Inspirational: Azar Nafisi

Our local community radio station, WJFF, broadcasted an interview today with Azar Nafisi, author of Reading Lolita in Tehran and most recently Things I’ve Been Silent About.

What an incredibly literate, stimulating, thought provoking speaker she is, and to think she's chosen US citizenship. She brought acute, sensitive attention to parental relationships, loss and memory with a simple sentence or two that made it difficult to drive from home to town as I was so riveted by her words and emotion. Some of her insights made me more than think, several might compel me to act in ways I might not otherwise.

A big loss to Iran, and an huge asset to the States.

Books: Things I've Been Silent About

Azar Nafisi of Reading Lolita in Tehran has written a second memoir, Things I've Been Silent About, reviewed in this week's New York Times Book Review section.

I haven't read her first book, but this second one appeals to me for several reasons, and the reviewer's comments touched on issues I've been examining in literature and non-fiction and in my own writing. She states in the review, "she relies on memory, a powerful tool that can distort as well as enlighten."

And Nafisi statement that the memoir is “a response to my own inner censor and inquisitor."

The censor has often plagued me in writing and in speech.

It is the very issue of memory and distortion that rides the see-saw of reality.