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Jasmine and Stars: Reading More than Lolita in Tehran, by Fatemeh Keshavarz. Chapel Hill, NC: The University of North Carolina Press, 2007. x + 165 pages. Index top. 174. $24.95.
Reviewed by Nasrin Rahimieh
Jasmine and Stars is a passionate and poetic supplement to the monolithic and unforgiving image of post-revolutionary Iran that has gained currency through best-selling titles like Azar Nafisi's Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books.
Since its publication in 2003, Nafisi's work has become one of the most widely read books in North America. Some of her critics have speculated that me book's popularity is rooted in its representation of life in die Islamic Republic as relentlessly oppressive, particularly as experienced by women. Writing from the position of a former professor of English literature in Iran, Nafisi zeroes in on repressive measures aimed at limiting American influence in Iranian life and letters. Over against the ever-tightening rein of the Islamic Republic, Nafisi posits a gathering of a group of her female students at her home devoted to reading some of the more canonical works of English literature. This book club...