The Colonel Page 21

  Amoghli, Heidar Khan: leading member of the Communist Party of Iran, which was founded in the northern port of Bandar-e Anzali in 1920. Founder of the short-lived Gilan Soviet Republic of 1921.The party was outlawed by the government of Reza Shah in 1931.

  Azeri: the Azeri language, a form of Turkish, is nowadays spoken mainly by the indigenous inhabitants of the north-western Iranian provinces of Azerbaijan and Zanjan, though Persian remains the official language there. Many Azeris migrated to Tehran and their language can be heard in much of the south of the city and in the bazaar. Tabriz, the capital of Iranian Azerbaijan, was Iran’s gateway to the west, through which many European ideas were imported. The Constitutional Revolution of 1906 was started by Azeris, and many of the founders of the Iranian communist party were also Azeris. Colonel Mohammad-Taqi Khan was an Azeri. Until the Russians conquered it in 1828 most of what is now modern Azerbaijan was Iranian territory.

  Behesht-e Zahra: (‘The Paradise of Zahra’) the largest cemetery in Iran, located in the southern suburbs of Tehran. During the Shah’s reign, resistance fighters who were executed or killed in guerrilla fighting were buried there. It was the site of Ayatollah Khomeini’s first major rally after his return from exile in France in 1979. Behesht-e Zahra is also the final resting place of the ‘martyrs’ who fell in the Iran – Iraq War of 1980 – 88 and of political opponents executed after the establishment of the Islamic Republic.

  Birjand: capital of South Khorasan province in eastern Iran, close to the Afghan border.

  Dadviyeh: one of the first Iranians to convert to Islam during the lifetime of the Prophet Muhammad. After the death of the Prophet, he was betrayed and assassinated.

  Dhofar: province in the south-west of the Sultanate of Oman, next to the border with South Yemen. In December 1973, a force of 3,000 Iranian elite troops went to help Sultan Qaboos bin Said put down a rebellion by PFLOAG (People’s Front for the Liberation of Oman and the Arabian Gulf), instigated by South Yemen, which housed a substantial Soviet base at the time. The Omani Army was trained and led by British officers.

  Ferdowsi: (940 – 1020) Persian epic poet, author of the monumental 60,000-stanza Iranian national epic, the Shahnameh (Book of Kings). Ferdowsi was one of the first exponents of a new literary form of the Persian language, which had fallen out of use following the Arab invasion of Iran in the 7th century. The Shahnameh, completed in 1011, glorifies pre-Islamic Iran. It ends with the Arab invasion of Iran in AD640, regarded by Iranian nationalists as the nation’s greatest tragedy, in that it practically destroyed Persian culture and language. Ferdowsi’s verse is notable for employing almost no Arabic words.

  Al-Hajjaj ibn Yousef: a draconian 8th century Arab governor under the Umayyad caliphate, responsible for many deaths, particularly of thousands of pilgrims to Mecca. He was later made governor of the Persian provinces, where he savagely put down a number of rebellions.

  Khezr: In the Qoran Khezr, who has drunk the water of life and is therefore immortal, is the teacher of Moses. Khezr sees things that Moses cannot see or understand. Taking him on a journey, Khezr nearly sinks a boat, then murders a young man and, in a town where no-one will give them hospitality, he repairs a broken wall. Moses does not understand why, and protests. Khezr tells him that many seemingly malicious acts are beneficial: he has damaged the boat to prevent the crew from falling into the hands of a pirate kings; he has killed the boy to stop him bringing disgrace and danger to his parents, for God would give them a better son; the wall was to cover buried treasure left for the orphan of righteous parents, which was about to be exposed to thieves. In subsequent legends Khezr appears in various guises, at the last moment, often dressed in green, to guide or save the faithful when they are in trouble. In this novel, with hideous irony, Khezr Javid is the eternal and indestructible secret policeman, necessary for the survival of every régime, of whatever political hue.

  Khiabani, Shaikh Mohammad: (1880 – 1920), renowned patriot from the early days of independent Iran. Active during the 1906 Constitutional Revolution, at the age of 30 he was elected as a member of the Democrat party to represent his native Tabriz in north-western Iran in the Iranian parliament. Revolting against the 1919 treaty that handed effective control of the country to Britain, he set up the breakaway republic of Azadistan (‘the land of liberty’) in Tabriz. The revolt was soon crushed, and Khiabani was put to death.

  Kuchik Khan: (1880 – 1921), founder of the revolutionary Nehzat-e Jangal (Forest Movement), a guerrilla army that operated in the heavily wooded regions of northern Iran, attacking the Shah’s regime and the foreign (Russian and British) forces supporting it from 1914 onwards. He established the Socialist Republic of Gilan in 1920, which was crushed the following year by government forces. After the Islamic revolution the secular guerrillas retreated to the same forests.

  martyrs’ memorials: shrines put up to honour both the soldiers who fell in the Iran – Iraq war and those Khomeini supporters killed in armed street clashes after the founding of the Islamic Republic. They are usually brightly lit small red tented pavilions, known as hejleh – bridal chamber – where the unfulfilled young martyr can find marital bliss. A photograph of the martyr, surrounded by lights, is the centrepiece. The shrines are left up for forty days.

  Mossadeq, Mohammad: (1881 – 1967) Prime Minister of Iran from 1951 to 1953. A staunch defender of Iranian independence, he nationalised the country’s oil industry and ended British dominance in Iran. After the forced British withdrawal, the United States, with British help, organised a coup against Mossadeq. Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, who had been forced into exile, returned and, with American help established a modernising régime, regarded by leftists as a dictatorship, that lasted until his overthrow in 1979. After Mossadeq was deposed in 1953, he was sentenced to 3 years’ solitary confinement in prison, followed by permanent house arrest on his estate until his death in 1967. He is revered as the only truly democratic statesman in the early history of independent Iran. A number of political commentators in the USA now say that it was a mistake to have overthrown him.

  Pesyan, Colonel Mohammad Taqi Khan: (1892 – 1921) His aristocratic family came to Iran from the Iranian Caucasus after the Russians conquered it in 1828. His grandfather had worked closely with Amir Taqi Khan (Amir Kabir). After military training in Germany he was given a command in the Swedish-officered Iranian Gendarmerie on the western Kermanshah front in World War I. Although Iran was neutral, this sector of Iran was occupied by Russian forces. Pesyan fought them but lost and then took his men over to the German-Turkish side. From there he went to Berlin and joined the German air force. After the war he was appointed head of the Khorasan gendarmerie in NE Iran, with the rank of Colonel. As a nod to his European training, he was given the nickname Kolonel, which stuck. Even official documents referred to him as Kolonel.

  Pesyan was on bad terms with Ahmad Qavam, the governor of Khorasan, who later became prime minister. The Colonel had thrown in his lot with Seyyid Zia, the fiercely nationalist post-war prime minister and in 1921 he arrested Qavam for failing to acknowledge Seyyid Zia as prime minister, and dismissed all his appointees. Seyyid Zia then appointed Pesyan as military governor of the province. Pesyan sent Qavam sent under arrest to Tehran. After the fall of Seyyid Zia, Qavam became prime minister. Pesyan rejected his appointees to the governorship of Khorasan and declared the province independent of the central government, going so far as to print his own currency. He attempted to finance the improvements he wanted to make to the province by taxing merchants, landlords and tribal leaders. He cleaned up the finances of the Shrine at Mashhad, which were being embezzled by the officials running it, and returned them to their proper charitable use. Totally honest himself, he led an austere life and encouraged education, including for women.

  When the central government was fully stretched dealing with the Jangali rebellion in the north, Pesyan threatened to attack the undefended Tehran with 4,000 men, accusing Qavam of being a servant of foreign interests. Tehran would h
ave welcomed him. He made overtures to Kuchik Khan (see above) and to the Bolsheviks of Central Asia for assistance, but the Soviet government of Moscow offered to assist Tehran against him. Qavam offered Pesyan amnesty, safe passage out of the country and even monetary compensation, but The Colonel refused to compromise. He accused Qavam of double dealing with the tribes against him and broke of all relations with the British, who were trying to act as intermediaries between him and Qavam, through their consul at Mashhad. Pesyan arrested all those who had worked with or for the British.

  Qavam, with Reza Khan (later Reza Shah) as minister of war, induced the local tribes to raise a force against him, which defeated him and his gendarmes at Quchan. The Colonel escaped, but was caught and killed in a subsequent skirmish. His head was sent to Tehran. Pesyan was buried in a shrine erected in memory of the great Nader Shah, the conqueror of India. Ever since, he has been a hero to Iranian nationalists, who have always resented the continuing interference of the Great Powers in the affairs of Iran. Although nationalistic, the Islamic regime has never taken this secular man to its heart.68

  Oshnu cigarettes: a cheap brand of Iranian cigarette, mostly smoked by working people. Also Homa cigarettes.

  Point Four Programme: development aid programme introduced by US President Harry Truman in 1949 as the fourth mainspring of American foreign policy. It was designed to provide aid – initially mainly economic and technical, but later military – to countries in Latin America, Africa and Asia as a way of countering the influence of Soviet Russia and China.

  Qaim Maqam: (1779 – 1835), renowned statesman, essayist, and poet of the early Qajar period. Mirza Taqi Khan Amir Kabir essentially adopted his outlook on politics and diplomacy. He was the architect of a ‘no war no peace’ policy with Russia which drew on religious and national sentiments to rally support behind the crown prince and his military modernisation programme, to create a credible defence against Russia. His policies facilitated funding for military reforms and guaranteed British support against Russia.

  Qavam, Ahmad: see under Mohammed Taqi Khan. In addition, he incurred the wrath of the communists for getting the better of the Russians. When the Soviets failed to honour their undertaking to withdraw from their wartime occupation of Iran in 1946, Qavam offered them the ‘northern oil’ deal, by which the Russians would receive a concession for oil exploration in the north in return for evacuating their troops. After the troops moved out, the Majlis (parliament) refused to ratify the arrangement and the Russians got nothing. Qavam, outwardly subservient to foreign interests – and criticised for such – was in fact a patriot, who earned the nickname of The Wily Fox.

  Rezaiyeh: (modern name: Urumiah) capital of the Iranian province of West Azerbaijan. Under the founder of the Pahlavi dynasty Reza Shah, Urumiah was renamed Rezaiyeh. The original name was restored with the advent of the Islamic Republic.

  Rouzbeh, Khosrow: founder-member of the Tudeh, the Iranian party established in 1941 as the successor to the banned Communist Party of Iran. An army officer and instructor at the country’s military academy, Rouzbeh was a leading member of a secret communist fifth column within the Iranian military. He was arrested, and escaped, on numerous occasions. After the coup against Mossadeq, he was condemned to death and executed in 1958.

  Rostam: principal character in the heroic epic poem, the Shahnameh, the great warrior who fights the enemies of Iran. His tragedy was that he unwittingly killed his son Sohrab in single combat, recognising him only as he lay dying.

  Sattar Khan: (1868 – 1914) revolutionary leader from Tabriz who played a key role in Constitutional Revolution (1906 – 11). Under his guidance, a ‘High Military Council’ was proclaimed in 1908. However, after revolutionary forces took Tehran, he and his followers refused to lay down their arms. In an ensuing armed clash with former comrades, Sattar was fatally wounded and died a few days later.

  SAVAK: Iranian secret service. Founded in 1957, its charter committed it to ‘defending the state and preventing all conspiracies against the public interest.’ The organisation was established with the help of US and Israeli security experts, and was used by the Shah’s regime to stifle all forms of opposition. It was a huge organisation, with informers everywhere, creating an atmosphere of suspicion and distrust between families and friends. Dissidents were rounded up, tortured and, in some cases, executed. In the last few years of the Shah’s reign, when Carter was president of the USA, they became noticeably more tolerant of opposition.

  Setar: traditional three-stringed instrument, similar to a small lute.

  Sha’ban the Brainless: ringleader of the mob paid by the CIA to stage anti-government demonstrations during the coup against Mossadeq. He earned his popular nickname Bimokh (the Brainless) for his witless thuggery. After the successful coup and the restoration of the Shah, Sha’ban was handsomely rewarded for his services.

  Shaghad: The half-brother of Rostam, the great hero of the Shahnameh epic. Shaghad and the king of Kabulisatan dig a pit full of swords and entice Rostam to ride into it, with his famous horse Rakhsh. Both are impaled on the swords. The dying Rostam persuades Shaghad to give him a bow and arrow. With his last breath, he shoots an arrow at Shaghad, who is hiding behind a tree. So strong was Rostam that the arrow pierced the tree and killed Shaghad behind, pinning him to the tree.

  Shahnameh: see Ferdowsi

  Shams ul-Emareh: palace added to the Golestan Palace compound, it was ordered by Nasir al-Din Shah, who had been impressed by the tall buildings he had seen in Europe, and finished in 1867. The first five-storey building of old Tehran, it was lavishly decorated with tiles and mirror work. It served both as royal harem and, later, as a place for official receptions.

  Taqi Khan: see Amir Kabir

  Teachers: The teachers Khezr Javid describes his early days as a teacher, before he joined SAVAK, were part of the Sepah-e Danesh, the Army of Learning, which was established by the Shah in the 1960s. As an alternative to military service, young men and women with an education were sent out to remote villages to teach basic literacy and hygiene. Some of these teachers were very energetic and idealistic and fitted in well with village life, becoming useful links between the village and outside officialdom, while others were unable to adapt to the primitive conditions in the villages of those days, and became desperately homesick and lonely.

  Toman: monetary unit in Iran; 1 toman = 10 rials.

  Yooshij, Nima: (1896 – 1960) Iranian poet, often considered the father of modern Persian poetry. His works, which eschew traditional verse forms, employ natural everyday speech and dialect to portray the life of ordinary Iranians. Mahmoud Dowlatabadi bears an astonishing physical resemblance to him.

  Afterword

  Mahmoud Dowlatabadi

  Mahmoud Dowlatabadi is a colossus of contemporary Iranian literature. He cut his literary teeth on the great Persian poets like Hafiz and Rumi, imbibing their rich language and blending it uniquely successfully with modern everyday speech to create his own thoroughly contemporary voice. His language is poetic, rhythmical, metaphorical, and allusive and flows like a broad, mighty river, full of eddies, side currents, quiet backwaters and whirlpools. As he puts it: ‘Words are like the strings of a guitar. You have to let their clear tones ring out and not stifle their resonance with verbs.’

  Dowlatabadi began working on this novel 25 years ago, but kept filing the manuscript away in a drawer, taking it out periodically and revising it. In 2008, he finally declared the text ready for publication. He dismissed any notion that earlier publication might have changed the course of history as an unreasonable and fanciful expectation to place upon a literary work. He also feared that the novel might itself have fallen victim to the unchecked violence of the revolution.

  The descriptions of torture are taken from the experiences of the author himself, or from those of his friends. It comes as no surprise to learn that The Colonel has never appeared in its original language in the author’s native country. The manuscript remains in the hands of the censor,
who has demanded a number of deletions and revisions, which the author has refused to make.

  Dowlatabadi was born in 1940 into a peasant family in the small village of Dowlatabad, near the town of Sabzevar on the northern edge of the Dasht-e Kavir, the great Persian desert. His early childhood memories are of carrying sacks of melons by donkey for sale in the nearest market town. ‘It was a bitter struggle between the unyielding stone and the fragile glass within me, countless shards on the dry earth, people wracked by poverty and hunger…’

  Aged 13, he left his native village and fended for himself, first in Mashhad and Sabzevar and later in Tehran, as a jack-of-all-trades. While keeping himself enrolled in school, he moonlighted variously as a hairdresser, checking tickets in cinemas and selling advertising space in local newspapers. He was homeless and often spent the night on the streets. In his spare time, he devoured every book he could lay his hands on, as much from the canon of Persian classical literature as from translations of the works of European political philosophers and novelists. He describes himself as self-educated. Though he never gained his high-school diploma, he was accepted for a place at drama school and wrote his first short story, The Night’s Abyss. This launched him on his literary career.