Reading Lolita In Tehran Part 18

My girls were sitting near the window. The only other table in this vast s.p.a.ce that was occupied was a small one near the wall, where two women were drinking coffee. "No men, no privileges," Manna exclaimed merrily. "This is one time when Nima might have been of some use." Na.s.srin's absence was more obvious in those last weeks when we were all together. I asked Mahshid for news of her. She had no news. And, she added with some bitterness, no news is good news, anyway.

Both Manna and Azin had brought their cameras-cafe memories, said Manna. As my departure drew closer, I became obsessed with taking pictures of all the details of our life. When I did not have an actual camera with me, I became a camera myself, writing feverishly about the flight of birds in Polur, our mountain resort near Tehran, the quality of air that was so tactile, especially early mornings around sunrise and all the beloved faces that surrounded us during those last weeks.

Mitra was subdued. Before I arrived, she had been telling the others about her problems at home and now she continued. Hamid's mother was strongly opposed to their going to Canada, and her disapproval was causing Hamid to vacillate constantly in his decision. What makes me resent this, Mitra said, is not just that she doesn't want us to leave but that she always meddles in our affairs. Before, it was her wanting us to have children-she wanted a grandson before she was too old to enjoy him-and now this. Both Mitra and Hamid were also wavering. He had a good job and financial security and in Canada they would have to start from scratch. She said she felt she was changing-she had become more anxious, more sensitive; she had started having nightmares. One night she woke up feeling that the whole house was shaking, but it was only her shaking the bedside table. Sometimes I think men just can't relate to how difficult it is to be a woman in this country, she said with frustration. For them it's easier, said Ya.s.si. In a way, this place can be a man's paradise. Hamid tells me, said Mitra, that if we make a good living, we can always take our vacations abroad.

Things are definitely better for men, said Azin. Look at the marriage and divorce laws; look at how many so-called secular men have taken second wives. Especially some of the intellectuals, said Manna, those who make the headlines with their claims about freedom and all that.

Not all men are like that, Sanaz objected.

Azin, suddenly brightening up, turned to Sanaz. Well, yes. Some men, like your new beau . . .

He's not a beau, Sanaz objected, giggling now, clearly enjoying herself after a long period of depression. He's a friend of Ali's. He's here on a visit from England, she informed me, feeling that an explanation was in order. We knew each other before-we were sort of friends, she said, through Ali. He was supposed to be our best man, you see. So he came to pay me a visit, just to be nice.

Mitra's dimples and Azin's knowing smile suggested that there was more to "nice" than met the eye. What? said Sanaz. He's not good-looking. Actually, she said, narrowing her eyes, he's sort of ugly. Perhaps more like rugged? suggested Ya.s.si hopefully. No, no, more like, well, more like ugly, but a very nice man, considerate and kind. My brother keeps making fun of him, she said, and you know sometimes I feel like going with him or something. The other day, he was saying how he can't wear short sleeves or go swimming over here. After he left, my brother kept mimicking him and saying, Very clever new method of seduction and my silly sister is just the kind of girl to fall for it.

The waiter came in to take my order. I ordered a cafe glace, cafe glace, and then, looking at Manna, said also, Could you bring all of us some Turkish coffee a little later? Ever since my mother had established the ritual of serving our cla.s.s Turkish coffee, we had gotten into the habit of telling our fortunes from the dregs. Manna and Azin always vied for the privilege of fortune-telling. The last time Azin had told mine, and I had promised Manna that she would get her turn soon. and then, looking at Manna, said also, Could you bring all of us some Turkish coffee a little later? Ever since my mother had established the ritual of serving our cla.s.s Turkish coffee, we had gotten into the habit of telling our fortunes from the dregs. Manna and Azin always vied for the privilege of fortune-telling. The last time Azin had told mine, and I had promised Manna that she would get her turn soon.

After the waiter left, Azin said, Boy I'd love to take a picture of him. Why don't you guys divert his attention and I'll take the picture. How can we divert his attention? said Manna. You don't want us to go to jail for flirting with this decrepit creature!

When the waiter returned with my order, I saw Azin bring up her camera, making signs to Ya.s.si, who was sitting beside me, and idly move the camera in my general direction, as if focusing on the wall. Could I have my coffee without sugar? Ya.s.si asked the waiter. I don't know; it's usually already mixed in, said the waiter peevishly. He turned around sharply at the sound of a click, glanced suspiciously at our innocent expressions and left. I don't know how it will come out, said Azin. We'll see. In the photograph he's standing over me, but his face is turned towards Ya.s.si; only we can't see his face from the chin up. His headless torso is slightly bent and he has an empty tray in one hand; both Ya.s.si and I are looking in his direction and I am holding on to my frosted gla.s.s protectively, as if it might be s.n.a.t.c.hed from me at any moment.

Later, I showed the pictures we'd taken in those last few weeks to my magician. You get a strange feeling when you're about to leave a place, I told him, like you'll not only miss the people you love but you'll miss the person you are now at this time and this place, because you'll never be this way ever again.

The waiter brought us our coffee in small different-colored cups, and while drinking, we pondered the trials and tribulations of being a writer in Iran, having so much to say but not being allowed to say it. I looked at my watch; I was already behind schedule. Let's hear Manna's reading of my fortune and then I'll have to go, I said. I told Manna as I took up my pencil and diary, ready to write, that I would record every word and that she would be beholden for what she was telling me. Remember what Cary Grant said in that fabulous film: a word, like a lost opportunity, cannot be taken back once it has been uttered.

Manna took up my coffee cup and starting telling my fortune: "I see a bird like a c.o.c.k, which means good news, but you yourself are very agitated. A road that looks bright. And you are on the first step. You are thinking of a hundred things at the same time. One road is closed and dark, and the other is open and full of light. Both could happen; it is your choice. There is a key; a problem will be solved. No money. A small ship that is still in the harbor and has not yet started to set sail."

25.

Does every magician, every genuine one, like my own, evoke the hidden conjurer in us all, bringing out the magical possibilities and potentials we did not know existed? Here he is on this chair, the chair I am in the process of inventing. As I write, the chair is created: walnut, a brown cushion, a little uncomfortable, it keeps you alert. This is the chair, but he is not sitting on that chair; I am. He sits on the couch, the same brown cushions, softer perhaps, looking more at home than I do; it is his couch. He sits as he always does, right in the middle, leaving a vast empty s.p.a.ce on either side. He does not lean back but sits up straight, his hands on his lap, his face lean and sharp.

Before he talks, let me have him go to the kitchen, because he is a very hospitable person and would definitely not leave me talking for so long without some offer of tea or coffee, or perchance some ice cream? Today, let it be tea, in two mismatched mugs, his brown, mine green. His graceful, aristocratic poverty, his mugs, his faded jeans, his T-shirts, his chocolates. While he is in the kitchen, let me be silent and consider how meticulously he has created his rituals-reading the paper at a certain hour after breakfast, the morning and evening walks, the answering of the phone after two rings. I am overtaken by a sudden tenderness: how tough he seems to us, yet how fragile is his life.

As he carries in the two mugs of tea, I tell him, You know, I feel all my life has been a series of departures. He raises his eyebrows, placing the mugs on the table, and looks at me as if he had expected a prince and all he could see was a frog. Then we both laugh. He says, still standing, You can say this sort of c.r.a.p in the privacy of these four walls-I am your friend; I shall forgive you-but don't ever write this in your book. I say, But it is the truth. Lady, he says, we do not need your truths but your fiction-if you're any good, perhaps you can trickle in some sort of truth, but spare us your real feelings.

He's back in the kitchen, rummaging through the refrigerator. He comes back with five pieces of chocolate on a small plate. He sits opposite me, almost on the edge of the couch. We are out of everything, I'm afraid. Just a few chocolates is all I have in the fridge.

I said to him that I wanted to write a book in which I would thank the Islamic Republic for all the things it had taught me-to love Austen and James and ice cream and freedom. I said, Right now it is not enough to appreciate all this; I want to write about it. He said, You will not be able to write about Austen without writing about us, about this place where you rediscovered Austen. You will not be able to put us out of your head. Try, you'll see. The Austen you know is so irretrievably linked to this place, this land and these trees. You don't think this is the same Austen you read with Dr. French-it was Dr. French, wasn't it? Do you? This is the Austen you read here, in a place where the film censor is nearly blind and where they hang people in the streets and put a curtain across the sea to segregate men and women. I said, When I write all that, perhaps I will become more generous, less angry.

So we sit, eternally weaving stories, he on his couch, I in my chair; behind us, the oblong circle of light in front of the rocking chair becomes narrower and smaller, and now it disappears. He turns on the lamp and we continue our talk.

26.

"I have a recurring fantasy that one more article has been added to the Bill of Rights: the right to free access to imagination. I have come to believe that genuine democracy cannot exist without the freedom to imagine and the right to use imaginative works without any restrictions. To have a whole life, one must have the possibility of publicly shaping and expressing private worlds, dreams, thoughts and desires, of constantly having access to a dialogue between the public and private worlds. How else do we know that we have existed, felt, desired, hated, feared?

"We speak of facts, yet facts exist only partially to us if they are not repeated and re-created through emotions, thoughts and feelings. To me it seemed as if we had not really existed, or only half existed, because we could not imaginatively realize ourselves and communicate to the world, because we had used works of imagination to serve as handmaidens to some political ploy."

That day when I left my magician's house, I sat on the top steps of the apartment house and wrote those words in my notebook. I dated the entry June 23, 1997, and wrote beside the date: "For my new book." It took me another year after that day to think again about writing this book, and another before I could bring myself to take up my pen, as the saying goes, and write about Austen and Nabokov and those who read and lived them with me.

That day, when I left my magician's house, the sun was fading and the air was mild, the trees a verdant green, and I had many reasons to feel sad. Every object and every face had lost its tangibleness and appeared like a cherished memory: my parents, friends, students, this street, those trees, the withdrawing light from the mountains in the mirror. But I was also vaguely elated and, to paraphrase Muriel Spark's heroine in her wonderful novel Loitering with Intent, Loitering with Intent, I went about my way rejoicing, thinking how wonderful it is to be a woman and a writer at the end of the twentieth century. I went about my way rejoicing, thinking how wonderful it is to be a woman and a writer at the end of the twentieth century.

Epilogue.

I left Tehran on June 24, 1997, for the green light that Gatsby once believed in. I write and teach once again, on the seventh floor of a building in a town without mountains but with amazing falls and springs. I still teach Nabokov, James, Fitzgerald, Conrad as well as Iraj Pezeshkzad, who is responsible for one of my favorite Iranian novels, My Uncle Napoleon, My Uncle Napoleon, and those others whom I have discovered since I arrived in the United States, like Zora Neale Hurston and Orhan Pamuk. And I know now that my world, like Pnin's, will be forever a "portable world." and those others whom I have discovered since I arrived in the United States, like Zora Neale Hurston and Orhan Pamuk. And I know now that my world, like Pnin's, will be forever a "portable world."

I left Iran, but Iran did not leave me. Much has changed in appearance since Bijan and I left. There is more defiance in Manna's gait and those of other women; their scarves are more colorful and their robes much shorter; they wear makeup now and walk freely with men who are not their brothers, fathers or husbands. Parallel to this, the raids and arrests and public executions also persist. But there is a stronger demand for freedom; as I write, I open the paper to read about the recent student demonstrations in support of a dissident who was sentenced to death for suggesting that the clergy should not be blindly followed like monkeys and calling for a revision of the const.i.tution. I read the writings of young students and former revolutionaries, the slogans and demands for democracy, and I know now as much as I will ever know anything that it is this dogged desire for life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness by young Iranians today, the children of the revolution, and the anguished self-criticism of former revolutionaries that will determine the shape of our future.Since I left Iran, respecting his wishes, I have not talked or written to my magician, but his magic has been so much a part of my life that sometimes I ask myself, Was he ever real? Did I invent him? Did he invent me?Sometimes I get e-mail messages on my computer, like fireflies, or letters postmarked from Tehran or Sydney, and they are from my former students, telling me about their lives and memories.Na.s.srin, I know, arrived safely in England. I do not know what happened to her after that.Mitra left for Canada a few months after we moved to the U.S. She used to write me e-mails or call me regularly, but I have not heard from her for a long time. Ya.s.si tells me that she enrolled in college and now has a son.I heard from Sanaz, too, when I first came to the States. She called me from Europe to inform me that she was now married and intended to enroll at the university. But Azin tells me she dropped that plan and is keeping house, as the saying goes.When I first came to America, I did not hear from Azin often; she usually called me on my birthday. A former student had told me that Azin was teaching at Allameh, the same courses and books that I once taught. The last she had heard of Azin, she added mischievously, she was moving into the room next to my old office on the fifth floor. I often thought of her and her beautiful little Negar. A few months ago, she called out of the blue, from California. Her voice was filled with that buoyant and flirtatious tone whose notes I seem to have memorized. She has remarried; her new husband lives in California. Her former husband had taken Negar from her and there was not much else to stay in Tehran for. She was full of ideas about enrolling in cla.s.ses and starting a new life.Mahshid, Manna and Ya.s.si continued to meet after I left. They read Virginia Woolf and Kundera and others, and wrote about films, poetry and their own lives as women. Mahshid got her much deserved tenure and is now a senior editor, publishing books of her own.During her last year in Iran, Ya.s.si held her own private cla.s.s, with students who loved her and with whom she went mountain climbing, about which she wrote me e-mails delirious with this newfound capability. She also worked hard to come to America for her graduate studies. She was finally accepted at Rice University, in Texas, in 2000 and is currently working on her Ph.D.Nima teaches. He, I always thought, is what we call a born teacher. He also writes brilliant and unfinished essays on James, Nabokov and his favorite Persian writers. He still regales me with his stories and anecdotes. Manna writes her poetry, and when I recently told her I wanted to write an epilogue for my book and was wondering what to say about her, she sent me this:Five years have pa.s.sed since the time when the story began in a cloud-lit room where we read Madame Bovary Madame Bovary and had chocolate from a wine-red dish on Thursday mornings. Hardly anything has changed in the nonstop sameness of our everyday life. But somewhere else I have changed. Each morning with the rising of the routine sun as I wake up and put on my veil before the mirror to go out and become a part of what is called reality, I also know of another "I" that has become naked on the pages of a book: in a fictional world, I have become fixed like a Rodin statue. And so I will remain as long as you keep me in your eyes, dear readers. and had chocolate from a wine-red dish on Thursday mornings. Hardly anything has changed in the nonstop sameness of our everyday life. But somewhere else I have changed. Each morning with the rising of the routine sun as I wake up and put on my veil before the mirror to go out and become a part of what is called reality, I also know of another "I" that has become naked on the pages of a book: in a fictional world, I have become fixed like a Rodin statue. And so I will remain as long as you keep me in your eyes, dear readers.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS.

There are numerous individuals whose real selves, ghosts or shadows make cameo appearances in the pages of this book. Some I have known for a long time, sharing with them many of the experiences narrated in the preceding chapters; others I feel as if I have known all my life, even if they were not there then. There is no way that I can acknowledge their contributions in these few words. Like the good fairies and genies protecting Nabokov's Pnin, they have been the guardian angels of my book. To them I owe more than I can ever articulate.

My mother, Nezhat Nafisi, died on January 2, 2003. I could not be with her through her last months of illness and her death. That grief will always be accompanied by a hatred I shared with her of evil totalitarian systems which Nabokov denounced for holding their citizens hostage by their heartstrings. For her, the fight against tyranny was not a political but an existential struggle. As a daughter and an individual I could never reach the standards of perfection she expected of me, but she did take genuine pleasure in my work and we believed in the same ideals and values. She had looked forward to reading this book, and I dedicate it to her in memory of her courage and sense of integrity, which were the main causes of her pa.s.sionate failings. She and my father were the first, most enthusiastic and selfless supporters of my work.

My father was the first storyteller in my life, creating stories for me and with me. He taught me many things, among them how to believe in ideals and how to confront the real world with the possibilities created by fictional ones. With my brother, Mohammad, I shared my earliest dreams and stories (an experience I continue to share with my beloved niece, Sanam Banoo Nafisi); although we lived apart during the writing of this book, his critical and compa.s.sionate eye has been my constant companion. My husband, Bijan, with whom I shared so many of the experiences in this book, has been literally my better half throughout this ordeal as all others. He was the only one apart from my editor who read the finished ma.n.u.script of my book, helping me much through his impartial judgment, moral integrity and love. My children, Dara and Negar, provided me with the kind of love and support that at times reversed our roles.

Other family members and friends made the writing of this book easier with their support and encouragement: Manijeh and Q Aghazadeh; Taraneh and Mo Shamszad; Parvin, whose invaluable friendship and constant support cannot be acknowledged in words, and also Khosrow, Tahmineh joon, Goli, Karim, Nahid and Zari; my good friend Mahnaz Afkhami, who offered friendship and wise counsel during a difficult and lonely time; Paul (thank you for introducing me to Persecution and the Art of Writing, Persecution and the Art of Writing, among many other things), Carl Gershman, Hillel Fradkin and the wonderful colleagues and staff at the University of Freedonia; Bernard Lewis (who opened the door); Hayedeh Daragahi, Freshteh Shahpar, Farivar Farzan, Shahran Tabari and Ziama (for teaching me about the relation between Beethoven and freedom); Lea Kenig for her friendship, support and love of books, which she generously shared with me; my retrieved childhood friends Farah Ebrahimi and Issa H. Rhode; and my voices of conscience and bosom friends Ladan Boroumand, Roya Boroumand and Abdi Nafisi. among many other things), Carl Gershman, Hillel Fradkin and the wonderful colleagues and staff at the University of Freedonia; Bernard Lewis (who opened the door); Hayedeh Daragahi, Freshteh Shahpar, Farivar Farzan, Shahran Tabari and Ziama (for teaching me about the relation between Beethoven and freedom); Lea Kenig for her friendship, support and love of books, which she generously shared with me; my retrieved childhood friends Farah Ebrahimi and Issa H. Rhode; and my voices of conscience and bosom friends Ladan Boroumand, Roya Boroumand and Abdi Nafisi.

I will always remain indebted to my students, who provided me with a new outlook on life and literature, but especially to Azin, Ya.s.si, Sanaz, Mitra, Mahshid, Manna, Ava, Mozhgan, Na.s.srin and Nima. Almost every page of this book resonates with memories of my teaching experiences and in a sense every page is dedicated to them.

Since I left Iran in 1997, the Paul H. Nitze School for Advanced International Studies (SAIS) at Johns Hopkins University has been my academic and intellectual home. I have benefited from the openness, curiosity and intellectual freedom shown by past and present colleagues and staff. I would like to thank them for providing an atmosphere that is academically exciting and adventurous but never intellectually stilted or confining. My thanks especially to Fouad Ajami and the Middle East department and to the staff and my colleagues at the Foreign Policy Inst.i.tute and to its director, Dr. Tom Keaney.

A generous grant from the Smith Richardson Foundation provided me with the opportunity to work on this book as well as pursue my projects at SAIS. My thanks especially to Marin Strmecki and Samantha Ravich for their belief in the rights of all individuals, no matter what part of the world they live in, to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. For quotations from Ayatollah Khomeini and facts about his life, I am grateful to Baqer Moin's Khomeini: Life of the Ayatollah Khomeini: Life of the Ayatollah (I.B. Tauris, 1999). (I.B. Tauris, 1999).

I would like to thank the staff at Random House for their support, enthusiasm and professionalism. I am grateful to Veronica Windholz for her scrupulous copyediting as well as her compa.s.sionate hatred of tyrannies, and to Robin Rolewicz, on whose smiles and generous and timely support, which went far beyond the call of duty, I came so much to rely. I had often wondered why some writers waxed lyrical over their editors until I started to work with Joy de Menil. Although very young, Joy decided to become this book's fairy G.o.dmother. I appreciate her friendship, developed over the course of writing this book, her imaginative insights and suggestions, her meticulous editing and not least her own pa.s.sion for and appreciation of great works of fiction.

And then there is always the inimitable, incorrigible Mr. R, wherever he may be at this moment and whatever story he may be inventing or partic.i.p.ating in.

[image]

PHOTO: LILI IRAVANI.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR.

AZAR NAFISI is a professor at Johns Hopkins University. She won a fellowship from Oxford and taught English literature at the University of Tehran, the Free Islamic University and the University of Allameh Tabatabai in Iran. She was expelled from the University of Tehran for refusing to wear the veil and left Iran for America in 1997. She has written for is a professor at Johns Hopkins University. She won a fellowship from Oxford and taught English literature at the University of Tehran, the Free Islamic University and the University of Allameh Tabatabai in Iran. She was expelled from the University of Tehran for refusing to wear the veil and left Iran for America in 1997. She has written for The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal and and The New Republic, The New Republic, has appeared on countless radio and television programs, and is the author of has appeared on countless radio and television programs, and is the author of Anti-Terra: A Critical Study of Vladimir Nabokov's Novels Anti-Terra: A Critical Study of Vladimir Nabokov's Novels. She lives in Washington, D.C., with her husband and two children. Visit her website at http://dialogueproject.sais-jhu.edu.

PRAISE FOR.

Reading Lolita in Tehran "Resonant and deeply affecting . . . An eloquent brief on the transformative powers of fictionon the refuge from ideology that art can offer to those living under tyranny, and art's affirmative and subversive faith in the voice of the individual."

-MICHIKO K KAKUTANI, The New York Times The New York Times "[A] vividly braided memoir . . . Anguished and glorious."

-CYNTHIA OZICK, The New Republic The New Republic "Certain books by our most talented essayists . . . carry inside their covers the heat and struggle of a life's central choice being made and the price being paid, while the writer tells us about other matters, and leaves behind a path of sadness and sparkling loss. Reading Lolita in Tehran Reading Lolita in Tehran is such a book." is such a book."

-MONA SIMPSON, The Atlantic Monthly The Atlantic Monthly "A poignant, searing tale about the secret ways Iranian women defy the regime. . . . [Nafisi] makes you want to rush back to all these books to experience the hidden aspects she's elucidated."

-Salon "A quietly magnificent book . . . [Nafisi's] pa.s.sion is irresistible."

-LA Weekly "Azar Nafisi's memoir makes a good case for reading the cla.s.sics of Western literature no matter where you are. . . . [Her] perspective on her students' plight, the ongoing struggle of Iranian citizens, and her country's violent transformation into an Islamic state will provide valuable insights to anyone interested in current international events."

-HEATHER HEWETT, The Christian Science Monitor The Christian Science Monitor "An intimate memoir of life under a repressive regime and a celebration of the vitality of literature. . . . As rich and profound as the novels Nafisi teaches."

-The Miami Herald "An inspiring account of an insatiable desire for intellectual freedom."

-USA Today "Transcends categorization as memoir, literary criticism or social history, though it is superb as all three. . . . Nafisi has produced an original work on the relationship between life and literature."

-Publishers Weekly (starred review) (starred review) "Nafisi's pa.s.sion for books is infectious, and her description of the effect of the revolution on its people is unforgettable."

-Denver Rocky Mountain News "[A] sparkling memoir . . . A spirited tribute both to the cla.s.sics of world literature and to resistance against oppression."

-Kirkus Reviews (starred review) (starred review) "Nafisi artfully intertwines her own coming-of-age in pre-Revolutionary Tehran with the daily frustrations of her pupils. . . . [She] relates her girls' moving stories with great sympathy."

-Entertainment Weekly "[Nafisi] reminds us why we read in the first place."

-Newsday "As timely as it is well-written. . . . As the world seems to further divide itself into them and us, Nafisi reminds her readers of the folly of thinking in black and white."

-Cleveland Plain Dealer Plain Dealer "Readers will have a new appreciation for the worn Nabokov and James t.i.tles on their bookshelves after reading Nafisi's engaging memoir."

-Minneapolis Star Tribune Star Tribune "Nafisi's writing has painterly qualities. . . . She is able to capture a moment and describe it with ease and melancholy. . . . Reading Lolita in Tehran Reading Lolita in Tehran is much more than a literary memoir; it becomes a tool for teaching us how to construe literature in a new, more meaningful way." is much more than a literary memoir; it becomes a tool for teaching us how to construe literature in a new, more meaningful way."

-The Library Journal "Brilliant . . . So much is right with this book, if not with this world."

-The Boston Globe "I was enthralled and moved by Azar Nafisi's account of how she defied, and helped others to defy, radical Islam's war against women. Her memoir contains important and properly complex reflections about the ravages of theocracy, about thoughtfulness, and about the ordeals of freedom-as well as a stirring account of the pleasures and deepening of consciousness that result from an encounter with great literature and with an inspired teacher."

-SUSAN S SONTAG "A memoir about teaching Western literature in revolutionary Iran, with profound and fascinating insights into both. A masterpiece."

-BERNARD LEWIS, author of What Went Wrong? What Went Wrong?

"Anyone who has ever belonged to a book group must read this book. Azar Nafisi takes us into the vivid lives of eight women who must meet in secret to explore the forbidden fiction of the west. It is at once a celebration of the power of the novel and a cry of outrage at the reality in which these women are trapped. The ayatollahs don't know it, but Nafisi is one of the heroes of the Islamic Republic."

-GERALDINE BROOKS, author of Nine Parts of Desire Nine Parts of Desire and and Year of Wonders Year of Wonders "When I first saw Azar Nafisi teach, she was standing in a university cla.s.sroom in Tehran, holding a bunch of red fake poppies in one hand and a bouquet of daffodils in the other, and asking, what is kitsch? Now, mesmerizingly, she reveals the shimmering worlds she created in those cla.s.srooms, inside a revolution that was an apogee of kitsch and cruelty. Here, people think for themselves because James and Fitzgerald and Nabokov sing out against authoritarianism and repression. You will be taken inside a culture, and on a journey, that you will never forget."

-JACKI LYDEN, author of Daughter of the Queen of Sheba Daughter of the Queen of Sheba

Suggested Reading

Nuha al-Radi, Baghdad Diaries Baghdad DiariesMargaret Atwood, The Blind a.s.sa.s.sin The Blind a.s.sa.s.sinJane Austen, Emma, Mansfield Park, Emma, Mansfield Park, and and Pride and Prejudice Pride and PrejudiceSaul Bellow, The Dean's December The Dean's December and and More Die of Heartbreak More Die of HeartbreakEmily Bronte, Wuthering Heights Wuthering HeightsLewis Carroll, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland Alice's Adventures in WonderlandJoseph Conrad, Under Western Eyes Under Western EyesHenry Fielding, Shamela Shamela and and Tom Jones Tom JonesGustave Flaubert, Madame Bovary Madame BovaryAnne Frank, The Diary of Anne Frank The Diary of Anne FrankHenry James, The Amba.s.sadors, Daisy Miller, The Amba.s.sadors, Daisy Miller, and and Washington Squar Washington SquareFranz Kafka, In the Penal Colony In the Penal Colony and and The Trial The TrialKatherine Kressman Taylor, Address Unknown Address UnknownHerman Melville, The Confidence Man The Confidence ManVladimir Nabokov, Lolita, Invitation to a Beheading, Lolita, Invitation to a Beheading, and and Pnin PninSarah Orne Jewett, The Country of the Pointed Firs The Country of the Pointed FirsIraj Pezeshkzad, My Uncle Napoleon My Uncle NapoleonDiane Ravitch, The Language Police The Language PoliceJulie Salamon, The Net of Dreams The Net of DreamsMarjane Satrapi, Persepolis PersepolisScheherazade, A Thousand and One Nights A Thousand and One NightsF. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby The Great GatsbyW. G. Sebald, The Emigrants The EmigrantsCarol Shields, The Stone Diaries The Stone DiariesJoseph Skvorecky, The Engineer of Human Souls The Engineer of Human SoulsMuriel Spark, Loitering with Intent Loitering with Intent and and The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie The Prime of Miss Jean BrodieItalo Svevo, Confessions of Zeno Confessions of ZenoPeter Taylor, A Summons to Memphis A Summons to MemphisMark Twain, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn The Adventures of Huckleberry FinnAnne Tyler, Back When We Were Grownups Back When We Were Grownups and and St. Maybe St. MaybeMario Vargas Llosa, Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter