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Title: In the Rose Garden of the Martyrs : A Memoir of Iran
ISBN: B000BHA3MM
Author:
Christopher de Bellaigue
Publicate Date: 2005-01-01
Publish: 2005-01-01
List Price: $26.95
Average Customer Rating: 3.0
Format: Hardcover
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Amazon Lowest New Price: $5.55
Amazon Lowest Used Price: $4.54
Amazon Merchant Price: $6.99
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| Customer Review: |
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1: Snapshots of Iranian Life
This memoir reads like a compilation of thorough newspaper articles or short stories, I never quite knew where the book was going next. It contains snapshots of Iranian life, histories of people involved in the Revolution and people who oppose its growing hypocrisy, and the reflections of a foreigner trying to understand and be understood. I found it very enjoyable to read, an absorbing glimpse into the lives of people who are motivated in ways foreign to my experience and a testament to the difficulty of turning a revolution into a stable government worthy of its citizenry.
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2: Thought-provoking but somewhat scattered
The book opens and closes with descriptions of scenes from an Iranian festival celebrating the martyrdom of the Imam Hossein, hero of Iran's Shia Islam. Sandwiched in between are snippets of the country's history, snatches of the personal experiences of the author's life as a Westerner in Iran and descriptions of the lives of ordinary Iranians and their experiences of the Revolution, the Iran-Iraq war and life in post-revolution Iran. The theme of martyrdom seeps through all of these encounters and experiences, and we are presented with an assortment of attitudes to the sometimes senseless, sometime noble aspects of martyrdom in Iranian history. The book has moments of thought-provoking brilliance as the author presents us with some of the dilemmas and paradoxes faced by ordinary Iranians. It also has moments where things become disjointed and it is easy to lose the thread. In the end, the idea of martyrdom is not enough to hold together a loosely structured narrative that jumps back and forth in history and alternates historical explanations with the anecdotal stories of a large number of diverse characters.
De Bellaigue never claims to have no personal opinions on the issues he is writing about and in fact he presents his own biases plainly on occasion. This does not prevent him from offering up alternative points of view, however, and these are the moments that become thought-provoking. It is a struggle to give this book a star rating. At some points it deserves 5 and at others 2. The author's masterful command of language rates a 5 throughout. All in all though, I would say it is a worthwhile read.
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3: A ground level look at Iran
This is a well-written and engaging book. It provides a close look at Iranian society and culture. When it comes to politics it is not as relevant and clear as it could have been.
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4: condemnation of the mullahs never materializes
Thumbing through Christopher de Bellaigue's "In the Rose Garden of the Martyrs," I smelled a rat.
Riddle me this: How is it that an Englishman who wrote what is being billed as a "searingly honest portrait" of life in modern-day Iran is not in, uh, jail?
How is it that he is permitted, to this day, to reside in unmolested luxury and comfort in a tony suburb north of Tehran? Wouldn't anybody "honest" be either imprisoned or shoved on a plane?
Answer: because his memoir is not "searingly honest." Or any kind of honest, for that matter.
That's right. de Bellaigue, who about a decade ago converted to Islam and married an Iranian, has managed to write a book about Iran that, while lovingly describing colorful characters, quaint locales, and heart-wrenching situations, never actually takes the trouble to specify where all the grief in this society is coming from! While he is competent at turning a phrase, his book ends up just flitting from anecdote to anecdote; he never manages (or bothers) to stitch his material into a more coherent (and therefore more condemnatory) narrative.
What's worse, de Bellaigue is, without hitting you on the head about it, apologizing for the mullahs, for the oppression, for the blood. Not that he does this directly, no. But every description, every episode in the book, each island of woe that drifts into view is allowed to drift right back out of view without our cicerone's ever clarifying the serpent in the basement. Well, no, sorry: not in the basement anymore.
If I were Iranian, I'd be fuming.
I'm not even sure why de Bellaigue wrote this thing. I charitably stuck through the whole tour, waiting for it to take off, but it never did. In fact, I only realized what de Bellaigue really was when I was about halfway into it: a whitewasher of atrocities.
Chris, if you're reading this: Shame.
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5: Almost Amusing... Fails to Delivers
'In the Rose Garden of the Martyrs' is more or less enjoyable to read, but not quite as advertised. It is definitely a personal account which adds much flavor to the book but tends to be choppy and seems to lack any real purpose.
While it does focus to some degree on the difficulties that the revolution now faces in Iran, it fails to tie these accounts together in any meaningful fashion. If this was the first book one was to read about Iran, it may prove difficult as it is taken for granted that one has a fair amount of background knowledge regarding Iran.
If you are one who reads about Iran often, this book would also be worth reading. If you want your first picture of Iran- choose something different such as 'Persian Mirrors' by Elaine Sciolino.
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