‘Literature as resistance’: Azar Nafisi on the subversive power of reading in troubled times

Azar Nafisi is the author of Reading Lolita in Tehran, which spent 117 weeks on the New York Times Best Sellers list.

Her newest book, Read Dangerously, argues that reading literature, reading challenging, dangerous literature is foundational and fundamental to continued democracy.

Imagination, itself, she says, is a threat to autocracy and totalitarianism. Imagination is inherently, by definition, “free and wayward.”

“It should be clear by now that when I talk about books,” Nafisi writes, “I am not talking about literature of resistance but literature as resistance.”

Azar Nafisi joins us for the hour.

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• Azar Nafisi: The author of six books; her newest is Read Dangerously: The Subversive Power of Literature in Troubled Times

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Colin McEnroe and Cat Pastor contributed to this show, which originally aired April 7, 2022.

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