Between change and persistence : Reżā Julāʾi’s short story Miti-Jenn as a mirror of social developments in Iran

This paper explores various aspects relevant to an understanding of current developments in Iranian society through Reżā Julāʾi’s short storyMiti-Jenn (published in Tālār-e Ṭarab-ḵāneh, 1371/1992). Born in Tehran in 1950, Julāʾi is a well-known writer who has won several literary prizes. Julāʾi frequently situates his stories and novels (e. g. Suʾ-e qaṣd be ḏāt-e homāyuni) in the Qājār period (1796–1925). Having had a closer look at hisœuvre, however, it becomes impossible to ignore the present-day implications of his interpretations. The short story Miti-Jenn allows us to identify both constant and changing elements in the development of modern Iranian society between the Constitutional Revolution (1905–11) and today. This analysis will center on the tensions between reason and superstition, and between reality and the surreal. It will focus on Reżā Julāʾi’s use of traditional demonical beliefs as a key to understanding some of the central problems of present-day Iran. Reżā Julāʾi: Introductory Remarks Reżā Julāʾi is a firmly established modern Iranian prose-writer and winner of several literary prizes. Ḥasan Mir-ʿĀbedini discusses him in his study of modern Persian prose, and Yusuf ʿAliḵāni includes him in his collection of ten writers of the so-called third generation (nasl-e sevvom). In the West, however, Julāʾi has gone virtually unnoticed, even by researchers. Kamran Talattof in his introduction to modern Persian literature simply mentions his name. In Ein Fenster zur Freiheit, Mohammad H. Allafi at least gives 1 All internet sources mentioned in this article were last consulted in January 2010. 2 Mir-ʿĀbedini 1999: 934–935, 986–994, 1106, 1233. 3 ʿAliḵāni 2001: 35–50. 4 Talattof 2000: 109. DOI 10.1515/9783110399882-008 Bereitgestellt von | UZH Hauptbibliothek / Zentralbibliothek Zürich