To get familiar with a country’s present situation one must know the history of that country. The Iran-Iraq War is one of the longest wars in the history of the world. It has also brought a big change in the contemporary situation of both of the countries and their relations.
Following are the top 5 books which will help you understand the conditions of both of the countries and the people who have lived those conditions.
The Complete Persepolis- by Marjane Satrapi
Marjane Satrapi is an Iranian-French author, graphic novelist, illustrator and film director. Her book The Persepolis is a great combination of haunting reality and a pinch of humour. It is a memoir which she has written from the point of view of a child. And as The Guardian also says “A humorous and haunting memoir of a young girl in Iran by Marjane Satrapi, Persepolis is an absolutely amazing book, filled with happiness, grief and moments of childhood in a world where all children are forced to grow up. And it’s told in a comic strip format, with simplistic but stunning images.”
I, Who Did Not Die- by Zahed Haftlang, Najah Aboud, Meredith May
I, who did not die is an autobiography of two former soldiers of different countries. Haftlang, who was just 13 years old at the time of war, was a soldier in the Iranian army whereas Aboud was a soldier of the Iraqi army. When both confronted one another to take each other’s life, Haftlang let Aboud escape to save his life. It is a story of how two soldiers became good friends regardless of their nationalities.
Revolutionary Iran: A History of the Islamic Republic- by Michael Axworthy
Michael Axworthy is a British author and commentator who has also been the head of the Iran section at the British Foreign & Commonwealth Office. His book Revolutionary Iran is a great pick to understand the changes that took place in Iran after bleeding in an eight-year-long brutal war. According to The Guardian, “Michael Axworthy in his calm and literate portrait of the Islamic Republic, certain long-lived chickens are coming home to roost. A fissure within the constitution of 1979, between parliamentary democracy and ecclesiastical control, now threatens to detonate the revolutionary ruling class known in Persian as the nezam or “system”.”
The Iran-Iraq War:
A Military and Strategic History – BY Williamson Murray, Kevin Woods
The Iran-Iraq War is a great book to know the perspectives of the Iraqis in the war. Authors Kevin M. Woods, Williamson Murray have written it by the lens of Iraqi soldiers and commanders. This book is written based on such Iraqi documents which were seized by the US army in the Iraq invasion in 2003.
The Iran-Iraq War- by Pierre Razoux
Pierre Razoux is a French writer and historian. The authors writing about Iran and Iraq never got the liberty to do research or provide definite information in their works. But as The New York Book Review says “Pierre Razoux’s “The Iran-Iraq War” falls short of providing a definitive account, but improves markedly on its predecessors. Razoux, research director at the Institute for Strategic Research in Paris, has made use of archival material available after the fall of Hussein.”
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