The Ayatollahs Love to Write Letters
Sep 25th, 2009 by pedestrian
Ayatollah Taheri writes to Ayatollah Montazeri:
….
It is undoubtedly difficult and disappointing for you (and for anyone else who has sacrificed their life, their well being, and their loved ones [4]) for the sake of opening the doors of compassion, justice, freedom and prosperity in this land) to witness these uninvited, ravenous guests; those people who are suddenly busy stealing the religion and the dignity of the nation, the country and the establishment as well as the pure blood of the martyrs and the struggle of the Muslim nation, post-revolution.
…
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Ayatollah Sanei writes to Mousavi:
…
We must be mindful of the fact that one of the key goals of any plan is to strengthen the union between all abused people because the source of all happiness and hope lies in this very unity on the path of God. We must take great care so that, God forbid, this message of unity does not become a tool for the oppressors to [take advantage of and] attack the oppressed. Such development would lead to nothing but further oppression.
…
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I bet they check the mailbox for a response every .2 minutes, just so they can write another one …
before we know it, khordad88 becomes hojatol eslam khordad 88; or?
“the Islam-evidence khordad 88″
well, it’s supposed to translate all the official stuff …. it’s not our fault the mullahs are the only ones who write!
Just a silly question…do the Ayatollahs actually write them out the old-fashioned way, with calligraphy pens and scroll paper and personal seals and fancy handwritten flourishes and whatnot? Or is it all done electronically now?
No particularly good reason for asking, I’m just curious.
LOL, you ask a perfect question. It is my own too!
From what I have heard, these “letters” are really emails that they either dictate to their assistants, or write up on paper and then send off for typing/email.
Darn…I had this great mental image of a very old bearded guy, dressed in a long flowing robe, sitting at his table with quill pen and inkpot in hand, scratching away at a long roll (of papyrus?) and covering it with beautiful flourishes, complete with flower decorations around the edges. He then seals it with wax and hands it to his personal messenger, who goes out and saddles his horse for the journey….
Err, I guess not. But I had still hoped it was done on paper, at least. Not fun to have one’s illusions shattered.
Though I’m sure e-mail transmission is much more efficient, not to mention reliable.
I know what you mean about the image in your head b/c I have one similar to it. Some of these men have outstanding hand writings, maybe it was a mandatory “course” of sorts in the old religious schools? It would be a shame if they didn’t use it.
Another (probably stupid) geeky language question…
For everyday writing, in school or university or whatever, do Iranians just use ordinary ballpoint pens? You don’t all carry around calligraphy pens, do you? (I saw in one of the pictures for the “Ayatollah and the Kids” post that one of the boys was holding a very ordinary-looking pencil…so I’m guessing the answer to this question is no.)
I’m just confused because, as I mentioned, I’ve been studying some Farsi recently and – both in my book and whenever I see it printed – it looks as though it were written with a calligraphy pen, not just a round-nibbed pen/pencil like the type we use here. In fact I went and bought a calligraphy pen for the purposes of practicing Persian script, because otherwise I couldn’t get the letters to look right!
(On a side note – though I have horrible handwriting in English, sometimes so bad even I can’t read it – my handwriting in Persian seems to be far clearer. Probably because it’s such a beautiful script I’d feel guilty if I mangled it. But returning to the main question…)
So, anyway, what writing implement(s) are commonly used in Iran?
LOL! Now there’s one I’d never been asked before
You are right! School textbooks stress calligraphy and present many of the lessons in the Persian textbook (but not the other books) with traditional Persian calligraphy. In the earlier grades, it’s simple so kids can read, and it goes on to become more refined.
They do this so that kids can get used to reading text like that … And it’s a useful strategy, your eyes get used to it at an early age and it becomes at one with reading regular printed text.
But in class, students only use ordinary pencils/pens as people do in other parts of the world
The special calligraphy pens are only used in art class, where calligraphy is taught in some of the grades.