Reading Lolita in Tehran

Book 34 of my 2018 Reading Challenge

Reading Lolita in Tehran by Azar Nafisi

Summary (via Goodreads)
Every Thursday morning for two years in the Islamic Republic of Iran, a bold and inspired teacher named Azar Nafisi secretly gathered seven of her most committed female students to read forbidden Western classics. As Islamic morality squads staged arbitrary raids in Tehran, fundamentalists seized hold of the universities, and a blind censor stifled artistic expression, the girls in Azar Nafisi's living room risked removing their veils and immersed themselves in the worlds of Jane Austen, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Henry James, and Vladimir Nabokov. In this extraordinary memoir, their stories become intertwined with the ones they are reading. Reading Lolita in Tehran is a remarkable exploration of resilience in the face of tyranny and a celebration of the liberating power of literature.

My Opinion
I was interested in the topic but this was a struggle to read.  I think I might have liked it more if I was just reading about her life but adding in critiques of the books they read took me out of the story.

I'm really sad that it didn't feel dated even with all the talk of fighting and torture because not much has changed.

A Few Quotes from the Book 
"When my students came into that room, they took off more than their scarves and robes. Gradually, each one gained an outline and a shape, becoming her own inimitable self. Our world in that living room with its window framing my beloved Elburz Mountains became our sanctuary, our self-contained universe, mocking the reality of black-scarves, timid faces in the city that sprawled below."

"We were unhappy. We compared our situation to our own potentials, to what we could have had, and somehow there was little consolation in the fact that millions of people were unhappier than we were. Why should other people's misery make us happier or more content?"