Persian Literature, Mage Publishers-Books

Savushun

Savushun chronicles the life of a Persian family during the Allied occupation of Iran during World War II. It is set in Shiraz, a town which evokes images of Persepolis and pre-Islamic monuments, the great poets, the shrines, Sufis, and nomadic tribes within a historical web of the interests, privilege and influence of foreign powers; corruption, incompetence and arrogance of persons in authority; the paternalistic landowner-peasant relationship; tribalism; and the fear of famine. The story is seen through the eyes of Zari, a young wife and mother, who copes with her idealistic and uncompromising husband while struggling with her desire for traditional family life and her need for individual identity.

Daneshvar's style is both sensitive and imaginative, while following cultural themes and metaphors. Within basic Iranian paradigms, the characters play out the roles inherent in their personalities. While Savushun is a unique piece of literature that transcends the boundaries of the historical community in which it was written, it is also the best single work for understanding modern Iran. Although written prior to the Islamic Revolution, it brilliantly portrays the social and historical forces that gave pre-revolutionary Iran its characteristic hopelessness and emerging desperation so inadequately understood by outsiders. [more>>]
Sutra & Other Stories

Here are six stories by one of Iran's greatest contemporary writers, rare and intimate glimpses into the lives of ordinary Iranian men and women; windows into the Persian soul. From the delicately painted tragedy of Mehrangiz in A City Like Paradise to the wry comedy of Anis, from two sisters' surreal nocturne in Childbirth to a village boy's broken dreams in Potshards, from a young woman torn between duty and passion in Bibi Shahrbanu to the brilliant and numinous Sutra, each story is told with the detail, clarity of vision, and deeply human compassion characteristic of Daneshvar's finest work.
Daneshvar's Iran is a landscape in which the medieval and the modern coexist uneasily. Against this backdrop, the author explores the persistent themes of her nearly five decades as a writer: themes of sexual and racial identity, the social relations of wealth and poverty, the workings of memory and dreams. The lives of her characters-here, some of her most subtly realized-are determined by conditions and norms over which they have little or no control; still, in the end, Sutra offers a vision of hope.[more>>]
Daneshvar's Playhouse: A Collection of Stories

These stories not only portray, with incomparable perception, humor, and compassion, women from the various strata of Iranian society, but they also capture the essence of a rich traditional culture undergoing change. A nanny lets go of a little girl's hand in Shiraz's exotic and crowded Vakil Bazaar, and goes off to flirt with the nutseller--the child is lost. In The Accident, the author portrays, in hilarious parody, a young woman who forsakes husband, children, and home just to own a car. The Playhouse is a traditional Persian theater where the play and the players act on many levels both real and fantastic. The Traitor's Intrigue lets you into the life of a middle-class couple and brilliantly shows how a colonel's allegiance passed from Shah to Khomeini. To Whom Can I Say Hello? tells of an old woman's memories, her life, love, tragic outcome, and eventual hope. Loss of Jalal is a moving chronicle of the final days of Jalal Al-e Ahmad, one of Iran's great writers and the author's husband. Simin Daneshvar draws from over a thousand years of Persian storytelling tradition and combines this with modern techniques of short fiction and cinema. The result is both entertaining and a key of uncompromising honesty, rich detail, and a dazzling range of voices that guides the reader into the center of a complex society and its concerns.[more>>]