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Summary: Teaching literature in Iran during the revolution and beyond
Review: This incredible memoir tells the story of Azar Nafisi's life. But it is far more than that. It's the story of a world collapsing around her. And it's also the story of some works of literature. This adds depth and dimension to the experience of reading the book.Ms. Nafisi is Iranian and spent her college years in America. When she returned in 1979, there was a revolution going on. There were arrests, executions and new restrictions for everyone, especially the women. At the time, Ms. Nafisi was teaching English literature at the University. Later, she held clandestine classes in her home for a small group of women. They would arrive wearing heavy veils but would remove them when they got inside. And their discussions of literature often related to their own lives. She describes exactly what it is like to live in a totalitarian society where punishments are cruel for even slight departures from the rules. For example, one of her female students, along with four other female students visited a young male friend. All the women were heavily veiled and the six young people were sitting around a table on someone's patio. All of a sudden the police broke in and imprisoned the five women. They were medically checked for virginity and then each given 25 lashes before they were released a few days later. The charge was that they were not properly chaperoned. The young man, of course, was not charged with anything. By the 1980s there was a war with Iraq going on and by then Ms. Nafisi had two young children. I really related to her as a mother as the bombs fell around her on a nightly basis and she would sit in the hallway near her children and escape into her world of books. It is this love of books and the teaching of literature that is one of the many glues that hold the book together. In one of her classrooms the book "The Great Gatsby" is put on trial. In another classroom she discusses Henry James. And, of course, her interpretation of "Lolita" is the centerpiece from which flows her strong discourse on the view of women, not only in Iran, but throughout history. The best part of the book is that it thrust me right into the midst of the author's world. It certainly wasn't pleasant. But I applauded the way she coped with the inevitable and influenced others to deal with their circumstances. Ms. Nafisi loves her country and takes pride in her Persian heritage. And yet she deplores that fact that in public the women there are forbidden to experience something as simple as being able to feel the wind and the sun on their skin -- a freedom I've always taken for granted. Ms. Nafisi now lives in the United States with her husband and children. I feel glad she escaped but yet understand her sorrow for her country. This book is one of the best I've ever read. It altered my perceptions as well as enriched my understanding of literature. I loved it and give it my very highest recommendation. Don't miss it!
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Summary: A Stunning Example of the Power of Words Over Force
Review: "Reading Lolita in Tehran" is Azar Nafisi's account of several fascinating events that ultimately center on books and the context in which they are read. Ms. Nafisi is a professor of English literature who lived in the United States for many years and obtained her Ph.D. here before returning to her native Iran to teach in the prestigious Tehran University. In this book she recounts her radical student days in America (protesting the Shah's regime), the political upheaval that swept Iran during and after the Islamic Revolution of 1979, her life of intellectual exile within her own country during the Iran/Iraq War, and her simple but highly subversive decision to teach a private women's seminar on forbidden English literature. While this book is very well written and interesting on many levels, more than anything else it provides a fascinating study on the value of literature in a given social and political context. Following her resignation from her teaching position in Tehran University because of government pressure and intrusion into her life, Ms. Nafisi decided to teach a private English literature seminar to a select group of her former female students. The students came from diverse social, religious and political backgrounds. Some were deeply religious while others lead lives that might be considered "interesting" even by liberal Western standards. Some had been imprisoned by the Iran's ruling regime while others had escaped the tumult of the Islamic Revolution relatively unscathed. One important thing these women had in common was that they were extremely intelligent and well educated. Many had read the works of Barthes and other Western intellectuals for pleasure and probably could easily hold their own in an English or American graduate program. Another was the fact that each of them had known life in Iran before the Islamic Revolution and each had strong personal feelings about living under an oppressive theocratic regime. What I found most interesting about this book was the new life that "old" texts by Nabokov, Fitzgerald, and others took on within the deeply oppressive context of Revolutionary Iran. When the group read The Great Gatsby, for example, one of the principle themes they explored was how the book's wealthy characters-like most people in power--always broke things and then expected someone else to fix them. If this book was decadent and pro-western as the Iran's ruling clerics claimed, then how did one explain the critical manner in which it portrayed its most privileged characters? Did its author provide an objective analysis of his own civilization? Was this process threatening to Iran's ruling regime? Similarly, When reading Lolita the group concluded that the novel's villainous character Humbert Humbert fooled himself and attempted to fool his readers by blaming his victim, Lolita (as he called her) for her own rape. The group then drew a parallel between his behavior and that and Iran's revolutionary government, which often blamed the victims for the oppression it meted out to them. Humbert Humbert, in this case, was neither the innocent lover that he makes himself out to be, nor the villain that most discerning readers take him for. Instead, his exploitive and propagandistic behavior made him emblematic of tyranny in general. Equally as fascinating is the dynamic of Ms. Nafisi's class itself. The students did not always agree with each other and seldom came to neat and tidy conclusions about either the books or the context within which they read them. The students sometimes carried out subtle personal arguments with each other through their conflicting interpretations of the books. And while none of them enjoyed living under Iran's theocratic government they still possessed different points of view about how that experience had come to be and what it meant. Reading Ms. Nafisi's recounting of her seminars is as pleasurable as quietly sitting in a room and listening to a conversation between very intelligent people. One comes away from this book not only with a new understanding of familiar texts but also with a deep appreciation for the fact that, at least for now, we do not live in a militant theocracy in which librarians and book sellers are forced to secretly inform the ruling regime what their citizens are reading. If for some reason this situation changes, then literature, as Ms. Nafisi demonstrates is an extremely powerful tool of survival and of resistance.
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Summary: A COMPLETE LIE!!! SHAME ON YOU MS. NAFISI! SHAME ON YOU!!
Review: PLEASE BE AWARE! THIS BOOK IS A COMPLETE LIE! O.K. Ms. Nafisi, I'm directly talking to you! How could you write such big fat lies? As an Iranian girl who has gone to the same University that you gathered your students from and have sat on those same seats, in the same classrooms, I had my eyes wide opened with great surprise when I read your book! Who says that the books you have named are banned in Iran??!! How come I was taught them in VERY GREAT DETAIL in that SAME UNIVERSITY?? Be honest with yourself! Was "Pride and Prejudice" banned?? How come I had it as a textbook in my "literature 1" class?? And even took a very hard test on it as my final exam?? Do you want me to name the Professor for you? I'm sure you would know the person!! This is just one example!
One thing that did spark my curiosity was that you have mentioned that having curtains is a "must" in Iran! I don't remember ever having anyone told me that I cannot leave my window without a curtain! In any case, any human being would have a curtain on their window! Especially if you don't want to be seen by the people outside, when changing your clothes!
Can I ask you a question?? Why are you making things much much bigger than they really are in Iran?? What's your goal? Maybe you are in cooperation with the U.S media! Causing all these false stereotypes is not really nice, and is very misleading!! Dear Readers,
As an Iranian girl, living both in Iran and the U.S. I would like to ask you to do more research before judging about a country that you have never been to. Iran is a great country that is improving day by day, and has done a great deal. Just wearing a veil doesn't mean that women are treated lower than men. NO! Ms. Nafisi's problem was the veil that she had to wear, AND also the problems she and her family had during the revolution, so she has chosen to make up for the difficulties this way, by giving out inaccurate information about the present regime. When reading this book, just keep in mind that it's ONE HUNDRED PERCENT LIE!
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Summary: loved this!
Review: I absolutely loved this book. In the US, it's difficult to get unbiased information about daily life in Iran. This book delved into the history, and showed both the daily inequities, but also the strength and determination, of its citizens, especially the women. It reminded me that there was a time when Iranian women were on equal status with men, and the historical events that changed that, from one person's perspective. It discusses day to day life, the Iran-Iraq war, and things the women would do to rebel against their situation. These women were intelligent, educated, and had a desire to learn. The author also intersperses her historical discussions, with literary criticisms. The book club members take fiction, and see things that Western readers likely wouldn't, to apply it to their own lives, and gain hope from it. When I first started this book, I thought it would catapult into my "top 5 ever" list. I still give it 5 stars, but the one part I disliked, was the digression into the past. I would have liked to have heard more about the book club members, and their lives. The way the book is structured, the first quarter, and the last quarter of the book discuss the club, with the middle being about the author. She also moves in and out of time often, and it can be hard to figure out what time period she is discussing. I hope that you will read this book. It's truly a phenomenal narrative, and one that all Western readers should read to better understand a country that's been propagandized for years.
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Summary: Brave Women
Review: This is such a great book. I read it in two days and I could not put it down. I shows how these great works of fiction can help people can help though even difficult times.
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Summary: Fabulous! If you love and cherish books, read this now
Review: What a fabulous find! Book-lovers should read this memoir of being female in Iran during and after the Islamic revolution contrasted with ideas and ideals of Western civilization as shown by great authors. Azir Nafisi, an English literature professor, has taken 4 novelists (Nabokov, Fitzgerald, James, and Austen) and shown how the ideals written about in their novels espouse those desired by her and some of her female students in authoritarian Iran. The ability to show and feel love, freedom, imagination, and passion espoused in great novels can only be dreamed by the women portrayed in this book. They gather to study forbidden books, and to find words and outlets for the feelings of inadequacy, fear, loss, and longing in their hearts fostered by a government dismissive (and fearful) of women. In addition to the internal struggles bravely portrayed, this book gives a fabulous cultural picture of life in Iran during and after the revolution. Beyond the political atmosphere, I felt the love Nafisi has for her native country and the people she left behind there.
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Summary: Compelling on many levels
Review: I highly recommend this book for anyone interested in what life is like for the average person in Iran, anyone who has a passion for literature, or both. It is beautiful, thoughtful, touching, illuminating. It also gives a crash course in the history of the Islamic Revolution, which was very helpful for someone like me who never really learned much about it in school. Gorgeous and important book.
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Summary: This was so pretentious
Review: Normally I love reading about Iran and I love Iranian movies, but I couldn't finish this. Jane Austin is nauseating anyway..then to have it disected by Iranian college girls is awful. I just found this very elitist.
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Summary: Iran is one of the most important countries to read about
Review: Iran is one of the most important countries that anyone in the USA should read about - it is on the knife edge between becoming the world's first Islamic democracy (if Khatami and the moderates win : and Khatami got to power on the eager support of women in Iran), or becoming an even worse theocracy than it is now if the hard line Shiite leaders such as Khameini win. So any book on Iran that makes what is happening there accessible to a wide audience - as this book does - has become vital reading for any concerned American today. Watch Iran! What happens there might change your life.... Christopher Catherwood, author of CHRISTIANS MUSLIMS AND ISLAMIC RAGE (Zondervan, 2003)
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Summary: An intimate account of Revolutionary Iran
Review: Nafisi may not bring an end to the tyrannical mullah rule in Iran, but she has opened up a Pandora's box in this book, illustrating a wonderfully rich set of relationships that helped carry through 17 years of hardline Islamic rule. I could think of no more engaging way to relate such experiences than by building these four essays around such noted authors. Of course, any Western book takes on a political tone when discussed under a religious fundamental regime, but I was really surprised to see her draw so much out of Henry James and Jane Austen. She forced me to look at these authors anew. Of course Nabokov was an easy pick, especially
"Invitation to a Beheading," which is as much a part of the first chapter on "Lolita"
as is Lolita herself. By showing us the personal nature of totalitarianism, that of imposing one's dream upon another, we get an idea just how far these repressive regimes will go to stifle one's imagination. Both Cincinnatus and Lolita are seen as heros in Nafisi's book for being able to withstand the tyrannical hold their oppressive masters had on them. I was less taken by the Trial of Gatsby, which was probably great fun in the classroom, but didn't translate so well to the page. But here, like in all her essays, Nafisi provides wonderful anecdotes of life under Revolutionary Iran. She introduces us to her fascinating array of students, some of which she eventually brings together in a private reading group to escape the close scrutiny of the moral police. It is in her home that the young women are finally able to unwrap themselves and reveal their true identities. It is a very intimate account of her time in Iran, written with such rich insights into literature and the nature of totalitarian regimes. I hope that Nafisi's book will inspire a greater dialog in Iran, and further open the door to democracy.
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