Surveying three recent books about modern Iran, Michael Young wishes for a little less personal and a bit more political.
New at Reason
Comments to "New at Reason":
Not having RTFA, I'm gonna go out on a limb and guess this is part of a larger trend that perhaps mirrors the unfortunate trend in documentary films that similarly exalts the "personal story" at the expense oftentimes of providing any background or larger perspective information whatsoever. At times, such a limited, personalized viewpoint can be very aesthetically satisfying. But it's been taken to such an extreme in current documentary filmmaking that it has become the only way to do things, and thus, to put it mildly, is overused.
Could the "Salman Rushdie Effect" have anything to do with it? I mean, we already know the mullahs are willing to get medieval on your ass if they take offense to what you write. Surely safer to couch your writing in some kind of Oprah-esque fluff.
joe | January 30, 2006, 8:26pm | #
It is right and proper that meditations on the self and the place of the self in Iranian society should be the outlet for Iranian people's opposition to the regime. Hasn't Iraq taught you anything about implementing a program of revolutionary democratization in a nation that hasn't yet developed a democratic civil society?Hell, hasn't the Iranian uprising of 1979 taught us that?
Free your mind, and your ass will follow.
why not review Fisk's newest book, spends a lot of time on Iran and politics and is brilliant...
Kahn | January 31, 2006, 1:25am | #
Hasn't Iraq taught you anything about implementing a program of revolutionary democratization in a nation that hasn't yet developed a democratic civil society?Iran isn't Iraq, but one thing remains true: Iran will almost certainly develop nuclear bombs before it develops democratic institutions.
Not that I want to invade Iran next. But we've heard what Iran's leaders are saying and they very probably mean it.
At times like this we can all be glad we aren't president. The president has to decide what the hell to do about impossible problems like this one.
Good article Michael.