Customer Reviews

600 Mulla Nasreddin Tales (Silsilah-I Tajdid-I Chap-I Mutun-I Mashhur-I Farsi) (Farsi Edition)

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I read Molla's stories in English not being fortunate to know enough Persian. I hope they translate more of these stories to English, because just mentioning Molla's name brings smile to the people who know him.

In the present times, in the US we have Woody Allen, and in the East the impaccable Aziz Nassin of Turkey whose very name make you smile.

Molla's Character is popular in the Middle East as well as the Indian subcontinent, the same way as another Persian storyteller, Scheherazade is. Molla, in the Persian culture is title for the learned men or teachers. When people saw someone with beard and turban, they already assumed he is a molla so they would throw their questions.

For instance, Once Molla was hammering the nail at the end of his donkey's bridle, as he was going to a teahouse. Someone asked him: "Molla, where is the center of the world." Molla said," The center of the world is where I just hammered the nail to my donkey's bridle." Someone said, " I don't believe this." Molla took a sip of his tea and said, " If you don't believe it, go measure it."

In the forties and fifties Molla became popular among British. Some English speakers, in the hight of tension, during Nationalization of Oil, used to quote Molla when they wanted to break the ice with their Persian counterparts.

The funny stories did not solve the problem, but opened the door for many translations in English, Franch, German and many other languages. I have seen the book translated in Arabic, Turkish, Ordu and Hindu. In each of these countries they have, in years, added more stories to the old ones, giving the character a native identity. I am sure the Arabic Molla has some particular stories and the Turkish one some other. Molla now belongs to every country in Asia, as Sheharazade does.

This book is, however, in Persian. As the English version was a lot of fun for me to read, I'm sure Persians, who have a great sense of humor, will find this book much funnier than the English translation. Enjoy it.--Khandeh dareh!

I have bought this book and read it, it's a great great book. I recomand everyone else to buy it also. (Az Khande Roode Bor Khahid Shod).

I am a student of Persian and have found this book to be an excellent source of short stories that are both enjoyable and relatively easy to translate. The binding is sturdy and the pages are heavy and durable, (Important if you're going to make lots of notes inside!) All the vocabulary I had to look up could be found in the Hippocrene Standard Persian-English Dictionary, also available on Amazon.

You can enjoy the casual feeling of Persia through these nice stories and forget about actual unfriendly political relations World vs. Iran; the paper is not of good quality, yellow, but OK, maybe resembles old times, but the scripture font is very small, by arabic letters YOu need more eye concentration on reading, and bigger font would be needed

I grew up with Mulla's stories. You can not find an Iranian who does not know a few stories of Mulla. Even though his storues are very funny, still they have a philosophical value too. A must read for anybody and everybody.

The Persians live their lives through poetry and the ancient wise tales. Molla Nasreddin is one of the best if you want to have guidance in life through a sense of humor. Persian poetry has been spread throughout the whole ME and central Asia over thousands of years of Persian empire when Persia included most of today's Turkey, Baghdad, and many other countries in the region (today's Iran is only 40% of the ancient greater Iran). I am glad to see that some of our brothers in Turkey think he is one of them. That is the whole point, wherever you are from you should feel as though he is that wiseman in your neighborhood who teaches you about life while you are laughing very hard. It is not important where he was from, it is important to listen to his human message. We are all the brotherhood of man. Laugh, learn and enjoy this precious book of wise and funny tales.

It's not the point that Hoca is a character of Turkey nor Iran. Hoca is one of the wisest man of all times. He makes us remember things everyone else has forgotten for ever and always. His sayings -jokes- guide us to the objective and practical knowledge of All.

Nasreddin Hoca is not an Iranian character!!!! He had lived in Aksehir,which is a small city in Anatolia(Turkey).I am a very surprised to see that an Iranian writer try to show Nasreddin Hoca as an Iranian character.Let's not forget that 2 or 3 years ago it was celebrated as the Nasreddin Hoca year in Turkey!