The Septembers Of Shiraz

Isaac and his cellmates hear the guards calling a list of prisoners’ names, who Mehdi explains will be executed. Soon after, Isaac is summoned. Mohsen recommences the interrogation, accusing Isaac of being a spy. Isaac denies this and claims he is a simple family man. Mohsen’s tone is more aggressive and threatening than before; he cites bank transfers in Isaac’s name and details from informants. Isaac ponders whether his brother Javad, brother-in-law Keyvan, and Farnaz have been arrested too. Mohsen offers Isaac a cigarette, but then burns Isaac’s face deliberately when moving to light it for him. He then burns Isaac’s hand and chest in the same way. Finally he kicks him to the floor and spits on him before telling him, “Your resistance is pointless” (63).

In their cell, Mehdi recommends honey for Isaac’s burns and tells him about the foot lashings he has endured. Mehdi is making a wooden toy for his daughter and Isaac admires his defiance, gaining hope of a reunion with his own children. He recalls arguing with Farnaz on the morning of his arrest about why they didn’t leave Iran: He accused her of clinging to her material possessions and she retaliated by saying he could not live without his status. His chronic exhaustion left him unable to be affectionate or loving, yet he still loves her, despite the increasing distance and coldness between them.

Farnaz and Habibeh drive to a second prison to look for Isaac. That morning, Farnaz vomited with nerves and Habibeh cleaned her up, which made Farnaz ask her to accompany her to the prison. Now Farnaz feels it was a mistake, but the guard lets them in when he sees Habibeh, a woman in a chador covering her head and shoulders. As they wait, they hear a sermon on the radio with an anti-Zionist message. Inside the prison, Farnaz recognizes a blindfolded prisoner as Sofoyan Vartan, an accomplished pianist who had played at her sister-in-law’s parties and with whom Farnaz sang several times, establishing a close and exciting relationship that filled the gap left by Isaac’s lack of romance.

Farnaz is interrogated in a room where they have a file on her, which she assumes means Isaac is in the same prison. She denies that her articles about foreign trips and alcohol were “propaganda for an indecent life” (76), but the guard refuses to tell her whether Isaac is there. After she and Habibeh leave, the housekeeper tells her that the guards accused Isaac of “dirty dealings” (77). Habibeh’s son Morteza has joined the Revolutionary Guard; she quotes him saying,” there is a lot of justice that needs to be set right” (78), and then claims that Farnaz is always belittling her. Farnaz wonders if Morteza is behind Isaac’s arrest and worries about Habibeh’s new resentment. Farnaz reminds Habibeh of their long friendship, but Habibeh questions whether they are really friends.

Arriving home, Farnaz is anxious for Isaac, who is in the “harshest prison in the country” (80). She also wonders why she married him.

Parviz visits his landlord Zalman Mendelson in his Hassidic hat shop. He tells Zalman that his father has been arrested; in turn, Mr. Mendelson tells Parviz about his how his own father was arrested in Leningrad, Russia, in 1934, for being a Jew.

Mr. Mendelson’s 16-year-old daughter Rachel, whom Parviz has noticed before, brings her father a snack. Her father introduces her to Parviz, but scolds Parviz lightly for offering to shake her hand—Hassidic women are not allowed to touch men that aren’t relatives. Parviz is hungry; he reflects on the generosity of his neighbors, and his inability to organize his life. Mr. Mendelson offers him a job in his shop to pay off the rent and earn some pocket money. Parviz accepts, saddened by his fall from a comfortable wealthy life full of choices and aspirations to this state of poverty.

Shirin is having lunch in her friend Leila’s house. They sit on the floor, which in Shirin’s worldview makes them like housekeepers. She wonders if her friendship with Leila is a good thing, as they would not have been friends before the revolution. Shirin learned that her father was in prison after her mother did not come to pick her up from school one day—instead, she went home with Leila until her mother could get her very late that night. Leila’s father is a Revolutionary Guard who takes “sinners” (92) to prison. Shirin tries to remember the last time she saw her father, and recalls her charming Uncle Javad’s visit a while before the arrest. She wonders if the events are connected.

Leila and Shirin go down to Leila’s basement. They find bottles of alcohol there and Leila wonders whether she would be a sinner if she didn’t tell her parents about it. While Leila is sweeping the floor, Shirin finds a box of files about various people with the charges against them. She takes one of the files and hides it under her coat. Then she tells Leila she wants to go home early. At home she looks at the cover of the file and then hides it in a drawer. She wonders if she has saved the man in the file from prison.