Reading Lolita in Tehran_ A Memoir in Books - Azar Nafisi [170]
Most people make that mistake about Austen, he said. They should read her more carefully.
Yes, that’s what I told her—Austen’s theme is cruelty not under extraordinary circumstances but ordinary ones, committed by people like us. Surely that’s more frightening? And that’s why I like Bellow, I said with a flourish, thinking of my new flame.
How fickle you are, he said. What happened to Nabokov? One book and he’s old news! No, but really, I said, trying to ignore his mocking tone. Bellow’s novels are about private cruelties, about the ordeal of freedom, the burden of choice—so are James’s, for that matter. It’s frightening to be free, to have to take responsibility for your decisions. Yes, he said, to have no Islamic Republic to blame. And I’m not saying they’re blameless, he added after a brief pause—far from it.
Look here, I said, rummaging through More Die of Heartbreak, which I had brought along for the sole purpose of quoting my favorite passages to him: “The meaning of the Revolution was that Russia had attempted to isolate itself from the ordeal of modern consciousness. It was a sealing off. Inside the sealed country, Stalin poured on the old death. In the West, the ordeal is of a new death. There aren’t any words for what happens to the soul in the free world. Never mind ‘rising entitlements,’ never mind the luxury ‘life-style.’ Our buried judgment knows better. All this is seen by remote centers of consciousness, which struggle against full wakefulness. Full wakefulness would make us face up to the new death, the peculiar ordeal of our side of the world. The opening of a true consciousness to what is actually occurring would be a purgatory.”
I love this “poured on the old death,” I told him. He talks somewhere about the “atrophy of feeling”—the West is gripped by an “atrophy of feeling . . .”
Yes, he said. Mr. Bellow, Saul as your students call him, is highly quotable. I don’t know if that’s a virtue or a fault.
Who started me on this? Who gave me The Bellarosa Connection? I asked him accusingly. I think this is important for my class. They tend to look at the West too uncritically; they have a rosy picture of the West, thanks to the Islamic Republic. All that is good in their eyes comes from America or Europe, from chocolates and chewing gum to Austen and the Declaration of Independence. Bellow gives them a truer experience of this other place. He allows them to see its problems and its fears.
Look here, I said. This is the whole point. This is what we’re going through. . . . He was not looking at me. You’re not listening, I said impatiently. He was looking behind me and making motions to the waiter, who was soon at our table. What’s going on? he asked. What’s all the commotion about? For there was a commotion behind us, which I had missed in my eagerness to propound the virtues of Mr. Bellow.
The waiter explained that this was a raid. Guards were standing at the entrance door, monitoring those who had started to leave. He delicately suggested that if we were not related, my magician should move to another table and I could explain, were I asked what I was doing there, that I was waiting for my order from the pastry shop.
I said, We are not doing anything wrong—I am not going to move—and, turning to my magician, added, Nor are you. Don’t be stupid, he said. You don’t want to create a scandal. I’ll call Bijan right now, I said. What good will that do? he shot back. Do you really think they will listen to him, since he has no control over his wife? He rose with his coffee cup in his hands. You forgot something, I said, handing him the copy of A Thousand and One Nights. He said, in English, Now you’re being childish. I think you need something to keep you busy, I said, and besides, I already photocopied the other one you gave me. He walked to a distant table with his coffee and the books, and I sat alone, trying to eat my napoleon, ferociously leafing through More Die of Heartbreak, as if cramming for the next day