Starting a new conversation about Iran

Amid the overwhelmingly negative media coverage of Iran in the west, a chorus of new literary voices has emerged that portray a far more complex image of that nation and its culture. Persis Karim, editor of the anthology Let Me Tell You Where I've Been: New Writing by Women of the Iranian Diaspora (University of Arkansas Press, 2006), suggests that literature can contribute something important, even essential, that has been absent from the conversation about Iran. Karim is an associate professor of literature and creative writing at San Jose State University. IPS: Tell me how the idea for this book came to you and why you think it's important. PK: This book is the outgrowth of a long-standing interest I have in the ways that immigrants and diasporic subjects come to grips with their identity and make claims about that identity through a fluid and creative process called "art." As a child growing up in the US, I was often asked "where was I from?" because I had a foreign-sounding name and looked different from many of my peers. My father was an immigrant from Iran (post-World War II) and my mother was an immigrant from France. I was often at a loss for what to call myself. I looked for people like me in books, in films, you know, people of multiple heritage, and there just weren't very many. I always gravitated towards literature and writing. And I was drawn strongly to Iranian culture, so, while working on a dissertation about exile writing, I felt a strange need to ask the question, where were the Iranian writers writing in English? Why haven't there been any notable writers dealing with their experiences? Where was the literature of the Iranian diaspora? What had the last 20 years meant for people of Iranian heritage, like me, who weren't really Iranian in the truest sense, but who identified with that place and the culture? From that question, the book A World Between: Poems, Short Stories and Essays by Iranian Americans was born. After that, people, mostly women really, kept sending me their poems and stories. There seemed to be an explosion of writing and a hunger for more writing to represent ourselves. I was fascinated by the power of these women's voices and struck by the urgency of these women to challenge the very simplistic views of Iran and Iranian women that were depicted both in the US media and also coming from the government of Iran. IPS: One section is called "Axis of Evil." How did you get to this topic? PK: [...] When Bush gave his notorious "Axis of Evil" speech in January 2002, I understood that that was the beginning of a new climate of Iranian villanization. It's impossible not to hear that kind of language and feel that it's going to do damage in the world. I felt I had to write a poem with that title. I kept thinking about my family in Iran. I kept thinking about how much I love them and want to be close to them and terms like "Axis of Evil" cause us pain, separate us, separate them from me, separate Iranians from the world, from America. I felt a real sorrow about language like that entering the public discourse. I felt already that Iranians have been ravaged by the politics of both Iran and the US. That's the real evil in the world. The abuse of language and ideas and the Orwellianness of where we are. It's not people who are evil, not countries, but those who hunger for power, who abuse power, who abuse language. My poem, "Axis of Evil," is about the ways all people everywhere–Iran, Iraq, the US–are abused by the evil of governments and lose sight of humanity. This section is also dedicated to those in Iran and the US who resist that abuse. IPS: Iran is at the top of the news these days. How can books like yours offer a more real, more clear picture of Iranian society? PK: I am not sure that they can make a clear picture about Iranian society, per se, but what it can do is open up a dialogue about Iran that has been so absent in the US, or even among Iranians themselves. My interest is in the way that literature, art, discourse can enable us to have a deeper understanding of ourselves, the way we have made mistakes, the way we've changed, our flaws even, and sometimes it's a safer conversation to have about something like a book than it is to do by ourselves. I think some people will object to some of the stories or experiences here, but my goal is to complicate the image that has been presented about Iran in the US, in the media. There's so much racism, so much oversimplification of the Middle East, Iran, Islam, etc. There are many faces and experiences to all these. Literature can offer a humane vision.