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About the author
تقی مدرسی
6 books16 followersTaghi Modarressi was born in 1932 (۱۳۱۱) in Tehran, Iran, the son of a lawyer. Two years after the young Taghi had begun elementary school, his father passed away, leaving behind a widow and three sons who subsequently moved into Modarresi’s maternal grandfather’s house. Later his grandfather’s personal library provided him with a wealth of reading material, some of which inspired his literary creations.
Taghi entered Tehran University Medical School, earned a medical degree, where he started also writing, became chief editor of Sadaf, a prestigious literary journal. Modarressi’s literary debut novel, Yakolyā wa tanhāi-e u (Yakolya and Her Loneliness, 1955) was published in Iran when he was student. Modarresi’s interest in psychology drew him to researching zār, the traditional means of treating psychological illness, practiced in the Persian Gulf region of Iran. While visiting villages and collecting materials for his thesis, Modarresi had an encounter that changed the course of his life. Suspecting him of revolutionary and leftist motives, the secret police detained and questioned him and confiscated his tape recordings and notes.
Becoming frustrated, Modarresi left Persia in 1959 for his post doctorate trainings in psychiatry and child psychiatry in Wichita, Kansas, took a residency at Duke University (1961-1963), which is where he met Miss Anne Tyler (http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/...),
a popular American writer in 1963. They married and soon moved to Montreal, where he began a residency at McGill University, was a professor of University of Maryland.
In 1982, he founded the Center for Infant Study, which is one of the few that offers psychiatric care for children under 5. In the late 1980s, Dr. Modarressi founded the Coldspring Family Center Therapeutic Nursery, housed at a Head Start center in Pimlico, which attempts to intervene as early as possible in the lives of children who have suffered emotionally scarring traumas. He died because of cancer in Baltimore, 1376 / 1997 at age 65. Anne Tyler wrote her memoir of living with Taghi in form of a novel in "Back when we were gone".
In the years that Modarresi devoted to settling into his new life and profession, the only significant literary work he published was Šarif jān, šarif jān (1961). It was not until after the 1979 revolution and the mass migration of Iranians to the United States that Modarresi found himself drawn back to fiction. He associates his return to writing with the discovery of what he calls a “new internal voice”. This new voice enabled him to recover his literary voice in Persian and determined his approach to the translation of the two of his novels, Ketāb-e ādamhā-ye ghāyeb (The book of Absent People, New York, 1986), and Ādāb-e ziārat (The Pilgrim’s Rules of Etiquette, New York, 1989). The two novels begin to link the theme of inner exile with the realities of cross-cultural existence. Modarresi’s last, and as yet unpublished novel, Azrā-ye Khalwat nešin (The Virgin of Solitude), also revolves around the themes of loneliness and inner exile that runs through Modarresi’s fiction.
Taghi Modarressi is arguably the best example of a bilingual writer who wrote and published both in Persian and English. He is a good example of an active scientific / creative mind, like Bahram Sadeghi (http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/...)
and Gholamhossein Saedi (http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/...),
lasted from Yakolia 1330's / 1950's to Azra of 1370's / 1990's, with a 24 years of break in between!
As Modarresi was engaged in writing The Virgin of Solitude (Azrā-ye Khalwat nešin), he was diagnosed with chronic lymphoma. In 1996 he retired from the University of Maryland and devoted more time to his fiction. He succeeded in completing The Virgin of Solitude before his death on April 23, 1997. Modarresi is survived by his wife, Anne Tyler, and two daugh
Taghi entered Tehran University Medical School, earned a medical degree, where he started also writing, became chief editor of Sadaf, a prestigious literary journal. Modarressi’s literary debut novel, Yakolyā wa tanhāi-e u (Yakolya and Her Loneliness, 1955) was published in Iran when he was student. Modarresi’s interest in psychology drew him to researching zār, the traditional means of treating psychological illness, practiced in the Persian Gulf region of Iran. While visiting villages and collecting materials for his thesis, Modarresi had an encounter that changed the course of his life. Suspecting him of revolutionary and leftist motives, the secret police detained and questioned him and confiscated his tape recordings and notes.
Becoming frustrated, Modarresi left Persia in 1959 for his post doctorate trainings in psychiatry and child psychiatry in Wichita, Kansas, took a residency at Duke University (1961-1963), which is where he met Miss Anne Tyler (http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/...),
a popular American writer in 1963. They married and soon moved to Montreal, where he began a residency at McGill University, was a professor of University of Maryland.
In 1982, he founded the Center for Infant Study, which is one of the few that offers psychiatric care for children under 5. In the late 1980s, Dr. Modarressi founded the Coldspring Family Center Therapeutic Nursery, housed at a Head Start center in Pimlico, which attempts to intervene as early as possible in the lives of children who have suffered emotionally scarring traumas. He died because of cancer in Baltimore, 1376 / 1997 at age 65. Anne Tyler wrote her memoir of living with Taghi in form of a novel in "Back when we were gone".
In the years that Modarresi devoted to settling into his new life and profession, the only significant literary work he published was Šarif jān, šarif jān (1961). It was not until after the 1979 revolution and the mass migration of Iranians to the United States that Modarresi found himself drawn back to fiction. He associates his return to writing with the discovery of what he calls a “new internal voice”. This new voice enabled him to recover his literary voice in Persian and determined his approach to the translation of the two of his novels, Ketāb-e ādamhā-ye ghāyeb (The book of Absent People, New York, 1986), and Ādāb-e ziārat (The Pilgrim’s Rules of Etiquette, New York, 1989). The two novels begin to link the theme of inner exile with the realities of cross-cultural existence. Modarresi’s last, and as yet unpublished novel, Azrā-ye Khalwat nešin (The Virgin of Solitude), also revolves around the themes of loneliness and inner exile that runs through Modarresi’s fiction.
Taghi Modarressi is arguably the best example of a bilingual writer who wrote and published both in Persian and English. He is a good example of an active scientific / creative mind, like Bahram Sadeghi (http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/...)
and Gholamhossein Saedi (http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/...),
lasted from Yakolia 1330's / 1950's to Azra of 1370's / 1990's, with a 24 years of break in between!
As Modarresi was engaged in writing The Virgin of Solitude (Azrā-ye Khalwat nešin), he was diagnosed with chronic lymphoma. In 1996 he retired from the University of Maryland and devoted more time to his fiction. He succeeded in completing The Virgin of Solitude before his death on April 23, 1997. Modarresi is survived by his wife, Anne Tyler, and two daugh
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September 3, 2013Modarresi’s last, and as yet unpublished novel, Azrā-ye Khalwat nešin (The Virgin of Solitude), also revolves around the themes of loneliness (As Yakolia in his first novel). A young boy, Nuri, along with his sister move into their grandparents’ house, after their father is killed in a car accident and their mother moves to New York. Nuri’s grandfather is from an old and well-connected family who worked his way into the Pahlavi establishment by becoming a Senator. For young Nuri, his Austrian grandmother, ”Madame” is a mystery (being different)! Nuri wants to know more about his grandmother … it is no longer only Madame who is a stranger, as other members of the family find their identity and sense of belonging challenged… in a sense of alienation, as lots of all those who straddle two languages and cultures …(according to Modarresi), regardless of the familial, social, or political circumstances causing their exile... they leave because they feel like outsiders… but can they finally seek asylum at host society? Or like Madame (an Austrian in Iran), after many years of living in Iran and speaking Persian, even the closest members of the family call her Madame, even after death, she has no chance to be buried in host society (Muslim cemetery)!
مادام، زنی اتریشی، همسر یک مرد ایرانی ست که به مقام سناتوری رسیده... زبان فارسی مادام، مغلق و منشیانه است(معلمش یک قمی بوده که پس از انقلاب عبا می پوشد و عمامه می گذارد و...) مادام مسلمان هم شده است! نوه های مادام، نوری و خواهرش لادن، پس از آن که پدرشان در یک تصادف فوت می کند و مادرشان به آمریکا می رود، در خانه ی مادام، بزرگ می شوند، خانه ای که بنظر اسرارآمیز می آید... نوری برای ادامه ی تحصیل به خارج می رود و خواهرش در تهران زندگی می کند، مادام فوت می کند اما اجازه ی دفن او را در قبرستان مسلمانان نمی دهند... نوری که برای مرگ مادر بزرگ به ایران آمده، و کنجکاوانه در گذشته و اثاثیه ی مادام کنکاش می کند، به دختری که ده سال از خودش بزرگ تر است، علاقمند می شود، و بالاخره هم از راه کوه و صحرا (غیر قانونی) از کشور خارج می شود... همه از زبان و فرهنگ خود، به زبان و فرهنگی بیگانه می گریزند، شاید گشایشی در زندگی شان پیش بیاید، آسایش یا چیزی در حد یک زندگی بهتر اما ... مادام اتریشی که عمری برای "همرنگ شدن" زبان فارسی یاد گرفته و حتی مسلمان شده و ... در انتها از سوی جامعه ی میزبان پذیرفته نشده است (بعد از سال ها زندگی در ایران، حتی افراد خانواده هم هنوز او را "مادام" صدا می کنند و پس از مرگ، جسدش هم به قبرستان مسلمانان راه ندارد)
مادام، زنی اتریشی، همسر یک مرد ایرانی ست که به مقام سناتوری رسیده... زبان فارسی مادام، مغلق و منشیانه است(معلمش یک قمی بوده که پس از انقلاب عبا می پوشد و عمامه می گذارد و...) مادام مسلمان هم شده است! نوه های مادام، نوری و خواهرش لادن، پس از آن که پدرشان در یک تصادف فوت می کند و مادرشان به آمریکا می رود، در خانه ی مادام، بزرگ می شوند، خانه ای که بنظر اسرارآمیز می آید... نوری برای ادامه ی تحصیل به خارج می رود و خواهرش در تهران زندگی می کند، مادام فوت می کند اما اجازه ی دفن او را در قبرستان مسلمانان نمی دهند... نوری که برای مرگ مادر بزرگ به ایران آمده، و کنجکاوانه در گذشته و اثاثیه ی مادام کنکاش می کند، به دختری که ده سال از خودش بزرگ تر است، علاقمند می شود، و بالاخره هم از راه کوه و صحرا (غیر قانونی) از کشور خارج می شود... همه از زبان و فرهنگ خود، به زبان و فرهنگی بیگانه می گریزند، شاید گشایشی در زندگی شان پیش بیاید، آسایش یا چیزی در حد یک زندگی بهتر اما ... مادام اتریشی که عمری برای "همرنگ شدن" زبان فارسی یاد گرفته و حتی مسلمان شده و ... در انتها از سوی جامعه ی میزبان پذیرفته نشده است (بعد از سال ها زندگی در ایران، حتی افراد خانواده هم هنوز او را "مادام" صدا می کنند و پس از مرگ، جسدش هم به قبرستان مسلمانان راه ندارد)
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