Farewell Shiraz : an Iranian memoir of revolution and exile / Cyrus Kadivar.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Kadivar, Cyrus, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

History.

Iran--History--1941-1979.

Iran.

Iran--History--21st century.

Iran--Social life and customs.

Manners and customs.

Shīrāz (Iran)--History.

Shīrāz (Iran).

Iran--Shīrāz.

Genre:

Autobiographies.

History.

Physical Description:

xxi, 402 pages, 16 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations, plates ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

Cairo ; New York : The American University in Cairo Press, 2017.

Summary:

"In October 1999 during a trip to Cairo, Cyrus Kadivar, an exiled Iranian living in London, visited the tomb of the last shah and opened a Pandora's Box. Haunted by nostalgia for a bygone era, he recalled a protected and idyllic childhood in the fabled city of Shiraz and his coming of age during the 1979 Iranian revolution. Back in London, he reflected on what had happened to him and his family after their uprooting and decided to conduct his own investigation into why he lost his country. He spent the next ten years seeking out witnesses who would shed light on the last days of Pahlavi rule. Among those he met were a former empress, ex-courtiers, disaffected revolutionaries, and the bereaved relatives of those who perished in the cataclysm. In Farewell Shiraz, Kadivar tells the story of his family and childhood against the tumultuous backdrop of twentieth-century Iran, from the 1905-1907 Constitutional Revolution to the fall of Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi, before presenting accounts of his meetings with key witnesses to the Shah's fall and the rise of Khomeini. Each of the people interviewed provides a richly detailed picture of the momentous events that took place and the human drama behind them. Combining exquisite vignettes with rare testimonials and first-hand interviews, Farewell Shiraz draws us into a sweeping yet often intimate account of a vanished world and offers a compelling investigation into a political earthquake whose reverberations still live with us today"--Amazon.com.

Contents:

Part 1: Of things past

Roses and nightingales

Land of fars

Dream city

A new world

Love and politics

Homecoming

Age of innocence

Spellbound

Our house

A false stability

Gathering storm

Uneasy summer

Writing on the wall

End of an era

Revolution!

Farewell youth

Part 2: Exile

Displaced

Café de la Paix

After Khomeini

Reunion

The Shah's ghost

Part 3: Witnesses and survivors

Past errors

Whirlwind

Night of the generals

Sentimental journey

Father and son

Soraya

Persepolis revisited

Ex-ambassador

No regrets

Palace witnesses

Master of ceremonies

Security of the realm

The diplomat

The general's widow

Khosrowdad

Blue eyes

Hoveyda's end

The last empress

Epilogue

Sources and bibliography

Photographic credits

Index.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 381-393) and index.

ISBN:

9774168267

9789774168260

OCLC:

960832650

Publisher Number:

99972584660