This is a collection of the letters of Nima Yushij (1897-1960), the prominent 20th-century Iranian poet who is regarded as the founder and father of modern Persian poetry. Nima Yushij devoted his life to his art and advocating his innovative style in poetry, mostly through his correspondences. The letters in "The Neighbor Says" are addressed to an imaginary neighbour or acquaintance. Although in many instances he comments on specific poems or stories that are assumed to have been sent to him by the person he addresses in his letters, it gradually becomes clear to the reader that "the Neighbour" might not exist, but that he might be an alter ego of the poet, a device with which the author can expound his ideas about poetry. The importance of the letters lies in the fact that Nima Yushij employs them as a vehicle through which to express his philosophy, ideas and vision for a modern, innovative and revolutionary approach to the art of poetry. In these letters which may serve as his "manifesto" for modern Persian poetry, Nima Yushij discusses, often in detail, what he means by modern prosody; why he more or less but not always abandons the classical rules of versification; how his vision and understanding of modern life and modern man differs from that of his predecessors, (ie: Persian poetic giants such as Rumi, Hafez, Sa'di, Ferdowsi and Nezami). This is the literary tradition that Nima Yushij challenges. He challenges the traditions in the society and the traditional ways not only by writing poetry that sounds strange and unfamiliar; is difficult to understand, as many of his contemporary readers were inclined to believe, and breaking the traditional rules of prosody and diction; but also introducing his own rules of prosody and a new poetic vocabulary. The volume also includes an essay on an important, usually neglected aspect of the writings of Nima Yushij, namely his short stories, which should be considered indispensable to an under-standing and appreciation of his poetry.

Women writers occupy prominent positions in contemporary Iranian literature, despite the increased legal and cultural restrictions placed upon women since the 1978-1979 Islamic Revolution. One of these writers is Moniru Ravanipur, author of the critically acclaimed The Drowned and Heart of Steel.

Satan's Stones is the first English translation of her 1991 short story collection Sangha-ye Sheytan. Often set in the remote regions of Iran, these stories explore many facets of contemporary Iranian life, particularly the ever-shifting relations between women and men. Their bold literary experimentation marks a new style in Persian fiction akin to "magical realism."

Recent reports from Iran indicate that Satan's Stones has been banned there by government authorities. While its frank explorations of Iranian society may have offended Islamic leaders, they offer Western readers fresh perspectives on Iranian culture from one of the country's most distinguished writers.

Translating a work of literature from one language to another is an art form, in which the translated work becomes a "conduit" through which the reader of one language may pass into the cultural world of another. For the translator, the process of translation offers an intimate experience of the text that is perhaps unavailable even to the author. And yet, as M. R. Ghanoonparvar observes at the outset of this book, "every translation is inevitably a failure, with occasional moments of success."

In Translating the Garden, Ghanoonparvar allows readers to watch him in the process of translating Shahrokh Meskub's Goftogu dar Bagh(Dialogue in the Garden) from Persian into English. This short philosophical work uses a conversation between a writer and a painter to explore Persian perceptions of art, literature, nature, identity, and spirituality. As he translates the text, Ghanoonparvar discusses the myriad decisions that a literary translator faces, from word choices to the problems of conveying cultural concepts and deciphering authorial intent. He also compares some of his translated passages with those of other translators to highlight the uniqueness of each act of translation. The complete English translation of Dialogue in the Garden rounds out the volume.

"I do not know of any other work which surveys the whole range of 19th- and 20th-century Persian prose writing in this way--from the travel accounts (safarnamehs) of the 19th century down to the present day. Of especial interest and importance to Western readers is the author's analysis of post-revolutionary writing." --roger m. savory, professor emeritus of middle eastern and islamic studies, university of toronto The extreme anti-Western actions and attitudes of Iranians in the past decade have astonished and dismayed the West, which has characterized the Iranian positions as irrational and inexplicable. In this groundbreaking study of images of the West in Iranian literature, however, M. R. Ghanoonparvar reveals that these attitudes did not develop suddenly or inexplicably but rather evolved over more than two centuries of Persian-Western contact. Notable among the authors whose works Ghanoonparvar discusses are Sadeq Hedayat, M. A. Jamalzadeh, Hushang Golshiri, Gholamhoseyn Sa'edi, Simin Daneshvar, Moniru Ravanipur, Sadeq Chubak, and Jalal Al-e Ahmad. This survey significantly illuminates the sources of Iranian attitudes toward the West and offers many surprising discoveries for Western readers, not least of which is the fact that Iranians have often found Westerners to be as enigmatic and incomprehensible as we have believed them to be.

The celebrated and beloved fourteenth-century Persian poet Hafez continues to play an essential role in the lives of Iranians today. For centuries, scholars have studied his work, exploring both his life and his deeply moving poetry of love, spirituality, and protest. Yet, Shahrokh Meskoob is one of the first scholars to take an innovative approach to Hafez's poetry. Meskoob goes beyond a linguistic and rhetorical analysis of Hafez's poetry in the Divan to access the interior thoughts of the poet and summon his spirit in the process of understanding Hafez's mysticism.