Amir Hassan Cheheltan (); (born 1956) is an Iranian writer. He has published 12 novels, six volumes of short stories and a screenplay of which are banned in Iran. Many are translated into English, German, Italian, Norwegian, Lithuanian, Arabic and Hebrew.

Life

Cheheltan was born in

Tehran Tehran (; , ''Tehrân'') is the capital and largest city of Iran. It is the capital of Tehran province, and the administrative center for Tehran County and its Central District (Tehran County), Central District. With a population of around 9. ...

in 1956 to parents with an interest in classical

Persian literature Persian literature comprises oral compositions and written texts in the Persian language and is one of the world's oldest literatures. It spans over two-and-a-half millennia. Its sources have been within Greater Iran including present-day ...

. After graduating from a mathematics high school, he studied

electrical engineering Electrical engineering is an engineering discipline concerned with the study, design, and application of equipment, devices, and systems that use electricity, electronics, and electromagnetism. It emerged as an identifiable occupation in the l ...

and after the

Iranian Revolution The Iranian Revolution (, ), also known as the 1979 Revolution, or the Islamic Revolution of 1979 (, ) was a series of events that culminated in the overthrow of the Pahlavi dynasty in 1979. The revolution led to the replacement of the Impe ...

of 1979, he left Iran for Great Britain to keep studying. After his studies he served in the military during the

Iran Iraq war Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) and also known as Persia, is a country in West Asia. It borders Iraq to the west, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Armenia to the northwest, the Caspian Sea to the north, Turkmenistan to the nort ...

Literary career

His first work was a collection of stories, ''Sigheh'' (Temporary Wife), released in 1976. Later he wrote his first novel, ''The Mourning of Qassem'', which was only to be published in 2003, twenty years after it was completed. Due to a difficult situation for the country's intellectuals, he fled Iran in 1999 and only returned two years later. He has been a guest at the International Literature Festival of Berlin for several years and his essays have been published in German newspapers such as the

Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung The (; ''FAZ''; "Frankfurt General Newspaper") is a German newspaper founded in 1949. It is published daily in Frankfurt and is considered a newspaper of record for Germany. Its Sunday edition is the ''Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung'' ( ...

and

Süddeutsche Zeitung The ''Süddeutsche Zeitung'' (; ), published in Munich, Bavaria, is one of the largest and most influential daily newspapers in Germany. The tone of ''SZ'' is mainly described as centre-left, liberal, social-liberal, progressive-liberal, and ...

. He has received scholarships from the German

Heinrich Böll Foundation The Heinrich Böll Foundation (German language, German: ''Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung Eingetragener Verein, e.V.''; Abbreviation: HBS) is a German legally independent political foundation. Affiliated with Alliance '90/The Greens, Alliance 90/The Gr ...

, the

Ledig House Art Omi, formerly Omi International Arts Center, is a non-profit international arts organization located in Columbia County in Ghent, New York. The organization provides residencies for writers, artists, architects, musicians, dancers and chore ...

in Belgium and the

Villa Aurora The Villa Aurora, 520 Paseo Miramar, Pacific Palisades, Los Angeles, has been an artists' residence since 1995. It is the former home of the German Jewish author Lion Feuchtwanger and his wife Marta. The Feuchtwangers bought this Spanish-style ...

in California.

Works

novels

* ''The Mourning of Qassem'', Now, Tehran 1984 * ''Hall of Mirrors'', Beh-negar, Tehran, 1991 * ''Tehran, City without Sky'', Negah, Tehran, 2002 * ''Love and the Incomplete Woman'', Negah, Tehran, 2003. * ''Iranian Dawn'', Negah, Tehran, 2005 * ''Tehran, Revolution Street'', Kirchheim, München, 2009 * ''American Killing in Tehran'', C.H. Beck, München, 2011 * ''The Calligrapher of Isfahan'', C.H. Beck, München, 2015 * ''The Persistent Parrot'', Matthes & Seitz, Berlin, 2018 * ''The Circle of Literature Lovers'', C.H. Beck, München, 2020 * ''A love in Cairo'', C.H. Beck, München, 2022

short stories

* ''Temporary Wife'', Bu-ali, Tehran, 1976 * ''Relic-cloth on the Shrine's Steel Grillwork'', Rawagh, Tehran, 1978 * ''No One Called me Anymore'', Negah, Tehran, 1993 * ''Not Long remains till Tomorrow'', Negah, Tehran, 1998 * ''Five O'clock is too Late to Die'', Negah, Tehran, 2002 * ''Several Unbelievable Truths'', Negah, Tehran, 2017

Awards

International Literature Award International Literature Award (''German'': Internationaler Literaturpreis – Haus der Kulturen der Welt) is a German literary award for international prose translated into German for the first time.1956 births Writers from Tehran 20th-century Iranian writers Living people Iranian male novelists 21st-century Iranian writers Iranian male short story writers Iranian writers in German 20th-century short story writers 20th-century Iranian novelists 21st-century novelists 21st-century short story writers Iranian expatriates in Germany Iranian military personnel of the Iran–Iraq War Iranian expatriates in the United Kingdom