Some words by the autor about his
Novels


Two Tales (Do Daastan)
1987, Parsi Publisher, Tehran


1- The Eastern Sunset (Ghoroub-e Sharghi )

2- THE JACK OF HEARTS (Sarbaz-e Del )




Why were our parents more modern than us?

This question motivated me to write Two Tales in the years folliwng the
Iranian revolution.

The events take place between the closing decades of the nineteenth
century and the end of World War II.

Why choose this period?

This was a time of great conflict between tradition and modernity that
during the Cold War seemed to turn into a challenge to eastern cultural
values. Religious and intellectual factions expressed their political
views in slogans such as "Return to Our Roots”. Anti-imperialist and
anti-Marxian attitudes soon grew dominant, culminating in the
revolution of 1979.


To deal with the origins of the upheaval, I focused on the first half
of the twentieth century. I read over a hundred books, old newspapers,
historical tomes, political memoirs, as well as many travel accounts by
foreign visitors.

Origins


Yet, I wouldn’t say the two tales are merely history, Let me explain
what my readings taught me.

Two revolutions marked 20th century Iran. The first, in 1906,
established constitutional monarchy in place of a dictatorship, with
Iran the first Middle Eastern country to embrace the social and
political liberties of the new era. The second revolution, in 1979, did
away with the constitutional monarchy in favour of an Islamic Republic.
The second revolution seemed to compensate for some failures of the
constitutional revolution between the two world wars and the negative
impact of the Cold War on the internal politics of Iran. But, as a
result, the new situation produced a theocratic constitution which
deprived Iran of the achievements of its earlier
constitutional revolution. Iran regressed, leaving the nation under
yoke of an ideological regime.




Stories

Hessam and Iraj, the protagonists of these two stories, belong to the
social class that drove the 1906 constitutional revolution in Iran.
They were intellectuals who dreamt of a modernist revival of the rich
and ancient cultural life of their country and its great civilization.
They sought progress along the path to modernity similar to the one
Europe had chosen after the Renaissance and the industrial revolution.
With this ambitious goal the constitutional revolution overcame
opposition groups and religious fundamentalists.

When I began to write these stories I could see that the
fundamentalists had risen from their own ashes. Nevertheless, I left
the ending of the stories open because it seemed to me that the effort
by Iranian society to achieve liberty had not disappeared.






The Empty Chair
1994, Nokteh Publisher, Tehran


1- The Empty Chair ( Sandali e Khali)

2- The Opera Singer (Khanandeye Opera)






These two stories continued the debate between tradition and modernity,
with similar characters but in the present time.

Nasrin and Parviz, the main characters in The Empty Chair and The Opera
Singer, are in a way descendants of Hessam and Iraj of theTwo Tales.

They grow up middle-class in the second half of the century, when the
old debate between tradition and modernity has gradually turned to a
struggle between eastern cultural values and the west.




Stories

The Empty Chair


Nassrin in The Empty Chair, lives in Paris. She isdivorcedfrom her
French husband whom she married before 1979, when she was student at
the Sorbonne. Nassrin has a school-age son and lives in an unstable
relationship with a Czech artist.

The Islamic revolution has created a wave of immigration among Iranians
from various social classes. Nassrin witnesses the struggle of the
expatriate Iranian artists and intellectuals in search of their
identity.


The Opera Singer


An Iranian opera singer? Yes, there was one!

This is another story about the crisis within a regime that tends to
impose a collective identity on society.

Parviz is a highly talented opera singer. In his career, he often
performed in the Tehran opera House.

After the Islamic revolution, it was hard to believe someone like
Parviz ever existed.Unfortunately, opera has been banned. Parviz is now
without a job. His powerful voice gets him an invitation to participate
in a musical celebration of the battle against “decadent western
culture”.

Unconvinced that western culture is the enemy; Parviz decides to leave
the country.


This story with different characters but themes similar to the ones in
Two Tales and Empty Chair completes a sort of novel: a quartet in four
movements.



The White Summer
1999, Siyamack Book, Tehran




Scheherazade
2002, Afra- Pegah Publisher, Toronto

David Levy, a cinema historian helped with the translation.