The Rhetoric of Omission (Iktifā’): in the Poetry of Abū al-Ḥasan al-Bākharzī (467H.)

Abstract

Iktifāʾ (Omission) is a rhetorical device that contributes to shaping the aesthetics of linguistic structure and indicates the poet’s skill and expressive capacity in conveying the implicit dimensions of discourse and revealing his poetic experience. This device is closely connected to the organization of speech, insofar as what is explicitly stated suffices in place of what is omitted, which can be understood from the contextual flow of the discourse, without violating grammatical rules and constraints or neglecting considerations of elegance and rhetorical effectiveness. This rhetorical practice appears in several forms identified by classical rhetoricians in their works. The poet al-Bākharzī - one of the poets of the Seljuk period - was particularly devoted to this device, employing it frequently in his poetry and in a variety of forms. These include ellipsis through the omission of a word, such as omitting the apodosis of a conditional sentence; relying solely on the use of a conditional particle to imply both the protasis and its apodosis; omitting a governed (genitive) noun; and omitting part of a word. Such usages serve to demonstrate the poet’s rhetorical mastery and cultural sophistication, while also inviting the reader to participate in interpreting and reconstructing the omitted elements within a single, coherent linguistic structure.