Iranian Humorist Draws Laughs

Iranian-American author Firoozeh Dumas entertained a diverse audience of about 80 people on Saturday afternoon as part of the Harvard Foundation for Intercultural and Race Relations’ Complexities of Color Writers Series.

Dumas, the author of “Funny in Farsi: A Memoir of Growing up Iranian in America,” said it’s an Iranian tradition to spend countless hours telling stories.

The audience laughed frequently during the event—which was co-sponsored by the Harvard Persian Society—as Dumas recounted moments of her life as an Iranian in the U.S. She also spoke about the difficulties that she faced as a humor writer.

“If you write about politics or oppression it’s not that hard, but for humor it’s a whole different game,” Dumas said.

She said that she was frustrated by the conservatism of the publishing industry when she decided to publish the compilation of short stories in book form. After being turned down by numerous agents, she went to a local Kinko’s and made 70 copies. For the next several months, she gave them to anyone would take them.

“One time I was in the restroom at the Four Seasons and I met Gloria Steinem,” Dumas said. “She got a copy.”

One of the copies eventually fell into the hands of an literary agent who negotiated a deal with Random House.

The memoir, now in its 10th printing, has recently been translated into Persian. It is also one of the three finalists for the 2005 Thurber Prize for American Humor.

But working with the Iranian government’s censor office was quite an obstacle, according to Dumas. The office removed three sections of the book, citing conflicts with Islam.

Dumas told many of the stories from her book during her talk on Saturday in Science Center A, and spoke of the difficulties that immigrants face when assimilating to the U.S.

“I once met a guy from China and no one here could pronounce his name,” Dumas said. “He ended up changing his name to Pedro.”

She also spoke about American ignorance of Iran, especially before the Iran hostage crisis, which began in 1979.

“When we came to America [in 1971], people were always asking us where we were from,” Dumas said. “We used to say ‘Iran.’ They’d say, ‘Where’s that?’”

But after realizing Americans’ love for pets, Dumas and her family found a quicker way to explain their background. “We started introducing ourselves by saying, ‘We are from Iran, where the Persian cats come from,’” she said. “I think that helped our popularity immensely.”

While Dumas spoke at length about being an Iranian at an inopportune time in America, the vast majority of her stories focused on her family.

“My parents were so thrilled that there was actually someone who wanted to marry me,” Dumas said. “In fact, after my husband and I were married for a year, my father—in his typical humor—told him, ‘There are no refunds! Exchanges? Yes, yes, I have two daughters. But no refunds!’”

But despite the humor of the book—or perhaps because of it—Dumas said her writing is not appreciated by all.

“I’ve gotten five nasty e-mails in my career as a writer and they were all from Iranian women who thought I was making fun of my family....But if there is anyone I’ve made fun of the most, it’s myself,” she said.