Exploring Iran

Here are some fun supplemental links for our reading of Jason Elliot's Mirrors of the Unseen. Further information about the animated celebration of Isfahan can be found here.
Here's a YouTube demonstration of the mosque's acoustical properties
and here are the shaking minarets. Some YouTube demonstrations of Zurkhaneh (both narrated in French) can be found here and here. You can find a few extra pictures of Louise Firouz and the Caspian Horse here. Last but not least, I discovered that UNESCO has this neat World Heritage Tour site that allows you to visit several of the historic sites explored in the book via 360° panoramic view. You! Are! There!

Our November Author: Jason Elliot

Alas, there is not much available online to help us get to know Jason Elliot, author of Mirrors of the Unseen, only a 2001 Salon interview focusing on Afghanistan and this Guardian article on Islamic art.

For November: Mirrors of the Unseen

For November we have selected Mirrors of the Unseen by Jason Elliot. This book will be out in paperback in early October.

Filling a long-neglected gap in the travel writing of the region, Mirrors of the Unseen is a rare and timely portrait of the nation descended from the world's earliest superpower: Iran. Animated by the same spirit of exploration as its acclaimed predecessor, An Unexpected Light, and drawing on several years of independent travel and research, this thought-provoking work weaves together observations of life in contemporary Iran with history, politics, and a penetrating enquiry into the secrets of Islamic art. Generously illustrated with the author's own sketches and photographs, Mirrors of the Unseen is a rich, sensitive, and vivid account of a country and its culture.