Tag-Archive for ◊ Teheran ◊

Author:
• Saturday, December 15th, 2012

Kader Abdolah was born in Arak, Iran in 1954. His real name is Hossein Sadjadi Ghaemmaghami Farahaniand his pen name is a combined pseudonym in memory of his two executed friends from the resistance. He is the author of novels, short stories and non-fiction as well as being a columnist and poet. From an early age Kader Abdolah wanted to become a writer like his forebear, Ghaemmaghami Farahani.

While studying physics at Teheran University, Abdolah joined an underground left wing movement against the dictatorship of the Shah and later against the authoritarian Khomeini regime.

He wrote articles in an illegal journal and while still in Iran, secretly published two books describing what life was like under the Khomeini rule. He escaped in 1985 and three years later was accepted, at the invitation of the United Nations, as a political refugee in Holland.

Kader Abdolah was quick at mastering the language of his host country as much as writing all his work in Flemish. He received many honours and awards: The Golden Donkey Ear prize in 1994, the Edgar du Perron prize in 2000 for My Father’s Notebook which was first published in Dutch in 2000 and then in English in 2006. He received the 2008 decoration de chevalier dans l’ordre des Arts et des Lettres. He was also Knight in the Order of the Netherlands Lion in 2000 and awarded an honorary doctorate at the University of Groningen in 2009. He currently lives in Delft in Holland.

After escaping Iran, Ishmael, the main character and narrator of the novel, like the author himself, becomes a political refugee in the Netherlands. While in exile he receives a parcel containing the notebook that had been written in cuneiform script by his half illiterate deaf-mute father, Aga Akbar, the talented tapestry mender and the illegitimate son of an Iranian nobleman and servant mother. Aga Akbar was acquainted with these scriptures when he was sent by his uncle to copy the three thousand-year-old ancient cuneiform inscriptions chiseled on a cave wall on Saffron Mountain.

These scriptures narrate the story of the first Persian king in history, king Cyrus, who lived 2500 years ago. The author relates historical facts: We are informed that several years later the reign of king Cyrus was followed by the Qajar dynasty which ended in 1921 with a coup d’état staged by Reza Khan. Reza Khan declared himself the new king of Persia and established the Pahlavi Kingdom. He was in turn followed by his son Mohamed Reza Pahlavi in 1941 and then by his prime minister, Mohamed Mosadeq, from 1951 to 1953. Ayatollah Khomeini follows in 1979 and the war with Saddam Hussein’s Iraq is also mentioned.

Ishmael decides to translate his father’s undecipherable work of a lifetime into Dutch. He feels it is his duty to do this as a painful, nostalgic, fond commemoration to his deceased father and his lost motherland. Throughout the novel, Ishmael recounts a double biography: his father’s life story combined with his own. He also writes about the political and social situation in Iran.

Aga Akbar was about nine years old when his mother died. His uncle, Kazem Khan, who looked after him, realised that his nephew couldn’t read or write. He decided to encourage him by giving him a notebook and asked him to “scribble something”, at least “one page every day. Or maybe just a couple of sentences”, which he did.

My Father’s Notebook blends facts, autobiography and fiction. The novel is about the intertwined past and present of Persian culture going back thousands of years. There are the myths, poetry, geography, religion and unique rich traditions on one side and the depiction of the twentieth century life in Iran on the other. It is also about the unconditional tender love between a son and his disabled father, despite their differences.

The author’s constant navigation between the enchanting past tarnished by Iran’s present bitter reality and his new life in exile in the Netherlands, brings two parallel worlds into focus and in complete opposition due to their entirely different cultures and history – conservative Muslim Iran on the one side and secular Holland on the other.

The novel ends on a sad note tinted with a ray of hope. Golden Bell disappears and her father, Aga Akbar, who accompany her in escape is found dead by a shepherd on a cold snowy mountain. Nevertheless, Golden Bell might still be asleep in the Saffron Mountain waiting to be woken at the right time to witness a new world of justice and freedom in her country. Just like the people mentioned in The Holy Koran in the Surat “The Cave” to which the author refers to in the novel’s prologue and epilogue.

An emotionally poignant story which gives an insight into the humanitarian problems relating to political refugees and their sufferings after being uprooted from their beloved homeland by repressive regimes.

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Author:
• Friday, March 27th, 2009

Anita Amirrezvani was born in Teheran, Iran in 1961 and raised in San Francisco by her mother, after her parents separated when she was two years old. She began going back to Teheran at the age of 13, several times afterwards, to spend time with her father and her Iranian family. During the nine years spent writing her first novel, The Blood of Flowers, she visited Isfahan three times to study the settings described in her novel on location.

She read many books about 17th century Iran under the reign of Shah Abbas and also spent time informing herself about art during this period; like paintings, architecture, textiles and the art and techniques of carpet making.

Amirrezvani worked as an art journalist and a dance critic in San Francisco for ten years.

The Blood of Flowers was published in 2007. It was short-listed for the 2008 Boeke Prize and long-listed for the 2008 Orange Prize for Fiction.

The Blood of Flowers, set in 1620 Isfahan, is a tale of endurance that led to success. Each detail in the novel is meticulously described. The colours are vivid, the flavours are mouth-watering and the fragrances are powerful as much as the emotions.

In order to enhance her fairy tale, the author has chosen an exotic background for her story about the craftsmanship of carpet making, promoted by Shah Abbas the Great, as a fine art. Like Orhan Pamuk’s My Name is Red, it’s a detailed description about how miniature drawing in the late sixteen century Turkey under the reign of Ottoman Sultan Murat III was also a very refined art.

Amirrezvani and Pamuk have both chosen the colour “red” to describe on one side, the colour used by the artists to enhance their work – the blood of flowers – that is used for dying the wool, and on the other side to describe the colour of blood. In Amirrezvani’s case it refers to the precious virginity while in Pamuk’s case it refers to the human incessant bloodshed.

Amirrezvani reveals in her novel that she is clearly influenced by folk tales, an old Iranian tradition. The seven tales woven into the main story, is a homage to the traditional folk storytellers throughout the ages. Another tribute in the novel is given to the anonymous carpet artisans, who will always remain unknown and whose beautiful work has survived many centuries and who are portrayed by the unnamed narrator.

The story is about a painful striving of an innocent immature, ambitious, strong-headed young girl through her journey to the harsh world of adulthood and through her many attempts and her final victory. She is faced with a dilemma; either to forsake her dignity and lead a degrading life of servitude, under her weak-willed uncle’s and his wicked authoritarian wife’s roof, or take the big risk of fighting for a better independent tomorrow, for herself and her mother.

The narrator discovers that a very thin thread exists between the strong will, love and happiness. She is portrayed as an early determined, strong-headed feminist, quite precocious for her time, despite the male dominated society she lives in.

With time and experience the narrator begins to understand her own worth and refuses to live with her “temporary husband” Fereydoon. It’s an unsettled life where she has to keep his interest by being constantly inventive during their night frolics in order for him to keep renewing their marriage contract – called the “Sigheh” – every three months. The explicit sex passages described in detail by the author are unnecessary to the plot.

Instead of being like the submissive Sheherazad in the tale of One Thousand and One Nights and her endeavour to keep the king’s keen interest in her tales in order to escape her death sentence, the narrator chooses instead to face poverty and starvation, in the hope of reaching her target by becoming one of the finest carpet makers of her time.

The description of the beautiful, painstakingly crafted carpets produced by the narrator and her women artisans, contrasts with their own abject poverty and suffering.

A good and rich insight of the old Iranian history and culture. Skillfully written with many themes that are still valid in today’s world.