.jpg "The Iranian children’s book writer Ebrahim Hassanbeigi in an undated photo")
TEHRAN -- The children’s book writer Ebrahim Hassanbeigi has said that Iranian authors were given the opportunity to write enough about ‘positive’ aspects of the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq war, now others should be allowed to write about the dark side of the event.
“Most authors who want to write about the bitterness of the war are not against the war. They know about the supreme sacrifices made during the event. They should been given the opportunity to express their views about the bitterness of the war,” Hassanbeigi told the Persian service ISNA on Sunday.
“Hard work and self-sacrifice dominated the war. The literary works published in 1980s and 1990s illustrated the issues and most of the works had positive view on the war… but there may be authors who think that this dimension of the war has been explored sufficiently over these years and now the other side the coin should be considered,” he added.
He said that he would not like to work on ‘the other side of the coin’ and added, “However, if there are people who would like to write in this field, they should have the freedom to do so.”
He has recently published “The War and Its Novels”, which is a collection of novels written by various Iranian authors about the war that is known as the Sacred Defense in Iran.
“The reality of the war should be expressed. Part of the war was the supreme sacrifices and other part was fear of the bombardments,” he added.
He said that the literary works about the war have been on a single dimension until now and added that there is no reason whatsoever to fear the diverging views that could be expressed about the war in forthcoming books.
MMS/YAW
END