Director & Producer: Bahman Maghsoudlou Executive Producer: Bijan Maghsoudlou Camera: Shahriar Assadi Editor: Bahman Maghsoudlou Associate Producer: Behrouz Maghsoudlou with: Javad Mojabi, Mohammad-Ali Sepanlou and Ebrahim Younesi
Ahmad Mahmoud was born on December 25, 1931 in Ahwaz. In his youth he worked as a day laborer, driver, construction worker and suffered imprisonment for leftist political views and oppositionist activities. His first story appeared in Omid-e Iran magazine, and in 1959 Mahmoud began publishing collections of stories with Mul (The Paramour).
Other collections followed: Darya Hanuz Aram Ast (The Sea Is Still Calm) 1960, Bibudegi (Uselessness) 1962, Za'eri Zir-e Baran (A Pilgrim In The Rain) 1968, Pesarak-e Boumi (The Little Native Boy) 1971, and Gharibeh'ha (The Strangers) 1972. Modern Persian Short Stories (1980) features a translation of his 1969 story "Az Deltangi" (On Homesickness) from A Pilgrim In The Rain. Hamsayeha (The Neighbors) appeared in 1974 and gave him immediate status as a novelist.
Dastan-e Yek Shahr (Story Of One City) was published in 1981. Zamin-e Sukhteh (The Scorched Earth) was published in the spring of 1982 in a limited 11,000 copies, with a second printing a year later of 22,000 copies. The three novels are a continuing saga set in Khuzistan during three important periods: The days of nationalization of oil in 1951, the aftermath of the coup d'etat which brought the Shah back to the throne in late August 1953, and Iraq's invasion of Iran in 1980.
In early 1990s Mahmoud published two collections of short stories: Didar (Visiting) 1990, Qesseh-ye Ashna (Familiar Tale) 1991, Az Mosafer Ta Tabkhal (From Passenger To Cold Sore) 1992, Madare-h Sefr Darejeh (Zero Degree Orbit) 1993, Adam-e Zendeh (The Live Human) 1997, and Derakht-e Anjir-e Ma'abed (The Fig Tree Of The Temples) 2000. On October 4, 2002 Ahmad Mahmoud died of Respiratory failure.
also see:
<http://www.ifvc.com/ahmad-mahmoud.htm> *****
***** Ahmad Mahmoud's Autobiography (1931-2002)
For a while now, I've wanted to write my biography and send it to you. Unfortunately, illness, work, chores, and a variety of other unmentionable things caused this task to be delayed. And now that I have sat down and focused my attention, I find that my mind is not cooperating and my hands are unwilling to commit. What have helpless (Rande Mande) people like me accomplished that is worth writing down? Nonetheless I shall try!
I was born on 4 Dey, 1310 (25 December 1931) in a city southwest of Iran on the Persian Gulf, and grew up in a hardworking family whose efforts were rewarded so that we were able to live comfortably. I obtained my elementary and secondary (high school) education in Ahwaz. I remember being 10 or 12 years old and spending every summer holiday at work. I was quite envious of my friends who would take trips every summer and I found myself with a desire to travel even if only once or twice just to get out of Ahwaz and escape laboring in the severe heat, but this opportunity never came along. There was one time when I went to Mashhad with my father. Upon arrival there came (Nafas Keshide Nakeshide) news that the allies had captured Khuzestan and that Ahwaz had been flattened to the ground. Thus the trip was ruined and my father and I returned to Ahwaz with much misery. When we got there we saw that Ahwaz was, of course, still in its place and that the police officers had simply been replaced by Indian officers. This is the story of my only trip. The only good thing about working in the summer was that I gained experience in several different professions.
When high school was over I became embroiled in politics. In those days everybody, the young and the old, was consumed with politics. Consequently, I went to jail for the first time from October five, 1953 to October five 1954, and lost my first chance to continue my education. When I was released from prison I had to serve in the military. In those days high school graduates went to Daneshkada-ye Afsari Ehtiyat (Military College) and became third degree Lieutenants. I thought that once I became an officer I would get the chance to continue my education, but this didn't happen either. Instead, after the first group of military officers who belonged to the Tudeh Party, I was thrown in jail again and spent some time in the second armored division of the army. It was here and in the state prison that I witnessed, from afar, the trials and executions of the first officers of the Tudeh party of Iran as well as Morteza Keyvan. They were imprisoned in the solitary confinement wing of the prison just down the hall from my cell and those of my friends. Prison activities necessitated our passing by their cells a couple of times a day and, as such, we exchanged gestures and sometimes shared a few words. It was also here that I saw Dr. Hossein Fatemi; he was wearing sunglasses and sitting on a foldout cot while holding a briefcase tightly to his chest. Four soldiers with machine guns were escorting him to the court, which was in the officers' club. The military court was in front of our cell and the prisoner of Mosaddeqh and his close friend was behind us. The Turkish bath, the infamous torture place, and the field of execution were to the left of our prison. Sometime later they transferred me and of my three friends to the prison at the Shiraz barracks and later to the prisons in Jahrom and Lar, two cities in the south. We were finally exiled to the Port of Lengeh on the Persian Gulf for two or three years.
In 1956, after my exile, I returned to Ahwaz and realized that the world had completely changed and the obsession with politics had disappeared in favor of an obsession with money. The city was crawling with banks, foreign companies and dealerships. Many of my friends were, despite maintaining the same ideology, striving to make money, which made me realize that I needed to look for food for the oncoming cruel and cold winter. I was 27 years old and unemployed and, as such, according to the law, I didn't deserve respect or civil rights. In order to obtain a job anywhere in the government I needed soo pishine (security clearance) papers for which I wasn't eligible owing to my prison conviction. At this point the drive to continue my education had withered away as I now had to answer to my survival. So I pulled up my sleeves and worked. I did any sort of difficult and underpaid job imaginable. In the midst of this hustle and bustle someone, may god bless him, gave me his backing and support. I was introduced to the Omran (State Office Of Development) in Ahwaz and after a few months of training, the opportunity for formal employment presented itself. At that point Security Services had been established and they asked for photos, documents, etc., to compose a file. I couldn't get approval from the security services (they simply wouldn't give it to me!) so I let it go and didn't show up at the office for work. The boss sent someone for me and I went and explained the reason for my absence. Using his own authority as "the supervisor for the Omran of district of Lorestan" he hired me. He was a good man, educated in France, and for some reason (probably the will of God) he liked me. Of course this was due to God's will and the human relationship. His name was Dr. Mohammad-Amin Alborzi, God bless him (this is my imitation of religion!). This is my tribute to him at this moment.
I wandered around the villages of Lorestan until 1960. Of course I didn't do any meaningful or worthwhile work since it wasn't possible. The work ranged from organizing village associations, repairing the place where the dead are washed in some villages, and building a kilometer of road to the same village and fixing the bathhouse of Hasan Abad, Hossein Abad, and Dowlat Abad. But this really wasn't work, especially because some of the Bakhshdaran (a Bakhshdar is a man who controls a few villages) had sharpened their teeth to feast on the meager income of the village anjomans who earned 5% interest and some other unknown commission in their bank account. Of the two or three signatures needed to access the village association's bank account, one was mine and any measly withdrawal needed my approval. I didn't sign unless I was sure that the money was going to solve a problem. There were also a lot of arguments, fights, and disagreements and as a result my friend, Dr. Alborzi, was transferred to another location. Thereafter, I wasn't able to continue either and handed in my resignation. Again I was unemployed. Once again Dr. Alborzi, the head of the department, took me to the Ital consulate company where I was hired as an expert social worker (I had passed the training course) in the company and the unions of Jiroft and it's villages, which was one of the work sites of this company - in agricultural and development examination and experimentation. I sometimes had projects in Kerman, Bam, or Zahedan but I was mainly in Jiroft until 1963.
One thing worth recalling is that according to the orders of the department, I was to examine social problems and create union companies (taavoni) for villages. As they had taught me in class, I walked in the fields, gardens, and farms in the countryside for a few months during the daytime and began speaking to villagers and slowly organizing them. I then decided to go to the Dowlat Abad village in the evenings in order to gather more villagers and talk to the men and women about the company's union and its formation. This business started growing and people began coming from other villages. Eventually we reached the point of accepting members and, God willing, the formation of a public group with elections and such, when one day the governor of the city summoned me to his office and told me to stop the unionization efforts. I said that I would work according to the taavoni rules and pointed out the fact that we even have a ministry of mutual assistance for villages. He said "Do as I say!" which prompted me to ask him whether any problems had occurred, to which he responded: "The gathering of villagers will be problematic." I said to him, "I work for the Ital consulate and I'll tell them what you said but I'll do as they order." He responded that he would present his case to the company as well. He did so in writing, subtle and comprehensible. That ended the union business. The department head then asked me to manage the spare parts storage facility. I accepted the position and became the warehouse manager. At this point I had lost track of all the different jobs I had experienced since I was ten. These jobs included: construction worker and laborer; baker and related work; secretarial jobs in commercial offices, shipping companies; selling garments; working for an advertisement company; writing articles for newspapers; editing; a few other things neither good nor convenient; and the manager of storage facilities.
I didn't last in the storage job and for a short while I became the garage manager of agricultural machinery, company cars, etc. but eventually resigned. I returned to Ahwaz. Many years had passed and my social rights had been restored. I'll just list the number of jobs thereafter: working in City Hall in Ahwaz; in the governor's office of Khuzestan until winter of 1960; worked in the Women's Organization of Iran; writing programs for National Radio; working for a company selling small airplanes; working for the office of production and distribution of clothing until 1978 and the revolution. After that I got a house, had my four kids, 2 sons and 2 daughters. The sons have wives and the daughters have husbands and they are all off doing their own thing and now my wife and I are left like madame and monsieur, old tired, and alone. I suppose you'll say that you didn't want the story of Hossein Kurd, rather what work have you done? To that I answer: nothing! To be clearer, I'll say: a sixty-year life and this is the little volume, which is a source of shame but I have some escape routes. I've worked 10-12 hours a day my entire life to meet the demands of everyday life. It is with these words that I delude myself and make myself feel better. With this disclaimer I'll recount what I have accomplished: I started by publishing a few short stories in Iranian magazines between 1954 and 1956; later I collected these stories and published them in my book Mul (The Paramour). My friends paid for the publishing expenses (500 Toman, the equal at that time of $70), which I paid back later. It was published in 500 copies and Rahnama-ye Ketab (Book Guide) wrote a few kind words about (a few lines) which was a good thing. This was in the summer or fall of 1957. Later in 1970, Guttenberg published Darya Hanuz Aram Ast (The Sea Is Still Calm) in 3000 copies, many of the leftovers of that the publisher still had on his hands. He put a prize stamp on the books and gave whoever bought a kilo of books a free book of mine- do you remember when Guttenberg was selling books using a scale?
I published the short story collection Bihudegi (Uselessness) myself in 1962 by Amir Kabir publishing house in 500 copies for 800 Tomans. A Pilgrim In The Rain was published in Tehran in 1967 due to my own efforts. The Little Native Boy and The Strangers were both published by Babak Publishing both in 1971; this time the publisher paid an honorarium of 500 Tomans as well as a few pairs of work pants (17 Tomans a piece) which he had gotten from his neighbor's factory. I took them home and gave them to the kids to wear. They were good to wear around the house. Three books were later re-published a number of times. I wrote the novel Hamsaye-ha (The Neighbors) in Ahwaz, finishing by the end of the spring of 1966. I went to Tehran and settled there in 1966. I rewrote some of its parts and I published as a short story collection in a few magazines: Fredowsi, Payame Novin, etc. In 1973 I re-wrote Hamsaye-ha in 1974, with the help of Dr. Ebrahim Yunesi, it was published by Amir Kabir. It was suspended after the first publication round and here I have to mention Mr. Ali Asghar Sorush , the translator who put in a lot of time and effort into getting permission for the first publication round of Hamsaye-ha from the Ministry Of Art And Culture. In 1981 the novel Dastan-e Yek Shahr (The Story Of One City) was published by Amir Kabir and a few months later it was published again by Nashr-e No. Nevertheless we were unable to get it into the market and it stayed that way for about 10-12 years, similar to Hamsaye-ha, which, after the first print in 1974 and after a period between 1978 and 1980, it rested forever.
Nashr-e No, with the publication of Zamin-e Sukhte (The Scorched Earth), began its work and a month later it was published again, in 1980 and then inevitably it was resigned to the fates of Hamsaye-ha and Dastan-e Yek Shahr. During this time I had a few stories in various journals and publications like Ketabe Hafteh, Payame Novin, Ferdowsi, Khushe, Naqshe Jahan, etc., but I don't really remember the rest. I have a few other finished and half-finished novels too which I'll probably publish if their styles and formats are favorable and approved. One is the Hamsaye-ha novel - in the year 1983 - Russian, translated by N. Kandiruvi, Radoka Publications, Moscow and a number of other short stories - Russian, French, English, German and Armenian. I have also written screenplays but there have been so few that this brief mention of them will suffice. Now I am removed and isolated in my house. During the days I write until one in the afternoon and in the evenings I either read a book or sit by the TV and enjoy an Iranian or foreign television show. Should I continue to write? I know I should. But don't complain since just writing this has taken a lot of effort.
God be with you Ahmad Mahmoud Tehran, 5 October 1994
<http://www.ifvc.com/ahmad-mahmoud-auto-bio.htm> *****
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Ahmad Mahmoud's Bibliography
- Short Story Collections
1. Mul (The Paramour), 1957 2. Darya Hanuz Aram Ast (The Sea Is Still Calm), 1960 3. Bihudegi (Uselessness), 1962 4. Za'eri Zir-e Baran (A Pilgrim In The Rain), 1967 5. Pesarak-e Bumi (The Little Native Boy), 1971 6. Gharibeh-ha (The Strangers), 1971 7. Didar (Visiting), 1990 8. Qesseh-ye Ashna (Familiar Tale), 1991 9. Az Mosafer ta Tabkhal (From Passenger To Cold Sore), 1992
- Interviews
1. Hekayat-e Hal (The Story Of My Condition Now), a long interview with Ahmad Mahmoud by Ms. Lily Golestan, 1995
- Scripts
1. 2 Filmnameh (Two Film Scripts), 1995
- Novels
1. Hamsayeh-ha (The Neighbors), 1974 2. Dastan-e Yek Shahr (Story Of One City), 1981 3. Zamin-e Sukhteh (The Scorched Earth), 1982 4. Madar-e Sefr Darajeh (The Zero Degree Orbit), 1993 5. Adam-e Zendeh (The Live Human), 1997 6. Derakht-e Anjir-e Ma'abed (The Fig Tree Of The Temples), 2000
<http://www.ifvc.com/ahmad-mahmoud-bibliography.htm> ***** -- Yoshie
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