Camelia: Save Yourself by Telling the Truth - A Memoir of Iran - Hardcover

Camelia Entekhabifard

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1583227199 ISBN 13: 9781583227190

Publisher: Seven Stories Press, 2007

Synopsis

Camelia Entekhabifard was six years old in 1979 when the shah of Iran was overthrown by revolutionary supporters of the Ayatollah Khomeini. By the age of sixteen, Camelia was a nationally celebrated poet, and at eighteen she was one of the youngest reformist journalists in Tehran. Just eight years later she was imprisoned, held in solitary confinement, and charged with breaching national security and challenging the authority of the Islamic regime. Camelia is both a story of growing up in post-revolutionary Tehran and a haunting reminder of the consequences of speaking the truth in a repressive society.

About this title

About the Author:

CAMELIA ENTEKHABIFARD was born in Tehran in 1973. While in high school and university, she became active as an emerging poet and painter. She then turned to journalism, writing for a number of papers, including the leading reformist daily, Zan [Woman]. In 1999 she was arrested for her journalistic activities and spent three months in prison. Upon her release, she came to the United States as a student and political refugee. Since then, she has reported on Iranian and Afghan affairs for Associated Press, Reuters, Eurasia Net, the Village Voice, and Mother Jones. Currently, she spends much of her time reporting from Afghanistan.

From Publishers Weekly:

Entekhabifard, an Iranian-born journalist now living in the U.S., opens her intriguing memoir on January 16, 1979, the day the Shah fled Tehran. She'd just turned six, so she didn't understand the tumult; she knew her parents preferred the Shah to Khomeini's mullahs, but neither of them discussed leaving Iran. She explains, how, instead, they adjusted. Mother and daughters observed hijab when necessary and, like others, learned not to attract the attention of the revolutionary guards. A poet, Entekhabifard took advantage of the Khatami regime's reformist climate to start work as a journalist. When political winds shifted, she was jailed for three months, where she cultivated a romantic attachment with her interrogator. His passion secured her release, but soon she realized she had to leave Iran, and him, and try a career in America. Rather than narrate her story chronologically (which would emphasize a repression-to-freedom theme), Entekhabifard intercuts accounts of various incidents, so that heavier stories—like her romance with her interrogator—emerge gradually. In the end, hers is a strangely disorienting account of that period. (Feb.)
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About this edition

• Publisher: Seven Stories Press
• Publication date: 2007
• ISBN 10: 1583227199
• ISBN 13: 9781583227190
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 256