From Durham to Tehran: Persianist Impressions

by Michael Craig Hillmann

From Durham to Tehran presents a Persian literature specialist's impressions and reflections on his field of study and profession, based on two research trips, one to Durham, England in 1986 and the other to Tehran, Iran in 1989. With a format of travel diary entries, the book intends to suggest issues which American students of non Western literary cultures face in their professional lives. It highlights ambiguities which characterize the situations and experiences of American students of living non-Western literatures. Moreover, it suggests that involvement in an older non-Western literary culture impels theAmerican to reflection on his or her own roots and cultural history. It includes memories of many notable literary figures including Jalal Al-e Ahmad, Ali Shariati and Sadeq Chubak. Baltimore-born author Michael Craig Hillmann first traveled to Iran as an American Peace Corps Volunteer in 1965, his assignment to teach English language and literature at the Faculty of Letters at Mashhad University. He met his wife Sorayya there. They married in 1967. He thereafter studied Persian, Arabic, and Islam at The University of Chicago and Tehran University. His daughter Elizabeth was born in Tehran in 1970. Since 1974 he has taught Persian literature and Iranian culture at The University of Texas at Austin. He writes on medieval Persian epic and lyric verse, twentieth-century Persian fiction and lyric poetry, Persian carpets, and Iranian painting.

Paperback

First published November 1, 1991

About the author

Michael Craig Hillmann, Ph.D., (born May 5, 1940) is professor of Persian Studies at the University of Texas at Austin and President of Persepolis Institute, Inc. He has published widely on Persian language and literature and specializes in lyric Persian verse, Persian prose fiction from the 1920s through the 1970s, and literary autobiography. Since the late 1990s, he has focused on Persian instructional materials development, resulting in, among other things, a new Persian language learning syllabus in four volumes called "Persian for America(ns)."