Quotessence
Home / Topics / Iranian Revolution Quotes

Iranian Revolution Quotes

Browse 13 quotes about Iranian Revolution.

Iranian Revolution Quotes

“As he defended the book one evening in the early 1980s at the Carnegie Endowment in New York, I knew that some of what he said was true enough, just as some of it was arguably less so. (Edward incautiously dismissed 'speculations about the latest conspiracy to blow up buildings or sabotage commercial airliners' as the feverish product of 'highly exaggerated stereotypes.') Covering Islam took as its point of departure the Iranian revolution, which by then had been fully counter-revolutionized by the forces of the Ayatollah. Yes, it was true that the Western press—which was one half of the pun about 'covering'—had been naïve if not worse about the Pahlavi regime. Yes, it was true that few Middle East 'analysts' had had any concept of the latent power of Shi'ism to create mass mobilization. Yes, it was true that almost every stage of the Iranian drama had come as a complete surprise to the media. But wasn't it also the case that Iranian society was now disappearing into a void of retrogressive piety that had levied war against Iranian Kurdistan and used medieval weaponry such as stoning and amputation against its internal critics, or even against those like unveiled women whose very existence constituted an offense?”

WomenMediaNew YorkHuman RightsIranMiddle EastWomens RightsTheocracyAmputationSeptember 11 Attacks1980sEdward SaidKhomeiniIranian RevolutionWomen In IslamStoningWomen And ReligionWomen In IranCarnegie EndowmentCovering IslamIranian KurdistanMohammed Reza PahlaviShiism
Book:Hitch 22: A Memoir
Create image

“Al-e Ahmad was fundamentally different from all the appropriators of his rhetoric. Even Shariati, who resembled him in many ways, never outwardly showed - and perhaps never felt - the doubts that Al-e Ahmad continually had and expressed. Ultimately these doubts prevented Al-e Ahmad from pushing any single solution as the salvation of Iran; he was the master of social and cultural critique but not of social and cultural construction. This failure was a mark of his extreme loyalty to and honesty about his own feelings.”

Iranian RevolutionIranian LiteratureIranian Studies
Book:The Mantle of the Prophet: Religion and Politics in Iran
Create image

“Israel's demonstration of its military prowess in 1967 confirmed its status as a 'strategic asset,' as did its moves to prevent Syrian intervention in Jordan in 1970 in support of the PLO. Under the Nixon doctrine, Israel and Iran were to be 'the guardians of the Gulf,' and after the fall of the Shah, Israel's perceived role was enhanced. Meanwhile, Israel has provided subsidiary services elsewhere, including Latin America, where direct US support for the most murderous regimes has been impeded by Congress. While there has been internal debate and some fluctuation in US policy, much exaggerated in discussion here, it has been generally true that US support for Israel's militarization and expansion reflected the estimate of its power in the region. The effect has been to turn Israel into a militarized state completely dependent on US aid, willing to undertake tasks that few can endure, such as participation in Guatemalan genocide. For Israel, this is a moral disaster and will eventually become a physical disaster as well. For the Palestinians and many others, it has been a catastrophe, as it may sooner or later be for the entire world, with the growing danger of superpower confrontation.”

PoliticsUnited StatesMoralityIsraelIranGenocideForeign PolicyMiddle EastSyriaImperialismJordanLatin AmericaIsraeli Palestinian ConflictGuatemalaPersian Gulf1967American ImperialismRichard NixonIranian RevolutionForeign Policy Of The Us1970ShahPloUnited States CongressGuatemalan Civil WarPalestinian PeopleMohammad Reza PahlaviSix Day WarBlack September In JordanPalestinian Territories
Author:Noam Chomsky
Create image

“The nurse is suddenly taken aback. She does not want to remember the past, which has not yet passed. She does not want to believe that she is a nurse’s aide, that she did not finish her studies, that in the second year in the College of Nursing, the revolution happened… She does not want to go back to the past, even though nowadays most people do not have a now, and they are constantly tossed from the now platform into the past…”

WomenIranian RevolutionIranian WomenIran Iraq War1979 RevolutionAgainst OblivionWomen R Rights
Book:These Crazy Nights
Create image

“And so, with a slow sweep of the arm that remained forever etched in my memory, he took out a match, lit it, and tossed it onto the pile of books. With a quiet huff...ff...ff the flames rippled over the pages, catching first the old books with the brown paper whose smell I loved so much. I vividly remember how Danko's Burning Heart was engulfed in flames that then licked at Luce's skirt who, desperately trying to protect herself from the fire in pages of Romain Rolland's book, held Pierre tightly to her breast. I watched as the fire spread to the intertwined lovers Pierre and Natasha, Heathcliff and Cathrine Earnshaw, Scarlett O'Hara and Rhett Butler, Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy, abelard and Heloise, Tristan and Isolde, Salaman and Absal, Vis and Ramin, Vamegh and Azra, Zohreh and Manuchehr, shirin and Farhad, Leyli and Majnun, Arthur and Gemma, the Rose and the Little Prince, before they had the chance to smell or kiss each other again, or whisper. "I love you" one last time.”

ReadingBooksBook BurningIranian RevolutionLiterature About LiteratureIranian PoetryIranian Women
Book:The Enlightenment of the Greengage Tree
Create image

“«Signora, le posso parlare un attimo?» [...] C'era un problema con Gatsby. Lo diceva per il mio bene. Per il mio bene? Che strana espressione. Con tutto il rispetto che aveva nei miei riguardi [...] aveva una lamentela da fare. Contro chi, e perché a me? Contro Gatsby. Gli domandai se avesse per caso sporto una formale denuncia contro il signor Gatsby, e gli rammentai che in ogni caso sarebbe stato inutile, dato che la morte estingue il reato. Ma c'era poco da scherzare. «No, professoressa, non contro il signor Gatsby; contro il romanzo». Era immorale. Insegnava ai giovani le cose sbagliate; avvelenava la loro mente - dovevo essermene senz'altro accorta anch'io. Veramente no, gli dissi. Gli rammentai che Gatsby era un'opera di narrativa, non un manuale di istruzioni per la vita. Di sicuro mi rendevo conto, insistette, che c'era chi prendeva a modello quei romanzi e quei personaggi. Forse il signor Gatsby andava bene per gli americani, ma non per la nostra gioventù rivoluzionaria. [...] Per Nyazi fra la realtà di tutti i giorni e quella immaginata da Fitzgerald non c'era differenza. Il grande Gatsby era un'opera emblematica, parlava dell'America, e l'America per noi era come il veleno. Era così e basta. Dovevamo insegnare agli studenti iraniani a combattere l'immoralità americana. Era serissimo, e in assoluta buona fede.”

RealityBooksGatsbyIranian Revolution
Book:Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books
Create image