Azar Nafisi on How Reading Is Crucial To Our Survival
Read Dangerously: The Subversive Power of Literature in Troubled Times is Azar Nafisi’s exhilarating examination of the role literature plays in understanding political systems and those who uphold opposing beliefs. Structured as letters to her deceased father, a compassionate man who instilled a profound respect for the art of storytelling in his children, Nafisi writes about authors who have engaged with the darkest aspects of their societies. In celebrating and studying these disparate writers, Nafisi notes how they created humane works that not only deepens the reader’s understanding of their own world, but also makes them more empathetic in the process. Nafisi also reflects on her family’s fascinating history in the letters, including her father’s imprisonment in Iran for political reasons, her own experience as a young professor living in the Islamic Republic of Iran, and her observations living in the United States for over two decades.
