Author: Azar Nafisi
Publisher: Harper/Fourth Estate
Year: 2004
Language: English
Pages: 347
ISBN/UPC (if available): 9780007178483
Description
In Iran in the late 90s, Azar Nafisi gathered seven young women- her former students – who gathered at her house every Thursday to discuss forbidden works of Western literature. Shy and uncomfortable at first, they soon began to open up, not only about the novels they were reading but also about their own dreams and disappointments.
Their personal stories intertwine with those they are reading - Pride and Prejudice, Washington Square, Daisy Miller and Lolita - their Lolita, as they imagined her in Tehran. Azar Nafisi also tells her own story, back to the early days of the revolution when she first started teaching at the University of Tehran, amid a swirl of protests and demonstrations.
REVIEW
‘Anyone who has ever belonged to a book group must read this book.’
- Geraldine Brooks
‘A book lover’s tale, a literary life raft on Iran’s fundamentalist sea…Engrossing, fascinating, stunning…All readers should read it.’
- Margaret Atwood
‘I was enthralled and moved by Azar Nafisi’s account of the pleasures and deepening of consciousness that result from an encounter with great literature.’
- Susan Sontag
Contents
Author’s Note
Lolita
Gatsby
James
Austen
Epilogue
Acknowledgements