A Brief Note on Sa'id Soltanpur's Life

by
Iraj Bashiri
Copyright, Bashiri, 2000

Besides being a poet, Sa'id Soltanpur (1916-1975) was a teacher, an actor, and a film director. An intellectual, he was constantly harassed by the SAVAK, Iran's secret police, during the latter part of the Pahlavi Dynasty (1925-1979). He was incarcerated a number of times and was tortured at the Qasr and Evin prisons.

Little is known about Soltanpur's early life other than he served as a high school teacher in Tehran schools before becoming a theater director. During this period, he composed "Sedae Mira" as well as wrote several plays including "Hasanak" and "Istgah." His essay entitled "The Roots of Theater" was written with a view to needed improvements in the state-supported Iranian theater of the time. His writings were routinely confiscated by the SAVAK, mostly upon publication. A brief chronology of the last decade before his final incarceration follows:

1965-1966
Upon completing Anahita Art Studio, Soltanpur joined the Anahita group as an actor. In 1966, along with Mahin Eskui, he produced Anton Chekhov's "Three Sisters."

1966-1970
Attended the University of Tehran's Faculty of Fine Arts. As a student, he directed Salin Hanchav's "Facing Death" and his own "Istgah." The latter did not proceed beyond its debut. It was banned never to be shown again.

1969
Cooperating and co-directing with Nasir Rahmani, Soltanpur established Iran Theater Society and directed a few plays including Ibsen's "Public Enemy," Muhsin Yalfani's ?? "Teachers," Berecht's "Faces of Simon Mashar, " and Gorkii's "Little Bourgeois." Each production ended with a few arrests. In some cases the director in others the writers or actors were arrested. In some cases the audiences were asked to leave the theater.

1970
SAVAK, using its university arm (Director of Students Affairs) closed the production of "People's Enemy" after eleven nights.

1971
SAVAK invaded back stage during the performance of "Teachers." They manacled the director and, amid audience protests, took him away and incarcerated him. The director and the writer had questioned the legality of the Shah's courts martial.

1973
One month prior to staging "The Faces of Simon Mashar", Soltanpur was arrested and incarcerated on charges of publication of works like "A Type of Art, A Type of Thought," an essay extremely critical of the organization, lack of critical apparata, and lack of content of state-run theater, cinema, and television programs. He remained incarcerated for the next thirty days, facing the torture chamber at Qizil Qal'a prison. One month after he was released, he brought "The Faces of Simon Mashar" to the stage. On the third night, SAVAK excused the audience but, facing student unrest, relented and allowed the play to run for another fifteen nights.

1975
Soltanpur was arrested for composition of poetry degrading the values of the establishment. After trial, he was incarcerated for three years. "Avazhaye Band" and "Az Koshtargah" were composed during this time.

"What has happened to my country?" taken from the collections Soltanpur wrote about his ordeal, reflects the pain experienced by many in Iran with whom the poet sympathized. Soltanpur was executed by firing squad in 1981. This translation appeared for the first time as the backdrop to Iraj Bashiri's first English edition of The Black Tulip in 1984.

What has happened to my land;
What has happened to my home;
That the prisons are filled with tulips and dew,
That the survivors of the martyrs,
Like scattered masses of clouds, weep in the wake of scorched tulips?

Behold,
As with the agitation of a whirlwind,
I twist in the wasteland,
More turbulent than a tornado.
I shall whirl,
Till the embers, uncovered from the ashes,
Shout louder than the cry of the sun in summertime.
Till anger and blood cover the burning sunset of death.

It is my cry;
It is my cry that reverberates across the plateau,
Disturbs the dark dust of silent time and strikes at the restful waters.
It is my cry that removes the dust of time from the anger of the days.

Without you,
O martyred comet,
O great King, who shook the foundation of royalty,
O last star,
Most rebellious song.
Without you in the purple garden, among the crowds, far and near,
I am but an exhausted machine gun in the course of a revolution.
Churning the blood of the masses.
I am empty, stark, bloody, fearful and heavy.
A gross, awesome thorn on the face of a rose,
A reminder for the future in the eyes of time,
A reminder of the martyrdom of distressed masses crushed by that Nazi, that Tsar.

O everlasting wrath,
O rage,
O light of explosions,
O anger,
Behold the secret execution squads in official uniform!
O wrath. Behold the thousand carrion eaters who,
Like a thousand winged, bloody-maned steeds, surround this wasteland.
Strike, oh anger,
Strike!
Like the burning coals of a volcano,
Strike against the declining might of colonialism!

But alas, his "archangels,"
With white wings,
Descend from the sides, and chew the hearts of the patriots.
With eyes and claws and teeth.
They smear the hands of hidden terror with the blood of this tribe.
So many warriors,
So many martyrs!

What has happened to my home?
What has happened to my country,
That from the village alleys,
The city alleys,
The fire alleys,
The blood alleys,
With the courage of patriots,
With the stature of resurrection,
The crowd of the poor,
The sudden crowd,
The crowd of revenge
Does not emerge?

The patient eyes of men have long remained in tears;
The heart of love has endured enough incarceration;
We have cried so much from the depth of prisons that our throats are torn with wounds.

0 hand of Revolution,
People's robust arm,
Sun's mighty fist,
What has happened to my country?

Sa'id Soltanpur, 1975