I also have a deep appreciation for the author, her family, and the wonderful students…. they demonstrate such courage in their questions and discussions…..

3. I’ve never understood how individuals survive in chaotic and oppressive environments. This book helped me understand the importance of small and meaningful moments of freedom and the happiness these moments can bring. While the author, Azar Nafisi, described constant missile attacks on Tehran in the spring of 1988 (168 attacks actually!), she vividly recounted in great detail the showing of Tarkovsky’s film, The Sacrifice during that spring. Nafisi wrote on page 206, “Knowing that I could not understand the words and that if I thought about the censorship I would be too angry to watch, I surrendered to the magic of colors and images.” She continued, “For a brief time we experienced collectively the kind of awful beauty that can only be grasped through extreme anguish and expressed through art.” Despite the chaos of war, Nafisi was relieved, at least for a few hours, by art. The little things we enjoy the most are some of the best forms of freedom.

4. Some of the most disturbing allegations from the recent Iranian elections come from one of the defeated presidential candidates, Mehdi Karroubi, who has alleged that protestors have been jailed, raped and killed during the government crackdown. One of Nafisi’s students, Nassrin too, was jailed for participating in protests and particularly, distributing leaflets. Sentenced to ten years in prison, she insisted she was one of the lucky ones as fellow protestors had been executed. Ultimately, Nassrin was released from jail after three years. These instances remind me of how important free speech is within a society and how those who have achieved free speech must value and utilize this right.

5. If I lived in a country in which wearing the chador was required, I feel I would wear the chador. As a university professor, Azar Nafisi had the incredible opportunity to make a difference through teaching impressionable students. She couldn’t teach without wearing the chador. To me, a refusal to wear the chador would have been selfish as so many students could benefit from quality teachers. Also, with so much power taken away from women, I imagine that maintaining employment would be extremely important to mental health and financial stability. If maintaining employment meant wearing a chador, I would wear it and protest it through other means if possible.

Azar Nafisi provides a telling personal account about her grandmother’s choice to wear the chador. She recounts on page 192, “It (the chador) was a shelter, a world apart from the rest of the world.” With the change of the seasons from summer to fall in Kansas City, I’ve been wearing a long jacket to keep warm. When I wear my jacket, I feel a sense of security and satisfaction. Some men have a way of making women feel uncomfortable if they are not covered head to toe in material. Too many times, I’ve felt men’s eyes on me when wearing summer clothes and instead of feeling good about my body image, I have felt disgust. I first and foremost want men to see me as an intelligent person. I imagine there was a great deal of sexual tension that existed in Iran during Khomeini’s conservative rule and expect that those few women not wearing the chador felt uneasy from unwanted male attention.

For me, there were two conversations in the book which took on special significance. Nafisi was talking about James (Page 216): “He had said that the greatest freedom of man was his ‘independence of thought.’” I had never thought about freedom this way. I grew up with certain absolute freedoms and had always taken for granted the idea that I could think differently than others and had been taught to be inquisitive and question. Nafisi describes so much forced ideology which becomes a brainwashing of thoughts and actions. To think or question authority in Iran held risks we do not face. The next conversation (Page 286 – 288) was a discussion among the girls about whether or not to stay in Iran. Mitra vacillated between staying and leaving for another country. “Over here we have our identity…We can make something of our lives. Over there, life is unknown.” Nassrin replied, “The ordeal of freedom.” I remember the day I graduated college, I told my friends that I felt I had been climbing a mountain my entire life – I always knew the next step I would take on my journey. I was now at the peak and all the next choices in my life were my own – I had a clean and open slate to choose what I wanted to do next and where I wanted to live. The freedom of choice was daunting.

4. Discuss some of the prominent themes in the book, which was published in 2003, and the relevance to what you read in the news today about life in Iran. Did you feel more of a connection to the struggles they face? What are your thoughts when you read about some of the current events? Do you wonder if any of the book club members are involved in any current day protests?

Our first book club meeting we took a look at the major themes we had begun to notice in the book – which included women’s rights, education, religion and the use of fear as a weapon. The book was published six years ago; however it could have been taken from today’s headlines. During and since the reading of the book, I have read the headlines more closely and thought more about the people in the stories and the pictures. There was a recent story of a woman journalist in Sudan who had been convicted of public indecency for wearing trousers outdoors and facing a month in jail. She had refused to pay the $200 fine as a protest against the country’s morality laws. Had I read this article before reading the book, I doubt I ever would have given it a second look. I felt as though I understood a bit more of what she faced whenever she left her home and what she might be thinking every time she walked out on the street. There was a description early on in the book as we ‘watch’ one of the characters walk home. Her entire personality changed as she made sure to make sure she was properly covered and not looking anyone in the eye.

5. One prominent topic throughout the book was the wearing of the chador and the personal struggle between wearing it by choice or by force. The decision to wear the veil or not to wear the veil could result in jail time and or the loss of a job. What do you think you might have done if you had been in the same situation?

Realistically, In 2003 Iran, I probably would have chosen to wear the chador – especially if it meant that my family might come to some type of harm because of my decision. I would hope that I could be a bit like Nafisi and try to make change through discussion and opening minds. On the flip side though, I believe I would have been among the thousands peacefully protesting the recent allegations of election fraud. (When I was very young and the civil right marches were taking place, I wanted to be among the protesters and wrote speeches which I thought at the time were right up there with Martin Luther King. Of course, at 7 years old, I wasn’t allowed to walk much past my elementary school by myself let alone go to Alabama!) I remember reading Ursula Hegi’s Stones from the River which looks at what life was like for ordinary people living in Germany during WWII and the decisions they faced because of the rise of Adolf Hitler and the Third Reich. I had always looked through the Nazi era through my father’s perspective and it was the first time I thought about ‘what would I have done in the same situation?” Would I have risked the life of my family for someone else? The question of decisions we might have made through historical times makes for fascinating discussion. It makes us more aware of the impact we can make today in always choosing to do the right thing – even if it isn’t always the easiest decision.