Azar Nafisi: Iranians Want the Same Things as People Around the World

In Dey (December-January) this year, widespread unrest erupted in Iran, initially protesting dire economic conditions before quickly turning political and spreading to hundreds of cities large and small. When the government concluded it might lose control, it suppressed the movement with what it described as an unprecedented killing in contemporary Iranian history.

BBC Russian interviewed Azar Nafisi, the Iranian author of 'Reading Lolita in Tehran.' Nafisi is the daughter of Ahmad Nafisi, a former Tehran mayor in the 1960s, and Nazhat Nafisi, one of the first female representatives in the National Consultative Assembly during the Pahlavi era. Born on December 21, 1955, in Iran, she studied English literature in Britain and the United States, earning a PhD from the University of Oklahoma. She returned to Iran in the 1970s and participated in political activities against Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi.

Nafisi taught English literature at the University of Tehran until 1981, when she was expelled for refusing to comply with mandatory hijab. She then secretly taught English and American literature to a small group of female students, which later inspired her bestselling book. She resumed teaching in 1987 at Islamic Azad University and Allameh Tabataba'i University before leaving Iran in the 1990s. She now lives and works in the United States. Recently, Nafisi signed a letter with other activist women supporting a request from 14 female activists in Iran calling for a peaceful transition from the Islamic Republic and the resignation of Ali Khamenei.

Asked why Iranian women show no fear in protests—from the death of Mahsa Amini to women lighting cigarettes with Khamenei's portrait or an elderly bloodied woman shouting, 'I'm not afraid of anything; I've been dead for 45 years!'—Nafisi responded: 'These events are not necessarily political but fundamental. As a woman, professor, and writer in Iran, I lost the right to "be." The Islamic Republic took this right from me. The first thing totalitarian regimes do is lie. They completely invert reality... People go to the streets knowing they might be killed, saying, "Yes, I might die, but I will remain true to my real self."'

Nafisi said she still has close relatives and friends in Iran, sharing hardships like sheltering during Iran-Iraq War bombings. She recently spoke with a friend who expressed despair, anger at the endless nightmare, but also hope from the broad participation—men, women, retirees—and solidarity, such as a man wearing hijab in protests. She noted the movement transcends politics, drawing widespread support.