Reading Lolita in Tehran (Nafisi)

[cahn]

I almost didn't read this. Something about the title made me think, oh, I don't know, that it would be about an American teaching about sexual freedom. Or something. Anyway, it didn't sound appealing. And I tend to get annoyed with books without quotation marks. But then it totally captivated me, from almost the very first. It is about literature, which is obviously a huge draw for me (and is probably going to get me to read Henry James and at least skim through Lolita). And about Iran, which I didn't think I would find fascinating but did. And it is a political warning, to both the Left and the Right: be careful what you wish for, and who your bedfellows are.

Really a book I'm glad I read, although I did find it slightly disjointed, I didn't particularly agree with her about Jane Austen, and I never got to care about the girls as much as I am pretty sure I was supposed to.

(Also, look, tags! I'm only, what, three years behind in my organization...)

(Coming very soon: The Magicians (Grossman), which was also on hold at the library and which I am snarfling through frighteningly quickly...)