Mehemmed Azadgar – November 2, 2024
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| Dr. Reza Baraheni |
My dear friend Asad Seif asked me some time ago to write an article about Reza Barahani for Avaye Taba'id (Voice of Exile). Naturally, I agreed. But what to write and how to write it in a way that wouldn’t be repetitive, deeply occupied my mind. I considered various ideas and ultimately arrived at what you see here. The reader of this note may have encountered one or two small parts of this writing in my other works.
Vahid Qarabagli
The Caspian Post
19 April 2022
March 24 saw the death in exile of Reza Baraheni (1936-2022), one of Iran’s most important literary figures of the 20th and 21st centuries and a foremost campaigner for minority rights in his homeland.
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| Dr. Reza Baraheni |
Reza Baraheni was one of Iran’s most important literary figures of the 20th and 21st centuries. Polymath novelist, essayist, translator, and public intellectual he was notably considered the “founder of modern literary criticism in Iran”, and was rated “Iran’s finest living poet” in 1977 by Harper’s Magazine. His works have been translated into English, French, Turkish and other languages. Well known as a prominent advocate of freedom of speech, democracy, and minority rights in Iran, he died on March 24, 2022 in Toronto, Canada, where he had lived in exile with his family since 1997. He was 86.
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| Reza Baraheni |
Reza Baraheni, Iranian dissident, prodigious author and former president of PEN Canada (2001-03) has died, at the age of 86, in Toronto.
He is survived by his wife Sanaz Sehhati of Toronto; daughter, Aleca, of Fairfax, Virginia; Oktay, of Tehran and Toronto; and Arsalan and Esfandiar, of Toronto.
A memorial is planned for April.
An internationally recognized novelist, poet and literary critic, Baraheni authored more than 60 books of fiction, poetry and literary criticism. His works have been translated in a dozen languages.
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| On the left, Reza Baraheni, on the right, Togrul Atabay. |
Alireza Asgharzadeh - December 10, 2018
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| Reza Baraheni |
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| Gholam-Hossein Saedi's journey to southern Iran: People of the Air and Fear and Trembling were the fruits of this trip. |
December 2: Anniversary of the Death of Gholam-Hossein Saedi
Reza Baraheni - "To me, Saedi had neither a beginning, nor an end, nor even a proper middle to his life. A person’s life is made up of all their moments."
In Memory of a Friend: Gholam-Hossein Saedi, Storyteller, Playwright, Dreamer
December 14, 2017 | Shahrvand
On Saturday, June 25 and Sunday, June 26, 2005, a ceremony was held at the University of Toronto to honor Reza Baraheni, poet, writer, literary theorist, university professor, and human rights activist.
The year 2005 marked the 70th anniversary of Dr. Baraheni's birth, and this event served as an early birthday celebration, organized by the Shahrvand newspaper in collaboration with the Sepas committee.
Aug 12, 2014
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| From left: Dr. Reza Baraheni and Dr. Javad Heyat |
Mohammad Tajdolati - Radio Zamaneh - March 1, 2010
Report on a Panel in Toronto for International Mother Language Day
For over 10 years, February 21 has been recognized by the United Nations and UNESCO as “International Mother Language Day,” with various programs held annually to emphasize the importance of mother languages.
Although the right to learn and be taught in one’s mother tongue is acknowledged in the Islamic Republic of Iran’s constitution, it has long been restricted. This denial has led to ongoing protests from Iranians belonging to diverse ethnic and cultural groups who wish to learn and speak in their native languages.
In this context, on February 21, the “Iranian-Canadian Foundation for Language and Culture of Azerbaijan”—established six years ago by Iranian Turks in Canada—organized a lecture on the importance of mother languages at the auditorium of a public library in Toronto.
Reza Baraheni — Shahrvand 1269 — Thursday, February 18, 2010
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| Dr. Reza Baraheni |
Repented a hundred times, but no more myself will bind.
— Hafez of Shiraz
My habit, which is not all that unusual, has generally been to refrain from responding to articles written in support or criticism of my written works and ideas. However, I never ignore them — just as I do not ignore them in my memory. Later, as much as possible, I address them within the discussions of my other writings, maintaining the dignity of the writer and the subject, so as to do justice to the matter. An exception to this personal rule occurs when the writer of a text, despite having good intentions in their words and writing, commits a grave mistake in interpreting my views on a subject. This may arise either from the unclear position of my discourse, or from a misunderstanding or misinterpretation, and leaving the matter unanswered might distort the truth and lead to further misunderstandings about the issue.
Reza Baraheni - Shahrvand - November 22, 2007
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| Reza Baraheni |
I constantly ask myself this question—not because of my own story, or because recent storytelling in Iran has discovered the West as a presence—but more because the West has become a presence in our stories, and in mine as a minor part of that tradition. Any such presence immediately raises the question of "difference" before us, since Iran has had, and has been, an immense narrative presence. We cannot speak merely of simplistic literary influences; instead, we must discuss intertextualities and the influences that have shaped other influences. However, both these phenomena—presences and differences, as well as non-literary influences shaping literary penetrations—have existed in Iranian literature.
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| Dr. Reza Baraheni |
I think that on the ethnic groups of Iran in your map of provincial divisions, you have made serious mistakes that the BBC could have easily avoided by consulting Ethnologue.com. The entire Western Azerbaijan has been called the land of the Kurdish people. Additionally, Eastern Azerbaijan has been cut off from the Caspian Sea, while the people of Astara, extending hundreds of miles to the south of that city, are Turkish-speaking people. According to the statistics given by the Islamic Republic of Iran, more than half the population of Tehran are Turkish-speaking people.
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| Reza Baraheni |
The first 18 months of life are considered the “chora” period—a time when the mother tongue forms the first game of the world between mother and child.
In this phase, language, though not yet understood by the child, becomes a medium of emotional exchange—a romantic ping-pong between mother and baby. Despite being forgotten over time, this exchange becomes the foundation and reference point for all future relationships.
Ana, dilin anasıdır.
Ana dili, dillərin anasıdır.
Ana dilindən uzaq qalan mələr, gecə-gündüz mələr, mənim kimi mələr.
Ana dili, getməz, getsə də, dönər, qapıdan salsan eşiyə, pəncərədən gələr.
Reza Baraheni - September 28, 2004
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| From left: Dr. Reza Baraheni and Dr. Javad Heyat |
At first glance, recognizing and introducing Dr. Javad Heyat seems quite simple. Those interested in learning more can check one or several private and public websites. These sites can be related to medicine or literature; they may pertain to notable figures in Iran or Azerbaijan. His constant presence in these centers presents us with a summary of his journey: born in 1925 in Tabriz, educated in Tabriz, Turkey, and France, a renowned heart surgeon, a close friend and colleague of the famous Dr. Christiaan Barnard, a member of the Academy of Surgeons in Paris, the person who performed the first new heart surgery in Iran exactly fifty years ago at the age of thirty, the first open-heart surgery in 1962, the first kidney transplant in Tehran during the same decade on a human, and the first heart transplant on dogs...
Reza Baraheni - September 1, 2003
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| Dr. Reza Baraheni |
A Section from the Article on SAVAK Documents, the Execution of Jazani and Others
The former Shah eliminated all opportunities for cultural plurality with the massacres in Tabriz, Zanjan, Ardabil, Mahabad, and the cities of Kurdistan. In fact, the fundamental principle of democracy in Iran, namely education in the mother tongue, was transformed into learning Persian, the language of one-third of the people of Iran.
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| Reza Baraheni |
Terror in Iran from the October 28, 1976 issue
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| Dr. Reza Baraheni |
I went to school in that way up until 14. I did not know any Persian because I was studying everything in Turkish. In those days, the northern part of the country was occupied by the Russians, but there was also, right after they left or at the same time that they were leaving, an indigenous government in Azerbaijan, which was a Turkish-speaking government.
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| Dr. Reza Baraheni - 1976 |
I speak here for the oppressed nationalities of Iran who constitute 60 percent of the whole population, but are forced to learn the mother language of the present Shah of Iran, namely Persian.
The Shah considers all Iranians to be Aryans, thus overlooking the ethnic diversity, which exists in the country. Everyone has to learn one language, Persian. This is a great injustice to the other nationalities. I belong to the Turkish-speaking Azerbaijani nationality. The men and women of my generation were told by the Shah to forget about their language and to read and write everything in Persian. When I write a poem about or a story about my parents, my mother, who is alive and doesn’t know how to read or write or speak Persian, cannot understand it. I have to translate it for her so that she can understand.
