Simin Behbahani

Simin Behbahani (born July 20, 1927, Tehrān, Iran—died August 19, 2014, Tehrān) was an Iranian poet who earned the sobriquet “the lioness of Iran” for eloquently challenging national authorities and expressing her steadfast opposition to oppression and violence in more than 600 poems.

Prior to her birth, Khalili’s father, an editor and writer, was temporarily exiled for works that were perceived as threatening to the government. Her parents were reunited two years later but ultimately divorced, and Khalili remained with her mother, a poet who encouraged her to write. She published her first poem at age 14. Khalili briefly trained as a midwife but was expelled from the program after being falsely accused of writing a newspaper article that criticized the school. Her dismissal was likely due to her association with the communist Tudeh (“Masses”) Party. Khalili married soon thereafter and assumed her husband’s surname, Behbahani. While raising a family, Behbahani studied law at the University of Tehrān. Following her divorce from her first husband, she remarried (1969) and completed her law degree. However, rather than pursuing a legal career, she found work as an educator, teaching high school for nearly 30 years.

Behbahani wrote prolifically throughout her life. Her first verse collection, Setar-e shekasteh (“The Broken Sitar”), was published in 1951. She was known for repurposing classical Persian poetic forms to explore contemporary themes, often inverting the traditional ghazal structure by using a female narrator. That was of particular note, as she began experimenting with those forms just as blank verse was becoming popular with Iranian poets and more classical forms were on the wane. Beginning in 1962, she also wrote lyrics for the national radio station. After the Iranian Revolution (1979) installed an Islamic regime, she increasingly gave voice to her abhorrence of human rights violations through her poetry and other writings, thus facing the constant threat of censorship and arrest.

Among her volumes of poetry were Jay-e pa (1954; “Footprint”), Chelcheragh (1955; “Chandelier”), Marmar (1961; “Marble”), Rastakhiz (1971; “Resurrection”), Khati ze sor’at va atash (1980; “A Line of Speed and Fire”), Dasht-e Arzhan (1983; “The Plain of Arzan”), Kaghazin jameh (1989; “Paper-Thin Vestment”), Yek daricheh azadi (1995; “A Window to Freedom”), Kelid-o-khanjar (2000; “Key and Dagger”), and Tazetarinha (2008; “The Latest”). Selections from many of her poems were set to music by Iranian vocal artists, and she also wrote lyrics specifically for them. Among the volumes that included English translations of her works were A Cup of Sin (1998), Shayad ke-masee hast: guzide-ye ashar (2004; Maybe It’s the Messiah), and Dobareh misazamet, vatan (2009; My Country, I Shall Build You Again). She also penned the memoirs An mard, mard-e hamraham (1990; “That Man, My Companion Along the Way”) and Ba madaram hamrah: zendeginameh-ye khod-nevesht (2011; “With My Mother: My Autobiography”).

Though persistently and unflinchingly critical of Iranian national politics, particularly the country’s treatment of women, Behbahani maintained a love of its culture and people. Nonetheless, political acts, such as advocating the One Million Signatures campaign, a women’s rights initiative in Iran, incensed the Iranian authorities. In 2006 she was beaten by police while attending an International Women’s Day rally in Iran. Four years later she was interrogated in a Tehrān airport and, her passport revoked, prevented from traveling to an International Women’s Day conference in Paris. Considered a national treasure by many Iranians and a feminist icon globally, her treatment sparked an international outcry.

Behbahani was awarded the Simone de Beauvoir Prize for Women’s Freedom (2009) and the Janus Pannonius Poetry Prize (2013).