Looking for literature in Tehran

AZADEH MOAVENI writes in the NYT book review about reading in Tehran. Most of the books are self help books dealing with Indian spirituality and feng Shui. After reading Lolita in Tehran, i imagined there to be a big reading culture existing there.

When I moved to Iran in 2000 to work as a journalist, I aspired to belong to a literary circle not unlike that of the engaged women of Azar Nafisi’s “Reading Lolita in Tehran,” who found relief from their authoritarian society in the imaginative world of novels. That bookstores did not exist as such — there were only bookstore/stationery stores, or bookstore/toy stores — was the first sign my plan might not work. I initially mistook Tehran’s most popular bookstore, with its windows full of weathered copper pots and other bric-a-brac, for an antique shop. Inside, the floor space dedicated to books was roughly a quarter of that taken up by kilims, cactuses and Lego sets. “I’m embarrassed to call myself a bookseller,” one store owner told me recently, gazing at the wall of Hello Kitty accessories that dominated his shop. In the hour we spent talking, customers came in to buy watch batteries, a condolence card, wrapping paper and a compass. Not a single person bought a book.