Satire, irony and humour have long been features of Persian literature's rich tradition, taking various forms from the coarse and obscene to the subtle and refined. Humour in Iran is a close and comprehensive study of satire and humour in verse as well as prose over the eleven-hundred years since the emergence of classical Persian literature. Combining Persian original texts with their English translations, it covers a range of texts and authors, from the lampoon in Ferdowsi's great epic of the ancient kings in the tenth century, through such master satirists as Obeyd Zakani, Sa'di, Rumi, Khayyam, Hafiz, Anvari, Sana'i, Khaqani, Suzani, Qa'ani, Yaghma, and so on. The book also includes twentieth century authors such as Iraj, Dehkhoda, Bahar, Eshqi, Aref, Hedayat, Jamalzadeh, Al-e Ahmad and more. A must read for scholars and students of humour and satire as well as Persian literature and Middle Eastern studies, and it will also appeal to general readers interested in ribald humour and satire.
Satire, irony and humour have long been features of Persian literature's rich tradition, taking various forms from the coarse and obscene to the subtle and refined. Humour in Iran is a close and comprehensive study of satire and humour in verse as well as prose over the eleven-hundred years since the emergence of classical Persian literature. Combining Persian original texts with their English translations, it covers a range of texts and authors, from the lampoon in Ferdowsi's great epic of the ancient kings in the tenth century, through such master satirists as Obeyd Zakani, Sa'di, Rumi, Khayyam, Hafiz, Anvari, Sana'i, Khaqani, Suzani, Qa'ani, Yaghma, and so on. The book also includes twentieth century authors such as Iraj, Dehkhoda, Bahar, Eshqi, Aref, Hedayat, Jamalzadeh, Al-e Ahmad and more. A must read for scholars and students of humour and satire as well as Persian literature and Middle Eastern studies, and it will also appeal to general readers interested in ribald humour and satire.
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • Finalist for the PEN/USA Award in Creative Nonfiction, the Thurber Prize for American Humor, and the Audie Award in Biography/Memoir This Random House Reader’s Circle edition includes a reading group guide and a conversation between Firoozeh Dumas and Khaled Hosseini, author of The Kite Runner! “Remarkable . . . told with wry humor shorn of sentimentality . . . In the end, what sticks with the reader is an exuberant immigrant embrace of America.”—San Francisco Chronicle In 1972, when she was seven, Firoozeh Dumas and her family moved from Iran to Southern California, arriving with no firsthand knowledge of this country beyond her father’s glowing memories of his graduate school years here. More family soon followed, and the clan has been here ever since. Funny in Farsi chronicles the American journey of Dumas’s wonderfully engaging family: her engineer father, a sweetly quixotic dreamer who first sought riches on Bowling for Dollars and in Las Vegas, and later lost his job during the Iranian revolution; her elegant mother, who never fully mastered English (nor cared to); her uncle, who combated the effects of American fast food with an army of miraculous American weight-loss gadgets; and Firoozeh herself, who as a girl changed her name to Julie, and who encountered a second wave of culture shock when she met and married a Frenchman, becoming part of a one-couple melting pot. In a series of deftly drawn scenes, we watch the family grapple with American English (hot dogs and hush puppies?—a complete mystery), American traditions (Thanksgiving turkey?—an even greater mystery, since it tastes like nothing), and American culture (Firoozeh’s parents laugh uproariously at Bob Hope on television, although they don’t get the jokes even when she translates them into Farsi). Above all, this is an unforgettable story of identity, discovery, and the power of family love. It is a book that will leave us all laughing—without an accent. Praise for Funny in Farsi “Heartfelt and hilarious—in any language.”—Glamour “A joyful success.”—Newsday “What’s charming beyond the humor of this memoir is that it remains affectionate even in the weakest, most tenuous moments for the culture. It’s the brilliance of true sophistication at work.”—Los Angeles Times Book Review “Often hilarious, always interesting . . . Like the movie My Big Fat Greek Wedding, this book describes with humor the intersection and overlapping of two cultures.”—The Providence Journal “A humorous and introspective chronicle of a life filled with love—of family, country, and heritage.”—Jimmy Carter “Delightfully refreshing.”—Milwaukee Journal Sentinel “[Funny in Farsi] brings us closer to discovering what it means to be an American.”—San Jose Mercury News
This volume surveys political satire as a journalistic genre in Iran since the latter days of the Qajar dynasty to the present, thus spanning one century and more. It is an important resource, but it also provides an analysis. Moreover, this volume is a rare effort to answer a question that looks simple but is very complicated: “Why would someone produce satire, knowing that this act might be followed by dangerous consequences?”, and to find out what motivates political satirists. For this aim, nine prominent political satirists have been interviewed: writers and cartoonists, men and women, those who live abroad and those who still live in Iran. The author analyses this data in relation to, among other things, the main theories of humor to provide a descriptive report for each satirist’s motivations as well as the strength of each motivational element in a general comparative context.
Hadi Khorsandi is Iran's best-known comic writer. His humorous essays and flawless parodies of officialdom skewer the mullahs governing Iran today, just as he skewered the Shah's people before the 1979 revolution. He now lives in exile in England. This is the only book where English-language readers can enjoy the wit that Iranian readers have appreciated for years. This collection of Khorsandi's writing highlights a genial and inventive spirit that will be instantly attractive to readers everywhere. Happily, his children carry on the family tradition in Britain: his son in journalism and his daughter as a top-ranking comedienne on TV, radio and in standup, mixing irreverent laughter with a sharp political edge.
This thought-provoking collection offers a multi-disciplinary approach on the subject of humour, Muslims, and Islam. Beginning with theoretical perspectives and scriptural guidance on permissible and restricted humour, the volume presents a variety of case studies about Muslim comedic practices in various cultural, political, and religious contexts. This unprecedented scholarship sheds new light on common misconceptions about humour and laughter in Islam and deftly tackles sensitive themes from blasphemy to freedom of speech. Chapter 9 is available Open Access via OAPEN under CC-BY-NC-ND licence.
The most beloved Iranian novel of the twentieth century “God forbid, I’ve fallen in love with Layli!” So begins the farce of our narrator’s life, one spent in a large extended Iranian family lorded over by the blustering, paranoid patriarch, Dear Uncle Napoleon. When Uncle Napoleon’s least-favorite nephew falls for his daughter, Layli, family fortunes are reversed, feuds fired up and resolved, and assignations attempted and thwarted. First published in Iran in the 1970s and adapted into a hugely successful television series, this beloved novel is now “Suggested Reading” in Azar Nafisi’s Reading Lolita in Tehran. My Uncle Napoleon is a timeless and universal satire of first love and family intrigue.
During the uprisings of the Arab Spring, oppositional movements used political humor to criticize political leaders or to expose the absurdities of sociopolitical conditions. This comprehensive study of political humor in the uprisings explores the varieties and functions of humor as a creative tool for resistance.
