MomReviews

I’m pleased to be bringing you this review of Nahid Rachlin’s memoir “Persian Girls: A Memoir”, as part of the MotherTalk book tour. “Persian Girls” tells Ms. Rachlin’s story of growing up in Iran, starting with being raised by her Aunt Maryam. In her words, she was a “gift” to Maryam from her younger sister Mohtaram. Nahid was Mohtaram’s seventh child, and Maryam was both childless and a widow, so Nahid was given to Maryam to raise. Maryam was raising Nahid in a typical house in Tehran, with high walls around the house so no men passing by could see in, and a communal courtyard in the middle that they shared with two other widows. Nahid was very happy there.

Then, one day when she was nine, her father suddenly showed up at school to take her back to her birth mother and the family she didn’t not know at all. Her thirteen year old sister Pari became her friend and confidante, and together they went to see American movies and dreamed of going to America. However, at eighteen, Pari was pressured by their parents to agree to an arranged marriage. Nahid was able to escape a similar fate by persuading her father to send her to college in America instead.

My favorite parts of this book were the descriptions of the every day life of Iranians-the food they ate, the clothes they wore, their cultures and traditions. I was fascinated by the description of Pari’s wedding. The only thing I wished there had been more of was descriptions of Nahid’s life at college. Those chapters go by very quickly and with very little detail. She makes no friends except for a girl she calls Linda, who drops out. She describes events such as mixers with boys invited from other colleges (I believe she is at an all-girls college, she calls it Lindengrove, but I couldn’t find any colleges with that name), sermons in the chapel that are required regardless of religion, as just “floating around her without meaning”. I kept wanting her to try harder to get to know her classmates.

This would be an excellent choice for a book club. There’s a reading group guide at the back with eight discussion topics, for example, the problem Ms. Rachlin had with feeling that she didn’t fit in with Iranian traditions, and yet she didn’t fit in with American traditions either. There’s the differences in how Ms. Rachlin saw the two cultures treat women’s beauty-Iranian women have to hide behind high walls and head scarves, while her college dormmates spent the time before a dance fluffing their hair and spraying on perfume in order to call attention to themselves. These topics as well as the way that Iranian law, culture and religion shaped Ms. Rachlin’s life, would all be great discussion topics.

You can learn more about Nahid Rachlin by visiting her website. She gives frequent readings and lectures in the New York area, and will be in Chicago in May. Meanwhile, pick up a copy of “Persian Girls: A Memoir” at the bookstore or library, or on Amazon.com.

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