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Writing Back? Jalal Al-e Ahmad's (1923–69) Reflections on Selected Periods of Iranian History

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Anja Pistor-Hatam
Anja Pistor-Hatam*
Affiliation:
Christian-Albrechts-Universität, Kiel
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Abstract

As a collectively acting subject, the Pahlavi regime constituted itself through a functional memory by construing a particular past. In this way, the official or political memory served as the regime's key legitimizing factor. Both Pahlavi shahs attempted to appropriate the Iranian past as well as its future; that is, they legitimized their rule in retrospect and sought to immortalize themselves prospectively. In contrast to the official historiography, ‘counter-memories’ are often established. The motive in producing such a ‘counter-memory,’ whose founders are usually the conquered and oppressed, is to delegitimize the perceived oppressive balance of power. An outspoken critic of the Pahlavi regime, the Iranian teacher and writer Jalal Al-e Ahmad ‘wrote back,’ trying his hand at a ‘counter memory’.

Type
Research Article
Information
Iranian Studies , Volume 40 , Issue 5 , December 2007 , pp. 559 - 578
Copyright
Copyright © The International Society for Iranian Studies 2007

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Footnotes

1

I am very grateful to Josef Wiesehöfer, without whose vast knowledge of ancient Iranian history, willingness to discuss my theses, and his many valuable suggestions, this article would not be the same. My thanks are also due to Konrad Hirschler and William O'Reilly for their proofreading of the text. Also, I'm indebted to the audiences at Cambridge's King's College, where I gave a paper on Al-e Ahmad in October 2005, and at SOAS in London, where I presented another one as part of the Sixth Biennial of Iranian Studies in August 2006, for lively discussions and many suggestions. All remaining flaws regarding content or writing style are, of course, mine.

References

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31 See for example Mohammad Modarresi Zandjani, Sar-gozasht wa ‘aqa'ed-e Khwadjeh Nasir ad-Din Tusi, quoted from al-Amin, Hasan, al-Isma'iliyun wa-l-mughul wa-Nasir ad-Din Tusi (Beirut, 1997), 11Google Scholar; Dja'fariyan, Rasul, “Die vorgebliche Rolle von Hwâğa Nasîr ad-Dîn at-Tûsî bei dem Fall von Bagdad,” in Spektrum Iran 3 (1990): 30–53Google Scholar; Dabashi, Hamid, “The Philosopher/Vizier: Khwaja Nasir ad-Din Tusi and the Isma'ilis,” in Medieval Isma'ili History and Thought, ed. Daftary, Farhad (Cambridge, 1996), 231–44Google Scholar.

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33 Al-e Ahmad, Adab-o-honar, 1: 79.

34 Al-e Ahmad, Adab-o-honar, 1: 79.

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47 Pistor-Hatam, Anja, Nachrichtenblatt, Informationsbörse und Diskussionsforum: Akhtar-e Estānbūl (1876–1896)—Anstöße zur frühen persischen Moderne (Münster, 2000), 226–58Google Scholar and the mentioned literature.

48 Al-e Ahmad, Adab-o-honar, 2: 543, 547.

49 Al-e Ahmad, Adab-o-honar, 2: 538–39.

50 Al-e Ahmad, Adab-o-honar, 2: 543–44.

51 Just as his Arab and Ottoman-Turkish contemporaries, the nineteenth-century Persian statesman Mirza Hosein Khan Moshir od-Douleh, for example, divided humankind into three stages of development: a first stage of savageness (wahshī -garī) and ignorance (bī-tarbiyatī), a second stage of nomadism (badawīyat), and, finally, a third stage of civilization (madanīyat). The civilized were intellectually strong, well educated, and had developed trade and industry. Anja Pistor-Hatam, Nachrichtenblatt, 188–90.

52 See here Pistor-Hatam, Anja, “Islamisches Erbe und westlicher Einfluß. Der Literat Jalâl Âl-e Ahmad (1923–69) zur Kultur in Iran,” Periplus 13 (2003): 84–98Google Scholar, especially on the importance of the Persian language as well as ancient myths and legends for the formation of the mind.

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55 Al-e Ahmad, Adab-o-honar, 3: 1126. It may well be that Al-Ahmad responded to Mohammad Reza Shah quoted in Ettelā'āt of 13 Mordād 1342sh (1963): “in their ethics and their spirituality Iranian Shi'ah have fallen far behind the caravan of the world.” Quoted from Akhavi, Shahrough, Religion and Politics in Contemporary Iran: Clergy-State Relations in the Pahlavī Period (Albany, 1980), 108Google Scholar. There also exists, of course, the well-known Arab proverb: ‘The caravan marches on and heeds not the barking of stray dogs.’

56 Al-e Ahmad, Adab-o-honar, 2: 538.

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57 Al-e Ahmad, Adab-o-honar, 2: 543–44.

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61 Referring to the Qashqa'is, Al-e Ahmad maintains that they were continuing the same nomadic way of life of the ancient Iranians. This tradition, he says, proves that, in reality, Iranians had not yet fully adapted to urban civilization. Al-e Ahmad, Adab-o-honar, 2: 544.

62 Wiesehöfer, Das frühe Persien, 13. See also Porada, Edith, “Classic Achaemenian Architecture and Sculpture,” in The Cambridge History of Iran (Cambridge, 1996) 2: 793–827Google Scholar, see here 811.

63 Edith Porada, “Classic Achaemenian Architecture and Sculpture:” 817–19. For Pre-Islamic Iranian art see also Seipel, Wilfried, (ed.), 700 Jahre persische Kunst. Meisterwerke aus dem Iranischen Nationalmuseum in Teheran (Wien, 2000)Google Scholar (exhibition catalogue).

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65 Al-e Ahmad, Adab-o-honar, 2: 544–45.

66 Al-e Ahmad, Adab-o-honar, 2: 541.

67 Al-e Ahmad, Adab-o-honar, 2: 539.

69 Al-e Ahmad, Adab-o-honar, 2: 545.

68 Al-e Ahmad, Adab-o-honar, 2: 544.

70 Al-e Ahmad, Adab-o-honar, 2: 545.

71 Al-e Ahmad, Adab-o-honar, 2: 546.

72 Al-e Ahmad, Adab-o-honar, 2: 546.

73 Al-e Ahmad, Adab-o-honar, 2: 539.

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75 Dumézil, L'idéologie tripartie, 8.

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80 Frye, “The Political History of Iran under the Sasanians,” 175.

81 See Al-e Ahmad, Dar khedmat. See also Nabavi, Changing Concepts, here 349. Nabavi refers to Al-e Ahmad's change of earlier opinion regarding the same ulama he had identified as a ‘reactionary force’ earlier.

82 Such as Olmstead, Albert T., History of the Persian Empire (Achaemenid Period) (Chicago, 1948)Google Scholar; Herzfeld, Ernst, The Persian Empire, Studies in Geography and Ethnography of the Ancient Near East, ed. Walser, Gerold (Wiesbaden, 1968)Google Scholar; Herzfeld had published on Ancient Iran and Mesopotamia since 1910 in English and German. Al-e Ahmad certainly knew French because he vastly translated from it. He may have known German since a translation of Ernst Jünger's U¨ber die Linie counts among his works although he might have used a French translation as an intermediary (there is nothing pointing in this direction in the article on Al-e Ahmad in the Encyclopaedia Iranica, however). He also traveled to the U.S., so he presumably had some knowledge of the English language.

83 See, for example, Gesellschaft, Deutsch-Iranische, ed., Festschrift aus Anlaß der Gründung des iranischen Kaiserreiches vor 2500 Jahren durch Kyros den Großen (Köln, 1971)Google Scholar; Eilers, Werner, ed., Festgabe deutscher Iranisten zur 2500 Jahrfeier Irans (Stuttgart, 1971)Google Scholar; Acta Iranica. Encyclopédie Permanente des Etudes Iraniennes, 1 (1974): Commémoration Cyrus.

84 Al-e Ahmad, Adab wa honar, 2: 543–44.

85 Al-e Ahmad, Adab wa honar, 2: 545.

86 Al-e Ahmad, Adab wa honar, 2: 535–49.

87 Al-e Ahmad, Adab wa honar, 2: 547.

88 See, for example, Simon, Heinrich, Ibn Khaldūns Wissenschaft von der menschlichen Kultur (Leipzig, 1959), 75Google Scholar.

89 Al-e Ahmad, Adab wa honar, 2: 545.

90 Hillmann, Iranian Culture, 142.

91 Fragner, Bert G., Die Persophonie. Regionalität, Identität und Sprachkontakt in der Geschichte Asiens (Berlin, 1999), 25–33Google Scholar.

92 Fragner, Persophonie.

93 See, for example, Al-e Ahmad's review of a history book written for the fifth grade of elementary school, “Tārīkh-e Īrān az āghāz tā eslām.” Al-e Ahmad, Adab wa honar, 3: 1107–19.

94 Gheissari, Iranian Intellectuals, 92.

95 Hillmann, Iranian Culture, 138.

96 Anthony D. Smith, National Identity, attributes to ethnic communities “1. a collective proper name, 2. a myth of common ancestry, 3. shared historical memories, 4. one or more differentiating elements of common culture, 5. an association with a specific ‘homeland’, 6. a sense of solidarity for significant sectors of the population,” p. 21.