Zusatztext 40592560 Informationen zum Autor AZAR NAFISI is a visiting professor and the director of the Dialogue Project at the Foreign Policy Institute of Johns Hopkins University. She has taught Western literature at the University of Tehran, the Free Islamic University, and the University of Allameh Tabatabai in Iran. In 1981 she was expelled from the University of Tehran after refusing to wear the veil. In 1994 she won a teaching fellowship from Oxford University, and in 1997 she and her family left Iran for America. She has written for The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, and The New Republic and has appeared on countless radio and television programs. She lives in Washington, D.C., with her husband and two children. Klappentext Every Thursday morning for two years in the Islamic Republic of Iran, Azar Nafisi, a bold and inspired teacher, secretly gathered seven of her most committed female students to read forbidden Western classics. Some came from conservative and religious families, others were progressive and secular; some had spent time in jail. They were shy and uncomfortable at first, unaccustomed to being asked to speak their minds, but soon they removed their veils and began to speak more freely-their stories intertwining with the novels they were reading by Jane Austen, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Henry James, and Vladimir Nabokov. As Islamic morality squads staged arbitrary raids in Tehran, as fundamentalists seized hold of the universities and a blind censor stifled artistic expression, the women in Nafisi's living room spoke not only of the books they were reading but also about themselves, their dreams and disappointments. Azar Nafisi's luminous masterwork gives us a rare glimpse, from the inside, of women's lives in revolutionary Iran. Reading Lolita in Tehran is a work of great passion and poetic beauty, a remarkable exploration of resilience in the face of tyranny, and a celebration of the liberating power of literature. Leseprobe Chapter 1 In the fall of 1995, after resigning from my last academic post, I decided to indulge myself and fulfill a dream. I chose seven of my best and most committed students and invited them to come to my home every Thursday morning to discuss literature. They were all women-to teach a mixed class in the privacy of my home was too risky, even if we were discussing harmless works of fiction. One persistent male student, although barred from our class, insisted on his rights. So he, Nima, read the assigned material, and on special days he would come to my house to talk about the books we were reading. I often teasingly reminded my students of Muriel Spark's The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie and asked, Which one of you will finally betray me? For I am a pessimist by nature and I was sure at least one would turn against me. Nassrin once responded mischievously, You yourself told us that in the final analysis we are our own betrayers, playing Judas to our own Christ. Manna pointed out that I was no Miss Brodie, and they, well, they were what they were. She reminded me of a warning I was fond of repeating: do not, under any circumstances, belittle a work of fiction by trying to turn it into a carbon copy of real life; what we search for in fiction is not so much reality but the epiphany of truth. Yet I suppose that if I were to go against my own recommendation and choose a work of fiction that would most resonate with our lives in the Islamic Republic of Iran, it would not be The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie or even 1984 but perhaps Nabokov's Invitation to a Beheading or better yet, Lolita. A couple of years after we had begun our Thursday-morning seminars, on the last night I was in Tehran, a few friends and students came to say good-bye and to help me pack. When we had deprived the house of all its items, when the objects had vanished and the colors had faded int...

8220;Resonant and deeply affecting . . . an eloquent brief on the transformative

powers of fiction–on 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 KAKUTANI, *The New York Times

*“[A] vividly braided memoir . . . Anguished and glorious.”
–CYNTHIA OZICK, *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* is such a book.” –MONA SIMPSON, *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] passion is irresistible.”
–*LA Weekly

*“Azar Nafisi’s memoir makes a good case for reading the classics 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

*“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)

“Nafisi’s passion for books is infectious, and her description of the
effect of the revolution on its people is unforgettable.”
*–Rocky Mountain News

*“[A] sparkling memoir . . . a spirited tribute both to the classics of
world literature and to resistance against oppression.”
–Kirkus Reviews (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

*“Readers will have a new appreciation for the worn Nabokov and James
titles on their bookshelves after reading Nafisi’s engaging memoir.”
–Minneapolis *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* is much more than a literary memoir; it becomes a tool for
teaching us how to construe literature in a new, more meaningful
way.” *–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 …