Ethics

This paper closely examines the book Reading Lolita in Teheran a memoir in books and seeks to answer such radical questions as the relevance of a piece or literature in a totalitarian regime, a readers conclusive generalization of the motives of the developed nations and the world at large and the benefit media folks can derive out of a text such as Reading Lolita in Teheran.

Reading Lolita in Teheran...books is memoir penned by Azar Nafisi and is a vivid description of the eighteen years, from 1979-1997, when this once forward Persian nation was on the way to becoming a dumping ground of its various leaders still varying ideologies about Islam. The books main attraction is that the author not only reveals the aspects of the Iranian society shrouded from the outside world, but also draws a parallel between the current state of affairs with the plots in western and American Classics and aspires readers to look them in a wider perspective.

Following are the answers to three of the most radical aspects of the book

1.The world of the novel is one of empty rituals.... It is only through the empty rituals that brutality becomes possible (Azar, p. 22).

Nafisi seems to mean that truth is stranger and much worse than fiction. If so, why read any novels, especially in a totalitarian society like Iran.

Well, in a totalitarian regime where all expression of freedom and imagination is barred, the open spaces the novels provided (Nafisi, 20) helps one to survive the closed confines of the regime. Novels are one of the major sources of their peoples communication with their peers around the world and through them, and oppressed Iranian ultimately sees the absurd sham of his persecutors and who must retreat into himself in order to survive....it is through analyzing the characters in a great novel and drawing parallels between the settings and surroundings can one learn to poke fun at his own misery in order to survive...recognized poshlust-not just in others, but in oneself.(Nafisi, 23)

Though the novel may seem to portray the tragic facet of life there is an affirmation of life against the transience of that life, an essential defiance. an act of insubordination against the betrayals, horrors and infidelities of life.(Nafisi, 45)

It is only through these novels can one really survive the brutalities of a totalitarian regime or more positively, take steps to reform it.

2. Islam has become a business... like oil for Texaco... You dont think theyd ever admit that we could live better without oil, do you (Nafisi, p. 275 ).What does this tell us about the United States, or the world in general Is Nafisis insight into politics a form of fiction, fact, both, or neither

These lines are here used within the context of the appointment of Hojatol-Islam Ali Khamenei as the successor of Ayatollahs regime at the start of 1990 and the people were amazed to see how From a tepid liberal he turned overnight into an irredeemable hard-liner.... (Nafisi, 274)

What he proclaimed and preached was not surely his religious beliefs but a gamut to acquire political support, power. This is where the analogy with the selling of oil by American oil company Texaco stands justified. Just as in there and around the world, capitalists will go to any extent to sell the same products by packaging and repackaging to give it a different form and make it affordable by only a fraction to attract the attention of the consumers and increase the demand.

Similarly the political ideologies of all the Iranian leaders are same. They only claim to make them less strict in order to win mass support.

There also  Their own interests precede everything (Nafisi, 276) and No matter how liberal they claim to be, they never give up the Islamic faade (Nafisi, 276)

Another interesting parallel is that just as selling oil or any commodity is a mode of making money and wielding power for any industrialized nation, so is Islam a means to attain political authority in Iran. And as one cant do without the basic needs of life, so one cant do without religion.

As per the authors political views, they corner mostly on the fictitious side because the ideologies she seems to propagate are all quixotic in this real world.

Though her belief that all individuals, no matter how contemptible, have a right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, is founded on solid grounds but the separation between the personal and public facades of life and the need to read and appreciate the cacophony of voices to understand its democratic imperative (Nafisi, 250) are not practical in todays world where coalitions and corporate lobbies rule the roost.

.
3. What can a reporter or journalist learn from Nafisis book What is the point of reading Lolita in Tehran, or Gatsby and James in California

A reporters or a journalists main aim is to report the true events without any fabrication. In the context of Iran, often this perquisite stands disputed because what appears on the exterior is superficial and gives a picture that is largely distorted. In a totalitarian regime, it is obvious that the rights of the press arent fully realized and in such a scenario, the onus lies on the journalists and the reporters to look for ways to report the true story of an event using non-conventional modes, taking full advantage of current electronic and internet revolution.

The author derived some serious parallels between the social and political state of her nation and the physical and mental state of the protagonist in the Novel Lolita. It gave her a better understanding of the miseries and forces surrounding her as well as her country and inspired her to inculcate the spirit of insubordination (Nafisi, 43) to survive the atrocities of the time in the better way.

Similarly, The Great Gatsby and James, though written in American context, have relevance to societies all over the world as they teach  you to value your dreams but to be wary of them also, to look for integrity in unusual Places. (Nafisi, 135)

 Gatsby recounts the dire consequences of the pursuance of a wrong dream or wrong interpretation of a collective dream, in this context, The American Dream.
James was outspoken on the matters of war and valued humanity above everything else and this is what the American civilization need to keep in mind as it goes about razing other civilization to ground.

The author gives a brilliant insight into the life of people under the Iranian Republic in the said period in her book and this paper has been a modest attempt at analysing few of the many radical points put forward in the book.