Born: Tehran, February 1923. Education: Finished his preliminary and high education in Tehran (Dar al-Fonun); Faculty of Letters, Theran Teachers’ College, 1943-1946. Family: Married the writer Simin Daneshvar in 1950. Career: Studied English and French on his own and used his competence in translating major western works into Persian and carrying out research in sociology, anthropology and dialectology of some remote areas of Iran, 1956-1960. Worked as a teacher throughout his life; was actively involved in the Tudeh (”People”), the local communist party, and was editor of its publications, Mardom and Rahbar, 1944-1947; Joined in the founding of the Hezb-e zahmatkeshan (”Toilers’ Party”), 1950; supported the nationalist government of Muhammad Mosaddeq, 1951-1953; served as unofficial spokesman for the 1950s and 1960s dissident intelligentsia, and edited its two publications, Niru-ye sevvom (”Third force”) and ‘Elm o zendegi (”Science and life”); composed many travel journals and village studies; his Chahar Ka’be (”Four Ka’bas”), including accounts of his journeys to the U.S.S.R., United States.,Europe, and Israel, remains unpublished; in the last part of life, he tried to restore a nationalist government that would return Iran to independence. Died: In a village in Gilan region, 9 September 1969; according to his wife, poisoned by Shah’s agents. He was buried near the Firuzabadi mosque at Shahr-e Rey, Tehran.
Publications
Collections of Short Stories
Did o bazdid. 1945. Az ranj ke mibarim. 1947.
Se-tar. 1948; translated in Iranian Society; An Anthology of Writings by Jalal Al-e Ahmad, edited by Michael C. Hillman, 1982.
Zan-e ziyadi. 1952.
Panj dastan. 1974.
Novels and Novelettes Sargozasht-e kanduha.1956.
Modir-e madrase. 1958; as The School Principal, translated by John Newton, 1974.
Nun wa’l-qalam. 1961; as By the Pen, translated by M. R. Ghanooparvar, 1988.
Sang-i bar gur-i. 1964; as A Gravestone, 1991.
Nefrin-e zamin. 1967.
Essays
Haft maqale. 1955.
Se maqale-ye digar. 1960.
Gharbzadegi. 1960; as Plagued by the West, translated by Paul Sprachman, 1982; as Weststruckness, translated by John Green and Ahmad Alizadeh, 1982 (2nd ed. 1997); as Occidentosis: A Plague from the West, translated by R. Campbell, 1984.
Arziyabi-e shetabzade. 1964.
Yek chah va do chale va masalan sarh-e ahwalat. 1969.
Dar khedmat va khiyanat-e roushanfekran. 1964-68.
Karname-ye se sale. 1968.
Esra’il ‘amel-e emperyalism. 1978.
Other
Khas-i dar miqat. 1966.
Ourazan. 1956.
Tat-neshinha-ye boluk-e Zahra. 1958.
Dorr-e yatim-e Khalij: Jazire-ye Kharg. 1960.
Translator, Qomarbaz (Igrok), by Fedor Dostoevski], from French.
Translator, Bigane (L’Etranger), by Albert Camus; with A. Khebrazade.
Translator, Su’e tafahom (Le Malentendu), by Albert Camus.
Translator, Bazgasht az Shouravi (Retour d’U.R.S.S.), by A. Gide.
Translator, Ma’edaha-ye zamini (Les nourritures terrestres), by A.Gide, with P. Daryush.
Translator, Dastha-ye alude (Les mains sales), by J. P. Sartre.
Translator, ‘Obur az khatt (Uber die Linie), by Ernst Junger, with M. Human. 1966.
Translator, Kargadan (Le rhinoceros), by E. Ionesco.
Translator, Teshnegi o gorosnegi (La soif et la faim), by E. Ionesco; completed by M. Hezarkhani. 1976.
Critical Studies:
Human Values in the Works of Two Persian Writers, in Correspondence d’Orient, by G. R. Sabri-Tabrizi, 1970; The Modern Literary Idiom, in Iran Faces the Seventies, by E. Yar-shater, 1971; Al-e Ahmad Fictional Legacy, in Iranian Studies, 9/4, by M. Hillman, 1976. Gecshichte und Entwicklung der modern persischen Literatur, 1964; Jalal Al-e Ahmad, ecrivain iranien d’aujourd’hui, in Melanges de l’Institut dominicain d’u Caire, by G. Jourdain Monnot, 1967. Qesse-nevisi, by R. Baraheni, 1969.
Jalal Al-e Ahmad is one of the most eminent figures of contemporary Persian literature, basically a fiction writer, but nevertheless an equally important ideologue of modern Iran. Being very talented, energetic, and passionately interested in the fate of his nation’s culture and political future, he played a decisive role in shaping the mind and actions of an entire generation of young intellectuals. In many respects he is a literary precursor of Dr. ‘Ali Shari’ati who couldn’t surpass Al-e Ahmad in literary excellence.
Jalal Al-e Ahmad’s typical telegraphic prose, revealing both arrogance and impatience even in syntax and rhythm, became a pattern for many Iranian young aspiring writers. He impressed the audience as one who knew the troubles and had the remedy for the problems of his country; critics termed him the ”wide-awake conscience” of Iran.
Al-e Ahmad published writings fill more than twenty volumes and include, not to mention the works of fiction for which he is most admired, travel journals, translations, village studies, essays, and reviews. His first published story, Ziyarat [The Pilgrimage], appeared in the March 21st (nouruz, the Iranian New Year’s Day) issue of Sokhan in 1945. An immediate critical success, it was republished at the end of the same year in his first published collection of stories, Did o bazdid [The Exchange of Visits]. His anti-religious stance in those stories marked his complete break with Islam and his family background (he belonged to a family of strong religious traditions). Three more collections of stories followed in the next seven years: Az ranj ke mibarim [From Our Suffering], Se-tar [The Sitar] and Zan-e ziyadi [The Superfluous Woman], respectively in 1947, 1948, and 1952. His stories are detailed sketches from the ordinary events of daily life; one of his critics likens him to a photographer who can convey the whole complex emotional universe of ordinary people by the careful arrangement of ordinary snapshots (B. Alavi, Gecshichte, pp.221-23). Al-e Ahmad turned to the composition of longer works in 1954, and in 1958 published his most celebrated novel, Modir-e madrase [The School Principal]; these novelettes have more extended plots than the earlier short stories, but share with them a taste for incident, an emphasis on colloquial and idiomatic language, and an understated style of characterisation of the psychological and emotional depths of the individuals portrayed. The themes of Al-e Ahmad fiction are diverse; prominent among them, however, are the superstitious beliefs of the common people, recorded in people’s own language; excess of the clergy in their exploitation of the visible advantages of religion; and intrusion of western ideas into Iranian traditional ideology.
But the fame of Al-e Ahmad increased considerably with his most widely known work of non-fiction, Gharbzadegi (a Persian compound word whose meaning is approximately ”weststruckness” or ”occidentosis”). This work has more the quality of polemic than of reasoned historical argument, and gives voice to the widespread belief that Iranian culture is endangered by the forces for change now at work within it. The importance of Al-e Ahmad’s work was rediscovered by the Islamic intelligentsia during the 1979 Revolution when his anthropological research in remote areas of rural Iran helped to bolster his re-evaluation of Islam.
The two elements of Jalal Al-e Ahmad’s work that appear to have made the greatest impression on his younger contemporaries are his deep sense of social commitment and his prose style. He was well read in such modern French writers as Camus, Sartre and Celine, but was also a careful student of Persian literature, both classical and modern. From this various sources he elaborated a powerful and idiomatic style, that is a vivid representation of colloquial speech and yet as richly suggestive as classical prose.
