U.S. scholar says his countrymen prefer films to reading

TEHRAN,April 18 -- U.S. scholar Paul Sprachman, who has translated several Iranian war stories into English, is convinced that Americans spend more time watching films and TV series rather than reading books. Today’s younger generation in America has no interest in studying historical events, they are mostly looking to the future and pay little attention to literary works related to the past, he said. Sprachman is currently in Tehran and met with several Iranian authors here on Monday at the office of author Amir-Hossein Fardi. The author has traveled to Iran to present the translation of the Iranian bestselling Persian novel on the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq war “Da” and to hold classes and workshops for writers. Several Iranian authors also attended the session including writers Mohammad-Kazem Mazinani, Mohammadreza Aslani Qazi, Habib Yusefzadeh and Mohammadreza Qorbani. Sprachman later regarded the negative propaganda against Iran as another reason for the lack of interest in reading Persian works. He regretted the interference of political issues in the culture and literature of America and said, “We should know that Persian is only a language without political aspects.” He regarded Persian a language whose cultural nature has superiority over its political aspect and explained that the Persian language holds wisdom and spirituality inside it. He also said that he loved Persian literature and will do his best to introduce it the best way among the Persian-speaking nations. Sprachman can read and write Persian, Arabic, German, Hindu-Urdu, French, and Latin. He is also somewhat familiar with Chinese, Russian, and Hebrew. Amir-Hossein Fardi’s novel “Esmaeil”, Mohammad-Ali Jamalzadeh’s “What’s Sauce for the Goose” and “Once Upon a Time”, Ebrahim Golestan’s “Esmat’s Journey”, and Jalal Al-e Ahmad’s “Plagued by the West” are the some of the Persian books Sprachman has previously rendered into English.