Abadan, The Rise and Demise of an Oil Metropolis

The image of Abadan as a vanguard city of oil-driven modernity was transformed by its role in the 1979 revolution and then shattered by the war that followed […] More

French-Iranian Writer's Debut Novel

Like Scheherazade, Djavadi’s protagonist is a storyteller, but unlike her, she doesn’t use storytelling as a device to please or feel loved […] More

Jafar Panahi's New Film: Three Faces

Three Faces continues a preoccupation in Panahi’s work with the restrictions placed on women in Iranian society. […] More

Iranian-Dutch Artist Atousa Bandeh

How could anyone experience war, or desert one’s country without taking refuge in the intimate? […] More

"Until we leave this plain of sin and pride..." Attar's Conference of the Birds

Attar’s long poem is the emphasis on two major themes of Sufism: the necessity to purify one’s self from all desires, to reach a level of passionate love that is […] More

Persian Language in the Court of Ottomans

The patronage of the Ottoman Kings attracted a lot of Persian literary figures to Anatolia. Sultan Salim ordered the composition of a new Turkish literary form based on Persian blueprint. […] More

Molla, Laughter, and the Constitution

Managing to speak to the intelligentsia and the masses, Molla Nasreddin was an instant success and would become the most influential and perhaps first publication of its kind to […] More