Blind Owl - by Sadeq Hedayat (Paperback)

About the Book

"Written by one of the greatest Iranian writers of the twentieth century, Blind Owl tells a three-part story of a pen-case painter, an isolated narrator with a fragile relationship with time and reality. In part one, he relates his own story in the first person, in a string of hazy, dreamlike recollections fueled by opium and alcohol. He spends time painting the covers of pen cases only to paint the exact same scene: an old man wearing a cape and turban sitting under a cypress tree, separated by a small stream from a beautiful woman in black who is bending down to offer him a waterlily. The novel transitions to a one-page part two where reader find the narrator covered in blood and waiting for the police to arrest him. Part three gives readers a glimpse into the grim realities that unlock the mysteries of the first part. Influenced by European writers like Kafka and de Maupassant, Hedayat also reveals a strong affinity with Dostoevsky. The protagonist of Blind Owl suffers from the brain fever characteristic of many of Dostoevsky's heroes such as Crime and Punishment's Raskolnikov. Both characters are also isolated in a tomb-like room, surrounded by deafening echoes of disturbed thoughts. Both are guilty of a horrible crime and paranoid of being arrested by the police at any moment. But whereas Raskolnikov has intellectually convinced himself that he must commit the crime for the greater good, the pen-case painter acts on instinct and seems oddly unaware of what he has done"--

Book Synopsis

A new English translation of one of the most important, controversial Iranian novels of the twentieth century

Winner of the 2023 Lois Roth Persian Translation Award

A Penguin Classic

Written by one of the greatest Iranian writers of the twentieth century, Blind Owl tells a two-part story of an isolated narrator with a fragile relationship with time and reality. In first person, the narrator offers a string of hazy, dreamlike recollections fueled by opium and alcohol. He spends time painting the exact same scene on the covers of pen cases: an old man wearing a cape and turban sitting under a cypress tree, separated by a small stream from a beautiful woman in black who offers him a water lily. In a one-page transition, the reader finds the narrator covered in blood and waiting for the police to arrest him. In part two, readers glimpse the grim realities that unlock the mysteries of the first part. In a new translation that reflects Hedayat's conversational, confessional tone, Blind Owl joins the ranks of classics by Edgar Allan Poe, Franz Kafka, and Fyodor Dostoyevsky that explore the dark recesses of the human psyche.

Review Quotes

"a much-needed and clear translation"
--Amir-Hussein Radjy, The New York Times

"The eerie, phantasmal Blind Owl...possesses the fully dimensional oddness of a vivid dream, which one can mine for interpretations, analyze for influences or simply submit to."
--Sam Sacks, Wall Street Journal

About the Author

Sadegh Hedayat was born in Tehran in 1903 and is considered one of the most important Iranian prose writers of the twentieth century. He is celebrated as the father of modernist Persian literature and is credited with bringing modern Persian literature onto the international scene. Although born into a prominent aristocratic family, Hedayat's writings display an obsession with characters who populate the fringes of society--the base and the marginalized. In 1936, while living in Bombay, he published his most famous work, Blind Owl, as a hand-written volume with original illustrations. Hedayat took his own life in Paris in 1951. Despite his short literary life, Hedayat was a prolific writer and leaves behind a copious body of work.

Sassan Tabatabai was born in Tehran in 1967 and has been living in the United States since 1980. He is a poet, translator, and scholar of medieval Persian literature. He is Master Lecturer in World Languages and Literatures and the Core Curriculum, and Coordinator of the Persian Language Program at Boston University. Tabatabai is the author of Father of Persian Verse: Rudaki and His Poetry (Leiden University Press, 2010), Uzunburun: Poems (Pen and Anvil Press, 2011), and Sufi Haiku (Nemi Books, 2021).