Exiled Iranian Satirist Still Mocks Ruling Elites
It's not easy to make fun of people who want to imprison you, but satirist Ebrahim Nabavi has made a career of it. The prolific Iranian writer and performer, on tour in the US, is interviewed by Saideh Jamshidi.
There is a mantra among the people who know Ebrahim Nabavi: “don’t mess with Nabavi.” One of his friends writes on his website, “With no doubt, it is against all common sense to go up against Nabavi. With his incomparable wit he can easily defeat any opponent, and if necessary, drag him through the mud.”
Nabavi is a prolific Iranian satirist, diarist and writer. In 1998, he gained wide-spread recognition for his political satire writings published in Jameh, the first reformist privately-owned newspaper in Iran. His approach has been to select a political official or a cleric and then conduct an imaginary interview with him.
Nabavi has been able to write about forbidden political or social topics such the history of homosexuality in Iran or conducting an imaginary interview with Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the founder of the Islamic Republic of Iran. After he was imprisoned for his writing in 2000 and 2002, he decided to leave Iran for Belgium.
Nabavi has published more than 50 books on different topics and in different languages. He is considered an important figure for those who follow Iran.
