SONG OF A CAPTIVE BIRD by Jasmin Darznik

5.5 ++
Ballantine Books
Historical Fiction, Multicultural Interest
Pub date February 13, 2018

Synopsis

All through her childhood in Tehran, Forugh is told that Iranian daughters should be quiet and modest. She is taught only to obey, but she always finds ways to rebel—gossiping with her sister among the fragrant roses of her mother’s walled garden, venturing to the forbidden rooftop to roughhouse with her three brothers, writing poems to impress her strict, disapproving father, and sneaking out to flirt with a teenage paramour over café glacé. It’s during the summer of 1950 that Forugh’s passion for poetry really takes flight—and that tradition seeks to clip her wings. 

Forced into a suffocating marriage, Forugh runs away and falls into an affair that fuels her desire to write and to achieve freedom and independence. Forugh’s poems are considered both scandalous and brilliant; she is heralded by some as a national treasure, vilified by others as a demon influenced by the West. She perseveres, finding love with a notorious filmmaker and living by her own rules—at enormous cost. But the power of her writing grows only stronger amid the upheaval of the Iranian revolution.

Inspired by Forugh Farrokhzad’s verse, letters, films, and interviews—and including original translations of her poems—Jasmin Darznik has written a haunting novel, using the lens of fiction to capture the tenacity, spirit, and conflicting desires of a brave woman who represents the birth of feminism in Iran—and who continues to inspire generations of women around the world.

My view

I'd like to thank Jasmin Darznik for her honest description of an Iran we do not often hear about, the Shah's modern Iran. It's restrictions, brutality.
Forough Farrokhsad grew up in the Shah's Iran. One can only imagine the courage it took Forough to follow her calling, writing poems, poems that read like a story. Her courage to express herself as a woman, feelings we women experience along our lives.
To understand her determination not to be silenced, one has to understand "modern" Iran. Women were expected to stay at home, silent. To express an opinion was not tolerated, and punished.
This is a book which needs to be read widely, by women and men.
Even today many of my Iranian friends deny the Shah's regime's brutality, yet thousands left Iran. This speaks volumes on the Shah's regime.
Forough pushed herself through all the barriers never holding back her truth...she passed away at 32 killed in a car accident.

I will add pictures, poems by Farough an book titles to her poems which are sold today around the world when this book is published.
This beautiful book will be sold at book stores February 13, 2018

P.S.
Although the Shah's regime was brutal, the revolution against the Shah in 1979 ushered in an even harsher regime run by Islam.