Censoring an Iranian Love Story (8 page)

Sara wants to complain:

Where did you suddenly disappear to?

But she doesn’t. And I write:

In this strange moment, every word, every sentence, seems hollow and absurd …

From the late Henry James, may God rest his soul, I know that to heighten the dramatic energy of my story, I have to limit its perspective to either Sara or Dara. But then to respect narrative candor, I will have to write of the secret thoughts and desires of that character. Should I fall into this trap, I will also fall prey to Mr. Petrovich. On the other hand, I really don’t want to portray my story’s character as cold or to conceal his or her emotions in the vein of Hemingway and his American successors. So what am I to do? In your opinion, what can one do with words that are at times idiotic when writing a simple scene of a young man and woman looking into each other’s eyes on some sidewalk in Tehran? Let’s leave it up to these old words and see what they themselves will write.

Suddenly, a bolt of lightning flashes from Sara’s black eyes and sets fire to the wheat fields of Dara’s soul …

I did say words sometimes become dim-witted. Since Madame Bovary’s death, such sentences seem rather inane. Let us write:

Four pupils like four black mirrors facing each other …

Four windows open onto each other’s darkness …

But where in the world is there something called a nose between two mirrors or two windows. We therefore have to forgo such cliché and nose-y portrayals. I will write:

In want for words, two pairs of pupils together darken a long silence.

I think if we Iranian writers continue such exhausting exercises, at long last our syphilis-stricken dream of winning a Nobel Prize might become reality. I should remember to tell that fortunate writer, or unfortunate writer, because in Iran he or she will surely be accused of collaborating with Western intelligence services, to make sure and thank Mr. Petrovich when addressing the Nobel Committee.

Anyway, perforce, Sara and Dara, start to walk side by side …

In step with the united steps of the two characters of our story, destiny changes.
In the chaos of the clash between the students, the police, and government sympathizers, the frail figure of the hunchback midget receives a hard blow from a person who is either beating an escape or rushing to strike. The midget falls to the ground, his small head smashes against a cement edge, and his eyes forever close …

B
R
N AND DANIEL

I
n this segment of the story, I come to think that selecting the name Dara for the antagonist was a big mistake. I have just remembered that Dara was not only the name of the character in first-grade textbooks, but it was also the name of one of Iran’s kings. It could therefore make Mr. Petrovich wary of my entire story, and with his conspiracy-seeking eyes he may scour every word and sentence thinking that I am a monarchist. However, given that my story has advanced tens of pages, I cannot simply use the find-and-replace function in Microsoft Word to change the name of my story’s character. For quite some time now, I have come to know him as Dara. Changing his name at this point would be similar to your brother or husband or boyfriend suddenly asking you to delete his old name and to start calling him by a new name, simply because he doesn’t want you to think he is a monarchist. In that case, your problem will be simpler than mine, because your brother or husband or boyfriend has a real existence, and with this real existence he can enforce the censoring of his old name and its replacement with his new one. However, from the start of this story, I have seen Dara in the shape of the word “Dara,” I have grown attached to him, and it is with this name that I have developed his character. If, based on the Sinbad Theory, I change his name at this point, I will also have to change his character. For a writer, this is akin to committing cold-blooded premeditated murder. Yes, it is true that my writings are dark and that because of the darkness in my mind I have sent several of my stories’ characters to death and destruction. But these days, with all my being, as a will and last testament, I want to write a bright love story in which there is no sorrow, no one dies, no hearts suffer, not even the tip of a pencil breaks.

It is here that I must recount the story of naming my daughter. Even if you don’t ask, I will tell you:

When my daughter was born I wanted to name her B
r
n (Rain). In fact, to find this unique and rare name, I had reflected and researched for more than a month. I had told myself that the daughter of a young man who wants to someday become one of the greatest writers of his country, even of the world, should have a name that is Iranian, beautiful, literary, rare, a symbol of life and reflective of the particular creative taste of her parents … But when I went to the General Register Office to get her birth certificate, I was told that I could not name my daughter B
r
n. I asked:

“Why can’t I name my daughter B
r
n?”

The young bearded administrator in charge of birth certificates looked at me as though he were looking at some idiot who had given no thought to the future and fate of his daughter and said:

“I have never heard of anyone naming their daughter B
r
n.”

“But I want to name my daughter B
r
n.”