Her Story: Reading Lolita in Tehran by Azar Nafisi

Book Discussion Group

This group explores stories of strong women, such as this memoir by a teacher in Iran who secretly read Western classics with her female students. Questions? E-mail dellerbrook@tscpl.org

Her Story: Exploring the Lives of Strong Women
Women have always shown strength in shaping their lives and the world around them. In this book discussion group we read and talk about fiction and nonfiction that highlights the courage, resilience and experiences of women past and present.

This month's selection is Reading Lolita in Tehran by Azar Nafisi. Every Thursday morning for two years in the Islamic Republic of Iran, Azar Nafisi, a bold and inspired teacher, secretly gathered seven of her most committed female students to read forbidden Western classics. Some came from conservative and religious families, others were progressive and secular; some had spent time in jail. They were shy and uncomfortable at first, unaccustomed to being asked to speak their minds, but soon they removed their veils and began to speak more freely–their stories intertwining with the novels they were reading by Jane Austen, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Henry James, and Vladimir Nabokov. As Islamic morality squads staged arbitrary raids in Tehran, as fundamentalists seized hold of the universities and a blind censor stifled artistic expression, the women in Nafisi’s living room spoke not only of the books they were reading but also about themselves, their dreams and disappointments.

Email dellerbrook@tscpl.org if you need help getting a copy of the book or have any other questions.

Upcoming Events