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I asked her about her immediate plans in the US. She said she will be participating in a fundraiser for Encyclopaedia Iranica in Northern California on the occasion of Professor Yarshater's birthday. She will have several performances coming up in the United States in the near future.
Gordafarid's parting wisdom was to recite a poem from Hafez for me. Here it is!
گرت چو نوح نبی صبر هست در غم طوفان
بلا بـگردد و کام هـــــزار ســــاله بـر آیــد
If, like Noah, you are patient in anticipation of the storm
The calamity will pass and your wishes of a thousand years will come true
I found Fatemeh Habibizad to be a warm, intelligent, and kind human being. She is a true delight to know and a source of pride to me as a woman and as an Iranian.
I asked her about her expectations of her audience during her performances. She said "I have no expectations of my audience other than to come and give their energy and take mine. I will tell stories and they can take whatever they want from those stories. Several times after my shows people have said that they were so affected by the performance that they went home and read Shahnameh, or that they pursued Shahnameh stories afterwards.
She has also published a book, Afarin-e Afarinesh, which is a book about Iran's national ceremonies, honoring and cherishing the nature. United Nations Development Program commissioned this book.
She would like to look at this art form from different angles, describing nuances and different narrating techniques. Compiling this book will take a long time. In addition to library and archival research, she will have to do field research in countrywide coffee shops and learn the specific lingo of different morsheds. Habibizad believes that innovation comes from understanding the old traditions.
I asked her what her future plans and her goals are. She said she has an important research project under way to organize her personal collection and research material about the art of story narration in Iran. After 15 years in this field, she is slowly feeling ready to work on this project now. She wishes to classify and publish her recordings and notes of Morshed Torabi and a few other morsheds. She plans to compile an encyclopedia of Persian narrators, naqqalan, religious scene storytellers, pardeh khanan, and speakers, sokhanvaran.
Also Gordia, Bahram Choobin's sister, entered the battleground as a mother, a woman, and a warrior. Later, she is a good king, her subjects love her, she doesn't have to imitate a man, she knows where she is standing and she does it well."
I had to learn about Persian poetry, drama, storytelling, Iranian national heritage, Persian music, and different disciplines of narration and storytelling only one of which is naqqali.
"I am a professional researcher. I am a woman, I'm not supposed to become rough and masculine as a result of my job. This job has made me very soft, very modest, and very forthright. Look at heroines from Shahnameh. Gordafarid is a woman, but she goes to battle as a pahlavan (warrior hero), she doesn't have to copy anyone."
I asked her how it worked for her in her personal life to have a job like this. She said: "What I do is a job. I have always been aware of my position and art as a woman. This is a man's art, I know, but I have adapted it with a woman's creativity."
"Discrimination against woman has deep roots in history, in religion. Women are second class citizens in many religions. Just like any other Iranian woman, I have tried to make the best of my situation despite the social and state discrimination against women. But, I was fire under the ash. They would try to put me out, but I would flare up, I would go aflame again. I had to be patient. I had to expect nothing. I had hope."
I asked Gordafarid whether she had experienced discrimination in her career and in Iran. I wanted to know how people took to her as a woman in this field.
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