The next article, titled “The Hero’s Death, the Subject’s Birth; The Subject’s Death, the Hero’s Birth” by Alireza Kikanli, approaches heroism through philosophical and theoretical lenses. This article argues that the death of a hero can lead to the emergence of new meanings in society.
“The Death of the Hero in Historical Thought” by Mehdi Bakhshipour Moghaddam is the sixth piece, examining how the meaning of the hero has evolved across different historical periods and how social and political developments have influenced this concept.
The next article, “The Unheroic Hero or When History Forgets” by Hamoun Ghapchi, investigates how certain historical figures, once considered heroes, have been forgotten in later eras.
“Remembering the Forgotten Heroes!” by Sa’adat Afzood explores documentary photographs taken by Mehdi Sahabi during the Islamic Revolution, with a particular focus on his images of revolutionary murals. The article also provides a comparative analysis of Sahabi’s paintings from the 2000s that centre on the same theme.
The ninth piece is “The Dialectic of Rebellion and Absurdity” by Mehdi Malek, which analyses the relationship between rebellion and the death of the hero in literary and philosophical works from an existentialist perspective.
Finally, “There Is a Light That Never Goes Out” by Behnoud Amini explores the concept of the hero’s immortality in art and literature, illustrating how certain mythological and historical figures remain alive in collective memory despite their deaths.
Issue 19 of Tabl Magazine, building on the preceding issue, examines the death of the hero not as an end but as a point for rethinking the concept of heroism, addressing contemporary challenges in this field.