The Dance of the Rose and the Nightingale (Gender, Culture, and Politics in the Middle East)

Rating:
Summary: Charming book, a delightful read!
Review: I picked up this book because I was interested in reading about Iran in the 1940s and 50s. I was pleasantly surprised what an outstanding writer Ramazani is, she has an adept pen and is a wonderful storyteller. I was amazed how candid she was, how much personal and family history she divulges.

I recommend this book highly to the Iranian diaspora throughout the world, Nesta Ramazani gives a truly intimate account of her own journey and the mid-20th century history of Iran.

Rating:
Summary: A true gem, a must read, an illuminating memoir
Review: Nesta Ramazani has written a true gem of memoir and history. With her extremely capable pen, she takes us on both a personal journey into her own diverse, eclectic, and inspiring life and also into revealing vignettes of Iranian life of the 1940's and 1950's -- a period lamentably ignored by too many historians.

The book does what the best memoirs should do: it tells a great tale, weaves the background history nicely, and illuminates slices of life and Iranian society in all its color and diversity.

It is touching, funny, enlightening, and exquisitely told. The book should be on the reading list of anyone interested in good memoirs, in Iran, in women's studies, in the Middle East, or simply in good writing. I rank the book at the top of any list of Iranian memoirs in the English language.

Rating:
Summary: A personal viewpoint of the meeting of different faiths
Review: Nesta Ramazani's The Dance Of The Rose And The Nightingale is the personal testimony of a young woman who grew up in Iran during the 1940s, the daughter of an English Christian mother and an Iranian Zoroastrian father. Reflecting a personal viewpoint of the meeting of different faiths, as well as the daily difficulties Iran experienced as its government tried to compel its traditional society and culture to modernize, The Dance Of The Rose And The Nightingale is a captivating, autobiographical life story and especially recommended reading for students of 20th Century Iranian history.