Book 48: Reading Lolita in Tehran, by Azar Nafisi

This is one of those books that I'd been meaning to read for a long time, and am happy that I finally got around to it. I'm a little surprised that it's somewhat controversial around the book blogosphere, as I found it to be a fairly straightforward account from one woman about what various works of classic literature meant to her as she was struggling with the fundamentalist regime in Iran. Yes, she absolutely inserts her own politics into the mix, and the book would have been less impacting if she hadn't done so. Nafisi was a professor in Iran at the time of the overthrow of the Shah and the subsequent societal change that came about as the result of the Ayatollah Khomeni's policy making. When it became too dangerous to read such books as Nabokov's Lolita or Henry James's Daisy Miller in her classes, she eventually found herself without a job. Since her dedication to teaching was impressive, she formed a secret book discussion group that met at her home - one that was comprised completely of young women whom she had hand picked from her classes. Seeing the books through their eyes (and the eyes of the students who Nafisi taught in school) made me want to peruse them again with that bit of added value and perception. A year ago or more, the book was optioned for a movie, and I'll be interested to see how it translates since I would think it would be quite difficult to display that love for literature on the big screen.