
The Bombay Review’s
Iranian Edition (Vol II)
Issue 40, March; ’21
Hello readers, writers, and you!
Welcome to The Bombay Review’s Iranian Edition (Vol II). This two volume series is part of our effort to bring international literature and new writing to The Bombay Review readers, who are largely based out of South Asia and the United States. A delicately hand picked curation of art and writing, this edition has opened the doors to larger literary cooperation with Iran, with a possible event and reading later this year.
For a long time, TBR had been planning an edition to showcase the good writing coming from or about Iran. Our initial project was scheduled for a winter 2020 release, but we were delayed because of the pandemic. Here we are finally, and look forward to your feedback.
The two issues are edited and compiled by Dr. Nilofar Shidmehr. A Ph.D., MFA, she is the author of two collections of short fiction and four books of poetry in English and Farsi. She also co-translated with Ali Azarang Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye into Farsi. Dr. Shidmehr teaches in the Liberal Arts Program and Adults 55+ program at Simon Fraser University. She was born and raised in Iran and currently lives in Canada. Her website is here.
The cover art for this issue was made by Moslem Khezri (b. 1984), a painter and university lecturer from Iran. He holds an MA in Painting from Tarbiat Modares University in Tehran and a BA in Painting from the University of Sistan and Baluchestan in Zahedan. His recent most exhibitions have been at the 2020 Art Dubai and in the 2019 Art Feast 7 in Tehran.
Happy Reading!
Iranian Edition (Vol I & II) | Foreword by Dr. Nilofar Shidmehr | Issues 39, 40 (2021)
“When I migrated to Canada on Oct 30, 1997, along with my personal belongings, I also brought with me a small Iranian rug. During my first two weeks when I’d resided at the house of an old Iranian friend, it had remained in my luggage, unrolled. My friend’s house already included a few Persian carpets.…
Iranian Edition (Vol II) – Issue 40, March, 2021 (Year 8)
Iranian Edition (Vol II) | Essay by Amir Ahmadi Arian | Issue 40 (2021)
Amir Ahmadi Arian teaches literature and creative writing at CUNY City College in New York City.
His work has appeared in The New York Times, Paris Review, New York Review of Books, Al Jazeera, London Review of Books, Electric Literature, Rumpus, Michigan Quarterly Review, Words Without Borders, the Guardian, Lithub, and elsewhere. He is the…
Iranian Edition (Vol II) | Poetry by Mohsen Emadi | Issue 40 (2021)
Mohsen Emadi is an Iranian/Mexican poet, translator, programmer and filmmaker. He has published the poetry books La flor en los renglones (Lola Editorial, Spain, 2003), We never talked about her eyes (Goo Publishing, Iran, 2007), Las leyes de gravedad (Olifante, Spain, 2011), Visible como el aire, legible como la muerte (Olifante, Spain, 2012), Abismal (CrC,…
Iranian Edition (Vol II) | Fiction by Maria Saba | Issue 40 (2021)
Maria Saba is an Ottawa-based writer, storyteller, and arts educator. Born and raised in Iran, she has published three books and over a hundred articles, interviews, and stories in four continents. Maria’s short story collection, “My First Friend”, was a semi-finalist for the Iowa Short Fiction Prize, and the title story, published in Scoundrel Time…
Iranian Edition (Vol II) | Art by Fereshteh Najafi | Issue 40 (2021)
Fereshteh Najafi, an Iranian illustrator, attained a Bachelor of Graphic Design and Master in Illustration at the Azad Art University of Tehran. In 2008, she immigrated to Genova, Italy, where she directed her creative work through illustration for children’s books. In recent years Fereshteh has worked both on illustration and giving workshops in Italy, Brazil…
Iranian Edition (Vol II) | Poetry by Roger Sedarat | Issue 40 (2021)
Roger Sedarat is a professor of poetry and literary translation in the MFA Program at Queens College, City University of New York. He is the author of four poetry collections: Dear Regime: Letters to the Islamic Republic, which won Ohio UP’s 2007 Hollis Summers’ Prize, Ghazal Games (Ohio UP 2011), Foot Faults: Tennis Poems (David…
Iranian Edition (Vol II) | Fiction by Alie Ataee | Issue 40 (2021)
Alie Ataee is an Iranian-Afghan fiction writer and playwright. She has an MA in Dramatic Literature from the University of Tehran. Her stories speak to the themes of immigration and identity crisis. She has published two novels and more recently a collection of short fiction.
Her books have won several awards including the Mehregan Adam…
Iranian Edition (Vol II) | Poetry by Saeed Yousef | Issue 40 (2021)
Saeed Yousef is a former professor of Persian language and literature at the University of Chicago (2002-2020). He began writing and publishing poems in mid-1960s. A political prisoner under the Shah (1971-74), he had to leave Iran after the revolution and went to Germany as a refugee. Yousef has published about 10 books of poems,…
Iranian Edition (Vol II) | Fiction by Nahid Keshavarz | Issue 40 (2021)
Nahid Keshavarz is a graduate of journalism school in Tehran. She has been living in Koln, Germany for more than thirty years. For fourteen years she has been manager of Refugee and Immigrant affairs in city of Koln.
She has passed courses in psychoanalysis and works as a psychoanalyst part time. Nahid is an active…
Iranian Edition (Vol II) | Art by Ahlam Faez | Issue 40 (2021)
Ahlam Faez lives in Iran, is a graduate of graphics and has been illustrating for about ten years now. She has collaborated with several magazines and illustrated the book “Moon and Fish,” “Blue-Eyed Boy” and five volumes of the collection “Little Hands of Prayer.” She has also been the director of the “Hooma” Illustration Group…
Iranian Edition (Vol II) | Photography by Samad Ghorbanzadeh | Issue 40 (2021)
Samad Ghorbanzadeh, born in Oroumieh in 1984, holds a Bachelor of Graphic Design from Ferdowsi University in Mashhahd and a Masters in Photography from Tehran University of Art. His work has been featured in numerous personal and group exhibition and Installations such as Art Fact Tashkent, Mohsen Art Gallery, Silk Road (Rah-e-Abrisham) Gallery, Shirin Art…
Iranian Edition (Vol II) | Art by Sheida Mohammadi | Issue 40 (2021)
Sheida Mohammadi, born in 2000, is currently majoring in Graphic Design at the College of Fine Arts, University of Tehran. From a very young age, she was attracted towards the arts, and more specifically illustration. Even though her major is in graphic design, she mostly focuses on illustration. Doll-making has been a long term love…
Iranian Edition (Vol II) | Art by Moslem Khezri | Issue 40 (2021)
Moslem Khezri was born in 1984 in Kerman, Iran and is a painter and a university lecturer. He holds an MA in Painting from Tarbiat Modares University in Tehran and a BA in Painting from the University of Sistan and Baluchestan in Zahedan. His paintings were featured in many solo and group exhibitions in Iran…
Iranian Edition (Vol II) | Art by Ebrin Bagheri | Issue 40 (2021)
Ebrin Bagheri, born in 1983, is an Iranian/Canadian visual artist currently living and working in Toronto, Canada. Bagheri has completed a Masters of Fine Arts degree at York University, and holds visual arts degrees from other Canadian institutions, including a Bachelor of Fine Arts from OCAD University and an arts diploma from George Brown College.…
Iranian Edition (Vol II) | Fiction by Ezzat Goushegir | Issue 40 (2021)
Ezzat Goushegir currently teaches at DePaul University (SCPS) in Chicago. She has published six books in Farsi, including four collections of short stories, a collection of two plays, and a book of poetry. Her plays in English have been staged internationally, published, and received awards like the Richard Maibaum and the Norman Felton award. Since…
Iranian Edition (Vol II) | Fiction by Arash Khoshsafa | Issue 40 (2021)
Iranian-born, Arash Khoshsafa is an Iranian Ph.D. candidate in English literature at the University of Malaya in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. For his scholarly and research work, he focuses on literary criticism and American fiction, especially dirty realist writers such as Richard Ford. In the literary sphere, Arash translates fiction from English into Persian and vice…
Iranian Edition (Vol II) | Poetry by Rosa Jamali | Issue 40 (2021)
Rosa Jamali (b. 1977) is an Iranian poet based out of Tehran. She’s got an MA degree from Tehran University in English Literature, and is the author of six collections of poetry in Persian, a play, various scholarly articles and is the translator of an anthology of English Poetry in Persian. Her first book, titled…
Iranian Edition (Vol II) | Essay by Annahid Dashtgard | Issue 40 (2021)
Annahid Dashtgard is a renowned author, changemaker and co-founder of Anima Leadership, a boutique consulting company specializing in issues of diversity, inclusion and anti-racism. Previously she was a leader in the economic globalization movement, responsible for several national political campaigns and frequently referred to as one of the top activists to watch. Her published writing…
Iranian Edition (Vol II) | Art by Zahra Ashouri | Issue 40 (2021)
Zahra is a designer and illustrator from Iran. Her professional experience includes graphic designing for a number of art companies. As she developed and groomed her work, she decided to focus her creative efforts on bringing fiction characters to life through her art and graphic designing.
HERE ARE SOME GREAT CREATIVE WRITING RESOURCES FOR YOU!