I have been frightened of 'literature' since I was fifteen. The word conjures up images of poetry recitation and the public humiliation of my 9th-grade self, by the teacher, no less. 'Literature' unearths self-induced fears of incompetence and artistic ignorance. In my experience, the classics of English or American literature tend to be those poems, novels, and short stories whose metaphors I rarely perceive correctly, whose prose lacks the drive of today's more familiar, media-saturated plots & pacing, and whose overall contribution to human culture continues to be a point of debate between specialists. Call something a classic of literature—English, American, Turkish, whatever—and I'm sure to find a way to avoid reading it. Until I 'met' my magician, Azar Nafisi.
Nafisi is an Iranian-born, university professor specializing in Western (& Persian) literature and now Iranian politics. She's most well-known for her "memoir in books," Reading Lolita in Tehran (RandomHouse, 2003), which shares truths and fiction across several years of her life in Iran, before-during-and-after the Revolution. As of 2008, Nafisi became an American citizen and now teaches and writes as a professor at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. I call her my 'magician' relying upon her own sense of the word, with reference to an elusive fellow she first names Professor R, then 'her magician' forever afterward.
'He' was a fine arts/drama professor and writer who resigned his teaching-post in protest of Revolutionary curricular reform. For Nafisi, he was a companion who accompanied and challenged her very best self as teacher, artist, and writer. I have been blessed with several figures in my life who remind me of Professor R and Azar Nafisi, but her magic has been to open my eyes and mind to 'literature' in some of the most remarkable ways.
Apparent in the very title, Reading Lolita in Tehran posits from the start that context matters, even changes the work of literature, for any reading of a so-called 'classic.' Gone is the 'classic' as a reified, objective thing, guarded and legitimated by experts and those allowed within their coteries. Nabokov's Lolita, in this case, has become Nafisi's Lolita, hers and her students' Lolita, the reading(s) of Nabokov's text within a poignant setting of Tehran, Iran, amidst the Revolution and afterwards. Every classic needs its reader to exist anew, off the shelf, as a continuing 'voice' in the project of a vibrant humanity. For the first time, I heard that "literature" could need me and my imagination if it wanted to say what it had to say.
Nafisi's chosen genre of writing—memoir—complements the first observation about context. Organized around works and themes of four different authors or characters—Nabokov, Gatsby, James, and Austen—Reading Lolita in Tehran illustrates on every page the intimate learning possible when literature breathes life into one person's narrative or story. No longer is literature an aloof voice of ages past with its imagery and artistry impossible to decipher correctly. Literature becomes the intimate marriage of an author's and characters' voices-in-situation, experienced by a reader in her communities, and then—if one does the reflective work—given transformative significance hospitable to others beyond the specific author. Nafisi has done the reflective work, and with her tutelage, I began to see symbols, themes, images within her chosen classics come to life in my own narrative. I devoured Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby while reading Nafisi's volume. It made portions of my narrative come to mind, newly sensitized to implications and connections with my own steeped history in an institution of material privilege and relational poverty. I'm learning to listen in 'literature' for legitimate touchstones between author's/characters/situations and my own life.
I suspect many more learnings could be articulated, if time were taken for such things. For now, this page-prose offers a bit of context and intention for future posts arising from the topic-area "literature re-opened." Nafisi's magic was no mean feat, given my long ambivalence and avoidance of anything internally or externally professed as a classic of literature. As she notes herself, though, such magic is never solely the magician's, but signals an avid learner open to being evoked or conjured anew. "Does every magician, every genuine one," she asks, "…evoke the hidden conjurer in us all, bringing out the magical possibilities and potentials we did not know existed?" (p. 337).
I tender my heartfelt thanksgiving here for the voice and vocation of Azar Nafisi, an author whose voice challenges my own, and a teacher who showed it is possible to teach transformative living amidst the delights and discomforts of 'literature.' I also smile with appreciation for the wisdom to receive her teaching and the challenge for my narrative & writing. Perhaps even my 9th-grade self will have new learnings to share in the days, months, and years to come.