Synopsis:
Every Thursday morning for two years in the Islamic Republic of Iran, a bold and inspired teacher named Azar Nafisi secretly gathered seven of her most committed female students to read forbidden Western classics. As Islamic morality squads staged arbitrary raids in Tehran, fundamentalists seized hold of the universities, and a blind censor stifled artistic expression, the girls in Azar Nafisi’s living room risked removing their veils and immersed themselves in the worlds of Jane Austen, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Henry James, and Vladimir Nabokov. In this extraordinary memoir, their stories become intertwined with the ones they are reading. Reading Lolita in Tehran is a remarkable exploration of resilience in the face of tyranny and a celebration of the liberating power of literature.
Review:
So when I originally picked up this book I thought it would be about her classes with these 8 special students of hers. But no, it really was a memoir. She talked about her life during those years she taught at Iran, either in university or in the privacy of her own home.
Her style was very lofty and at times obtuse. She truly is an English professor. Rhetoric abound. She’s very articulate, intelligent, and learned on Western/Europen novels.
She does talk about “her girls,” but they are not the central theme of her story. Her story is about living in the Islam Republic of Iran and how difficult that was for her as a woman, then as an English professor teaching western novels, which were considered decadent and immoral.
She starts off with Nabokov’s “Lolita,” explaining that the muslim woman in Iran has become the oppressed, abused, forlorn Lolita. Then she moves to Gatsby and the American Dream. She talks about life before the revolution, life during the revolution, and then after it. She talks about hope for a new dream for Iran. Then she moves on to Henry James and his novels. She talks about having courage, real courage. That the characters displayed real courage in the most unlikely places. Then she concludes with Austen and Pride and Prejudice. She compares Muslim restraint of love, emotion, and sex and the restraint shown in Austen’s novels. Everything was measured in silences, dialogue, and a struggle between the private and public sphere.
Throughout her discussion of the books she taught to her class she describes what’s going on Iran. The war with Iraq. The militant Islamic conservatism. The public executions. The death of the Ayatollah. And while she does this she talks about her girls and how they struggle to find an identity in Iran as a muslim woman, and then students of English Literature.
They meet every Thursday in the morning and discuss books, but they also start talking about their personal lives. One was married to an abusive husband, her third husband, and she wanted a divorce but was afraid to lose their daughter. Another was strictly religious and loyal to the homeland but had difficulties with progressing in her job because of a past political affiliation. Then there was the one who has a boyfriend and was about to get married if they move to Canada. They were all different and would not normally befriend each other if it hadn’t been for the class.
It’s a memoir really. Sounds like I’m reading her diary. Just blurbs about those times in her life. But she really offers us a bird’s-eye view of what it means to be a Muslim woman. But these are privileged muslim women who are allowed to attend university and study English literature. So these are not your ordinary muslim women.
Dr. Nafisi is European/American educated, a professor, married to a prominent man. She comes from a privileged background of scholars. She’s a scholar who reads and writes all day. She’s always with a book. She also describes her special relationship with another fellow intellectual, she dubs the “Magician.” She meets with him once a week at least to talk about her problems and books. He’s like her therapist.
It was she who decided to leave Iran because she could not live in a society that demeaned women when she grew up in an Iran where women had much more freedom. It was taking its toll on her physically. Insomnia, nausea, dizzy spells. She also endured hardship during the 8 year war with Iraq. Her city was being bombed almost daily. She couldn’t sleep at night and worried about her two children.
She endured a great deal even if she was privileged and as a professor she hopefully enlightened many minds. She talks about democracy in novles. Especially in James, Gatsby, and Austen. SHe talks about how these novels are magnificent in their democratic approach. All the characters have a voice, a say, etc. And she concludes that she wishes to add to the Bill of Rights, “Freedom of imagination.”
I think her books, her fantasies, her thoughts, her teaching of hopeful ideas, imagining a better Iran, helped her survive. Her freedom to imagine another way of existing.
She’s still a professor now at John Hopkin’s university and she added some Iranian authors to her repertoire.
Interesting things to note:
1. Bronte despised Austen. She said “Pride and Prejudice” was mindless frippery and lacked real emotion. I thought that was ironic since Pride and Prejudice and Jane Eyre are my two favorite English novels. LOL.
2. Iran’s origins, it’s true history is not embedded in Islam. That’s a vestige of the Arabs’ conquest. It’s not originally Muslim.
3. Iran is the site of ancient Persia.
4. Disparity: The veiled woman vs. the sensuous Persian belly dancer
5. Beautiful persian poets like Rumi. Oh he’s just heavenly.
6. She’s Iranian but she teaches English literature. Her husband watches the BBC and drinks homemade vodka. Heavily influenced by Britain. She appears Britanized. hehe. Neogolism.
7. She hopes for a better Iran. A democratic one.
8. She tries to keep in touch with the girls she taught Thursdays.
9. This is a story of a privileged woman teaching privileged students in a very oppressive regime. And teaching English literature what they consider Satanic drivel.
10.
Her story is not without deaths and hardship. But no one really close to her. She was very, very lucky. Even one of her girls had to go to jail for some time and developed a poor kidney as a result. But I still think that there were worst stories and conditions during that time that I can’t even fathom. This was a time of martyrdom. Poor young people were going to the front lines during the war to be martyred. When the Ayatollah died they erected a shabbily and hastily made monument in his honor as well as a fountain of red water to signify the blood of the martyrs.
11. It’s also interesting to notice the time from. 1980-1990s.
12. There were three main factions in the university and Iran in general. The marxists/maoists who believed in the proletariat revolution for Iran. Then there were the fundamentalist Jihad muslims. And then there were the dissidents who clung to western ideals and either had to hide it or were executed.
13. After the Soviet Union collapsed so did the marxist group in Iran. All that was left were the religious fundamentalists and the dissidents. Dr. Nafisi hopes that with the power of imagination Iran can form a democracy between these two groups. With open dialogue of course.
It was an interesting read. I learned a lot about Iran during that time. It was very dry. She’s a scholar and writes like one. Very unemotional. Very dry. I give it 3 1/2 out of five stars. 342 pages. You can read it in 1-3 sittings.
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