Book description
"There are several peculiar features about writing any detailed
account of the recent political events in Persia which make necessary
some slight explanation. The first point is that Persian political
affairs, fraught as they are with misfortune and misery for millions
of innocent people, are conducted very much as a well-staged drama - I
have heard some critics say, as an op ra bouffe." William
Morgan Shuster, "The Strangling of Persia" , 1912
So Hooman Majd introduces his story of Iran, with its volatile
politics, jostling leaders, global ambitions, and enormous
implications for world peace. What does it mean for the world if
"Green" represents not a revolution but a civil rights
movement, pushing the country toward a particular brand of
"Islamic democracy"? And how will Iran's diversity of
political positions, so often sidelined in news reporting, ultimately
resolve itself?
With witty, candid, and stylishly-intelligent reporting, Hooman Majd
introduces top-level politicians and clerics alongside regular
Iranians, including Jewish community leaders. A personal, candid tour
of the political and social landscape in Iran, The Ayatollahs'
Democracy is a powerful dispatch from a country at a historic
turning point.
HOOMAN MAJD was born in Tehran, Iran in 1957, and lived abroad from
infancy with his family who were in the diplomatic service. He attended
boarding school in England and college in the United States, and stayed
in the U. S. after the Islamic Revolution of 1979. Majd had a long
career in the entertainment business before devoting himself to writing
and journalism full-time. He worked at Island Records and Polygram
Records for many years, with a diverse group of artists, and was head of
film and music at Palm Pictures, where he produced The Cup and James
Toback's Black and White. He now writes for GQ, Newsweek, The New York
Times and many others, and has been a regular contributor to The
Huffington Post from its inception. He lives in New York City and
travels regularly back to Iran. His first book,
The Ayatollah Begs to
Differ,
was published in 2008.
