Azar Nafisi

I am currently reading Azar Nafisi’s Reading Lolita in Tehran, much interrupted by my Harry Potter fixation, I must add. When a new Harry Potter book comes out, it takes me a long time to turn back to the world of Muggles again, but I digress.

Reading Lolita in Tehran has a segment about putting The Great Gatsby on trial, which I think I am going to ask my students to read. I found it very interesting, the perspective students in an Islamic republic had on such a Western book.

Reading Lolita in Tehran is also the second book I’ve read lately to include some high praise for Nabokov’s novel, Lolita. I also read How to Read Literature Like a Professor by Thomas C. Foster, who mentions the book frequently. I suppose I was nervous about tackling the book, but I’m not sure why. I noticed it on a sale table at Border’s and picked it up.

I was talking about Azar Nafisi, though. At NPR, you can read her thoughts about how literature creates connections between people. If there is one thing I have learned from her memoir, it is that literature transcends experiences and binds us together in so many ways that may not even be apparent until years later. I highly recommend her book to teachers of literature.