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A Year Amongst the Persians

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As Edward Said pointed out in his seminal work entitled "Orientalism", and as thousands of others have reiterated since, that large body of literature and art dedicated to describing the "true nature" of the East, whether written by travellers, soldiers, diplomats, officials, businessmen, or novelists or painted by famous artists, actually contributed in a very important way to the control and administration of occupied parts of that 'East' by Euro-American powers. By daring to define the cultures and peoples of the Muslim world, and by establishing what constituted "knowledge" of that huge expanse of territory, European writers could justify their control over these "unruly, wild, and irresponsible" people. After all, the West had a `superior, modern civilization'. Said condemned this long, gigantic effort at control as being an extremely important basis for the whole colonial enterprise.

However, Orientalism does not come in one model, one color only. Like every other theory that purports to explain vast spheres of human activity. Orientalism can be carried too far. In the rush of enthusiasm that followed Said's work, many students and scholars condemned the very wish of Westerners to investigate other cultures, maintaining that each person should study only their own culture. In fact, some scholars turned to a more introspective mode, while others continued to study foreign cultures apologetically. In my opinion this represents the folly, the ridiculousness of political correctness. Would it really be a better world if each one of us gazed only at our own navel ? Is not cross-cultural understanding a "must" in today's world ? If Iranian, Somali, or Javanese scholars are not busy studying the mores and beliefs of Americans or Australians, does that mean we should stop studying their cultures ? As always, the real question is not what data should be collected, but what use should be made of it ?

Edward Granville Browne travelled to Persia (Iran) as a young man who had already studied Farsi and Turkish, who was fascinated by the culture and literature of Persia. He spent a year living and travelling around the country back in 1888. Nobody who reads this book could possibly compare him to a more typical Orientalist like Lord Curzon, who managed to write a "classic" work on Persia without knowing Persian, without ever mentioning any Persian individual other than top officials or faceless pesky servants. Browne, enthusiastic in the extreme, resembled more than a little the hippies of a century later---he lived with locals, he ate their food, dabbled in their religions, and experimented with their drugs. I was sorely disappointed to realize that, as Browne died in 1926, I would never be able to meet such a charming, intelligent, and (above all) kind and fair individual. These qualities shine out from the description of his travels in direct and glaring contrast to the writings of such people as Paul Theroux or V.S. Naipaul who find only crudity, stupidity, venality. Browne was fascinated by the then-new religion that is now known as Bahai. He mixed with Zoroastrians and various sects of Muslims too, constantly discussing philosophy and religion in Farsi with whomever he met. His text is full of quotations from Persian poetry, of interesting characters he met, and descriptions of the scenes he travelled through. In short, this is one of the best travel books I have ever read, by one of the most sympathetic, likeable authors I have ever come across. It's a long read-over 600 pages---but extremely rewarding. And if this is Orientalism, then so be it. The Persians put up a statue to Browne and named a street after him in Tehran. The cruder effects of Orientalism's mailed fist have probably guaranteed that neither still exists. Iran has a long tradition, not only of religious bigotry, but of openness, fondness for philosophy, rejection of narrow paths, and non-conformism. A YEAR AMONGST THE PERSIANS remains an important reminder of the varied nature of Iran and its people. We need that reminder more than ever.