Balqis Soleimani, Iranian writer:
“…From the early 90s, because of my work at the Council for the Expansion of the Persian Language, I had some passing acquaintance with Tajik literature, but I can confidently say that the novel A Woman Who Walkes with Statues by Shahzoda Samarqandi is the first truly important novel I have read in the Persian script by a writer from Tajikistan…”
A Woman Who Walked with Statues Kun Fayakun (“Be, and it is”)
Some scholars believe that the isolation of the Persian language is one of the reasons why Persian novels and short stories have not gained a global audience. As far as I know, Persian is an official language not only in Iran but also in Afghanistan and Tajikistan. For years I have closely followed Afghan fiction, and in all fairness, Afghan writers—despite war, other domestic hardships, and endless migration—have created unique and remarkable works.
From the early 1370s, thanks to my position at the Council for the Expansion of the Persian Language, I had some acquaintance with Tajik literature as well, yet I can boldly say that Shahzade Samarqandi’s A Woman Who Walkes with Statues is the first major novel I have read in the Persian script by a Tajik author. As we know, the script used in that region is Cyrillic, and this very fact has created obstacles for other Persian-speakers in accessing the literary output of that country’s writers and poets.
It seems that only a small number of writers and literati there, after Tajikistan’s independence, have harboured (and still harbour) the desire to write in the Persian script. This effort has helped—and continues to help—the different varieties of Persian to connect with one another, enriching the language and increasing its number of users, thereby reducing the isolation of this ancient and fertile tongue.
Fortunately, Shahzade Samarqandi’s novel was published in Iran by Khordegan Publications before it could be printed in the Netherlands (where the author now lives) or any other country. I take this as a very good omen and hope that this work will be seen and read in Iran, the cradle of Persian language and literature.
That said, right from the start I must warn that reading this book is not entirely easy or smooth for an Iranian reader. The reason is the distance that exists between Iranian Persian writing and Tajik Persian writing. We do not have—or have very little of—this distance and difficulty with Dari (Afghan) Persian texts. Neighbourhood ties, the frequent coming and going of Afghan writers to Iran, and the publication of many Afghan authors’ works in Iran have all created that closeness. By contrast, seventy or eighty years of writing in the Cyrillic script in Tajikistan have prevented the Persian script in that region from evolving and keeping pace with the times. It is as though for a writer who has read and written in Cyrillic for years, switching to the Persian script feels like translating from one script into another. For this reason, when an Iranian reader encounters a novel like Ms Samarqandi’s, they sometimes hit bumps and rough patches in the writing that—being unaccustomed to this style—slow down the act of reading. Yet we should remember that all these things can be possibilities and subtleties that one variety of Persian can offer to another. Full, multidirectional contact between the Tajik, Dari, and Iranian varieties of Persian can make the trunk, branches, and fruit of this culturally prolific language thicker and more abundant.
But if you want to read a contemporary novel with a sideways glance at postmodernist fiction, I recommend Ms Samarqandi’s novel. Its subject is the very act of writing, the process of creating a literary work, and the relationship of power with words and with writers.
If you want to read a feminist novel that subtly explores the relationship between two women and ultimately prefers sisterly solidarity over male–female relationships, read this slim volume.
If you want to know how, beyond Iran’s own abundance of political conflicts and political novels, the relationship between politicians and people of culture plays out in another shared cultural geography such as Tajikistan, read this work.
And if you dream of oneness with our kin regardless of political borders, read Ms Samarqandi’s novel, embrace her and her work, and welcome this “Samani” daughter with open arms.
Publisher:
https://denabooks.com/product/زنی-که-با-مجسمه-ها-راه-می-رفت/