PageOneLit.com:
Where
did
you
grow
up and
was
reading
and
writing
a part
of
your
life?
Who
were
your
earliest
influences
and
why?
Maryam
Tabibzadeh:
grow
up in
the
city
of
Darab
in the
province
of
Fars
in
today's
Iran.
Yes,
reading was
my
first
love
in
life.
I
had
inherited
the
love
of
reading
and
writing
from
my
father.
Both
of my
parents
were
good
readers
and
good
examples
to
follow.
My
father
subscribed
all
the
available
weekly
magazines
and my
parents
read
them
often.
PageOneLit.com:
Why do
you
write?
Maryam
Tabibzadeh:
I love
to
write.
You
wake
up in
the
middle
of the
night
and
have
some
thing
in
your
chest
and
nothing
calms
you
down
but
writing
about
it.
PageOneLit.com:
Who
and/or
what
have
been
your
biggest
influences
with
regard
to
your
writing
and
why?
Maryam
Tabibzadeh:
I give
the
credit
to
both
my
father,
whose
hand
writing
and
composition
was
the
talk
of his
friends,
and my
Uncle,
whose
poems
were
published
in
Iran's
weekly
magazines.
My
father
and my
uncle
worked
with
me on
my
writings,
I
remember
distinctly
one
day
when I
was
submerged
in one
of the
novels
I was
reading,
that
my
father
told
me you
can
create
the
same
novel
If you
want
to one
day. I
was
eleven
at the
time.
I
thought
about
it and
then I
started
writing
my
first
short
story
and
took
it to
my
school.
I
was so
pleased
to see
my
school
mates
read
it and
passed
it
along.
That
was
the
beginning
of my
writing.
Ironically
a
generation
later
I got
the
same
bout
of
encouragement
from a
close
family
member.
I was
shy to
write
anything
in
English
since
it is
my
second
language.
But my
daughter, Sheila
Mahoutchian,
gave
me the
courage
to
write,
and
she
inspired
the
creation
of
this
book.
She
painted
a
picture
of the
day my
book
would
be
published
and
asked
me how
I felt
about
it, as
if it
really
happened.
This
inspiration
was
what
stirred
the
creation
of
"Persian
Dreams"
PageOneLit.com:
Tell
us
about
"Persian
Dreams."
Maryam
Tabibzadeh:
Like
American
Gone
with
the
Wind
and
Russian’s
War
and
Peace;Persian
Dreams
combines
the
sweetness
of
romance
with
the
bitterness
of
revelation
and
war.
This
story
is
told
from
the
unique
perspective
of a
woman
between
lands.
It
shows
the
inward
nature
and
inside
perspectives
of the
people
of
Iran,
specifically
the
women,
leading
up to
and
directly
after
the
revolution
of
1978.
This
perspective
is
unique
because
we
usually
get a
picture
of
this
from
the
outside,
from
the
American
or
foreign
point
of
view,
but
here
we see
the
situation
from
the
inside.
The
historic
lesson
is
only
further
enhanced
by the
sweet
romantic
events
of a
family
through
three
generations.
Based
on
mostly
autobiographical
events,
this
novel
is
both
sweetly
nostalgic
and
simultaneous
educational.
It
opens
the
door
to the
inner
workings
of
Iranians
and
their
history,
even
while
giving
us
pretty
images
and
poetry
to
dance
on the
frames
of our
minds.
Its
uniqueness
lays
in
this
duality.
PageOneLit.com:
Where
did
the
influence
come
from
to
write
this
book?
Maryam
Tabibzadeh:
The
story
was
always
in my
mind.
I
lived
through
it, I
had
friends
that
lived
through
this,
and I
often
listened
to my
father's
and
grandmother
generation's
stories
of the
times
that
they
lived
through.
This
is the
story
of
Iranian's
last
100
years,
and
what
it has
lived
through
to get
to
where
it is
now.
My
idea
was
that
if
there
was a
way to
record
it, in
the
way of
a
story,
I
could
reach
both
the
younger
generation
of
Iranians
in
America,
and
Americans
themselves
to
educate
them
somehow
on
where
we
have
come
from
and
what
has
led up
to the
current
situation.
PageOneLit.com: In
"Persian
Dreams"
your
plot
spans
one
generation
to the
next.
As one
reviewer
says,
'Persian
Dreams
'
"...offers
great
insights
into
the
lives
of
women
in
this
society
and
how
the
changes
in the
political
climate
have
affected
women's
lives
and
roles
over
the
years."
How
much
research
did
you
have
to do
regarding
Persia/Iran
history
to
write
"Persian
Dreams"?
How
did
you
research?
Maryam
Tabibzadeh:
The
study
of
history
always
attracted
me and
all my
years
of
living
I am
reading
historical
events.
My
home
land
history
is
very
long
and
tumultuous.
I was
reading
frantically
all
the
books
I
could
find
for
the
last
100
years.
I also
have
read
many
different
books
which
were
written
during
and
after
the revolution.
My
life
in
Iran
and
the
two
research
papers
I
wrote
while
I was
a
student
in
Pahlavi
University
all
contributed
to
this
work.
I also
read
and
translated
several
poems
from
the
Persian
Language
and
tailored
them
to
this
book.
It
took
me
three
years
of
research
and
writing.
PageOneLit.com:
What
did
you as
the
writer
learn
from
writing
"Persian
Dreams?"
Maryam
Tabibzadeh:Two
things:
That
the
first
page
is
important
and
you
must
find
the
right
publisher.
It
does
not
matter
if you
write
a
great
story
but it
does
matter
if you
have a
great
agent. I
also
learn that
there
is
much
to
writing
a book
besides
research,
and
writing.
Promotions
are
the
fun
part.
PageOneLit.com:
In
"Persian
Dreams"
your
plot
covers
a
culture
that
has
gone
through
changes,
but
the
past
continues
to
inform
the
present.
Discuss
these
changes
and
the
unchanging
of
cultural
practices
Maryam
Tabibzadeh:
The
women
gained
the
rights
to
vote
and
wear
what
they
like.
The
arrival
of the
modern
schools
and
the
opportunity
for
women
to
work
in the
work
place
about
50
years
ago in
the
Iran's
traditional
culture
and
then
again
the
arrivals
of
revolution
and
the
changes
in
the
modern
society
created
by the
last
ruler
all
contributed
to the
change
in the
cultural
practices.
I felt
it was
necessary
to
show
the
multitude
of
views
on the
matters
that
shook
the
nation
through
some
of the
most
important
times
leading
up to
and
directly
after
the
Revolution.
I
wanted
to
show
that
Iran
is not
as
one-dimensional
as
people
like
to
think.
No
country
is
really.
Especially
during
a
period
of
political
unrest,
many
varying
view
points
exist
around
what
is
happening
during
these
tumultuous
times.
The
differences
in
characters
show
us all
the
different
experiences
that
were
present
throughout
these
times.
The
characters
express
experiences
that
women
underwent,
characters
that
men
had to
deal
with,
that
young
people
had to
deal
with,
in
regard
to all
the
pride
of
their
parents
and
the
culture
of
their
people.
The
characters
themselves
tell a
story
that
has
long
gone
untold.
PageOneLit.com:
Discuss
the
women
in
"Persian
Dreams"
and
how
they
must
struggle
to
find
their
place
in
Islam
but
still
be
free
to
find/follow
their
own
dreams.
Maryam
Tabibzadeh:
It
depends
on the
woman's
dreams
and
the
country
in
which
they
are
living.
For
Noosha,
she
was
able
to
achieve
her
dreams
and
have a
place
in a
Islamic
country
since
her
dreams
was to
continue
her
higher
education
and
earn
her
living
by
working.
This
is not
against
Islam
so
there
was no
contradiction
between
the
two.
However
if a
woman's
dream
is to
be
equal
to men
which
Islam
obviously
prohibits
then
there
is no
way to
have
both.
I can
not
wear
what I
like
to
wear
as a
woman
and
have a
place
in
Islam
it is
impossible.
Of
course,
there
are so
many
different
issues
which
have
the
same
nature.
PageOneLit.com:
"Persian
Dreams"
is
'well
paced'
Which
part
of the
writing
process
do you
have
the
most
difficulty
--
Plot
or
Character?
Maryam
Tabibzadeh:I
think
the
plot
was
the
hardest
part.
I did
not
know
to
choose
the
plot
style
similar
to the
fairy
tales
as Old
Persian
way of
writing
or
write
the
events
as a
flashback.
Finally
I
chose
the
fairy
tale
to go
with
the
name.
PageOneLit.com:
What
do you
hope
readers
walk
away
with
after
reading
“Persian
Dreams"
?
Maryam
Tabibzadeh:
I hope
that
they
will
be
enchanted.
The
story
carries
along
in
that
meandering
way
that
folklore
storytellers
are
famous
for,
the
images
and
