Touba and the Meaning of Night

A major literary event, the publication of "Touba and the Meaning of Night" introduces English-speaking readers to the epic masterpiece of a great contemporary Persian writer, renowned in her native Iran and in much of Western Europe. This remarkable novel, begun during one of the author's many imprisonments, was published in Iran in 1989 to great critical acclaim and instant best-seller status - but a year later, Shahrnush Parsipur was again arrested, and all of her works were banned by the Islamic Republic. "Touba and the Meaning of Night" explores, from a distinctly Iranian viewpoint, the ongoing tensions between rationalism and mysticism, tradition and modernity, male dominance and female will. Throughout, it defies Western stereotypes of Iranian women and Western expectations of literary form, speaking in an idiom that reflects both the unique creative voice of its author and a new tradition in Persian women's writing.