Bahram Beyzai

thumb|Bahram Beyzai in 2002 Bahram Beyzai (26 December 1938 – 26 December 2025) was an Iranian filmmaker, playwright, theatre director, researcher, and ostād ("master") of Persian literature, mythology, and Iranian studies. Quotes 'The credulous people of fifty-seven,drowned in hope, dizzied by the promise of oil, forgot the rights of the generations to comelisten now to their cry, these days: That vote, cast without true understanding, is void what a bazaar they built from God and faith! A vote built on hidden intentions,raising the banner of self-interest! What the future revealedwas self-worship stepping out from the shadows! Bitter came the sigh of those who did not know, their feet bound in even heavier chains!Deceit, discrimination, and plunder became religion, suddenly silent was "the Most Merciful of the merciful"!And worship turned into servitude the slave saw nothing but his own chains! Our share became ISIS and al-Qaeda,while the clerics reaped hundreds of benefits! Hear now, in this volcano,let no trace remain of the oppressors! That ill-omened, ugly vote is voidour generation will write another verdict! Compatriot, rise and raise a cry, blood has boiled into blood in this struggle!Mother Iran has risen from her place, reclaiming her country from the predators!The occupied land of Iran when will it be freed from these verses of vengeance! Enough deceit, enough plunder, enough flood of lies,enough auctioning off your country with fanfare and noise! Broken be the hand that broke another's hand,severed be the chain meant to bind others! Know this: the father's war is with his own childlearn from him right from wrong! Tear from your neck the mark of servitude,shatter the darkness with radiance! Kaveh's apron lit the way, this dawn became the burning headscarf of the moon!And this tree of the hair of the fallen is the banner of the free's victory!We are not slaves of these homeland-less ones tomorrow will say who we are! A seal of nullity on the regime of the oppressorsmay this root be torn from the face of the earth!'**personal poem Mehr 1401 مردمِ خوشباورِ پنجاه و هفت غرقه‌ى اميّد و گيج سهم نفت، حقِّ نسلِ بعد رفت از يادشان بشنويد اين روزها فريادشان: باطل است آن رأى برنشناخته كز خدا و دين چه دكّان ساخته! رأى بر نيّاتِ پنهان داشته بيرق خُودمحورى افراشته! آنچه از فرداى آن دانسته شد خودپرستى تا برون از سايه شد! تلخ آمد آهِ نادانستگان پا به زنجيرى گران‌تر بستگان! خُدعه و تبعيض و غارت گشت دين لال شد يكباره اَرحَمْ راحمين! وين عبادت تا عبوديّت كشيد بَرده جز زنجير خود چيزى نديد! سهم ما شد داعش و القاعده مُفتيان بردند صدها فايده! بشنويد اكنون در اين آتشفشان اى نمانَد از ستمكاران نشان! باطل است آن رأىِ ناميمونِ زشت نسل ما رأى دگر خواهد نوشت! هَموطن برخيز و فريادى برآر خون به خون جوشيده در اين كارزار! مادرِ ايران زِ جا برخاسته كشورش را از دَدان پس خواسته! كشورِ اشغالىِ ايران‌زمين كِى شود آزاد از اين آياتِ كين! خُدعه بس، غارت بس و سيلِ دروغ بس حراجِ كشورت با بانگ و بوق! بشكند دستى كه دستى را شكست بُگسلد بندى كه خواهد دست بست! هان پدر جنگ تو با فرزند توست يادگير از وى دُرُست از نادُرُست! بَركن از گردن نشان بندگى درشكن تاریک با تابندگى! پيشْ‌بندِ كاوه روشن كرد راه روسرىْ‌سوزانِ مَه، شد اين پگاه! وين درختِ گيسوى جان‌دادگان بيرق پيروزى آزادگان! برده‌ى اين بى‌وطن‌ها نيستيم روزِ فردا گفت خواهد كيستيم! مُهر باطل بر نظام الظالمين كَنده باد اين ريشه از روى زمين! I do not endorse ignorance. I love these people, but not their ignorance. I love the potential within them—the potential that can lead to their awakening «من جهالت را تأیید نمی‌کنم، عاشق این مردمم ولی نه عاشق جهالتشان. عاشق آن استعدادی هستم که درونشان هست و می‌تواند به جهش آنها بیانجامد.» https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/12269414 جدال با جهل (Struggle with Ignorance). People are like mirrors. A tarnished mirror makes you appear dim; a cracked mirror makes you seem broken; a polished or warped mirror shows you straight or distorted. But that is different from who you truly are «آری، آدمیان به آینه‌ها شبیه‌اند. آینهٔ زنگاربسته تو را کدر نشان می‌دهد و آینهٔ ترک‌خورده تو را شکسته، و آینهٔ صیقلین یا مواج تو را صاف یا معوج؛ و این جز آن است که تو صاف باشی یا شکسته یا کدر یا زنگاربسته…» طومار شیخ شرزین (The Scroll of Sheikh Sharzin), screenplay. We are a people who have forgotten their past and are confused about their present Iran is not a country that began with Islam, nor one that ended with i Our mythology is not dead — it is merely sleeping, and it sleeps inside us. https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/iranian-studies/article/abs/from-the-land-of-the-pure-in-search-of-the-lost-origin I gradually realized that the entire culture of the country had become a form of cultural imitation. "Protest and claim of responsibility", Rastaxiz-e Javanan. 28. My parents were Baha'is and I grew up in a Baha'i family. But my religion is a culture. My religion is not a religion itself. Religion is a personal belief and it does not belong to anyone in the world. Persian BBC I was born in this country and I have as much right to work and live as you do, and I certainly have more right to cinema than you, who have done nothing but prevent my work. I am a filmmaker, and it is because of my existence and that of other filmmakers that you sit behind that table, in a room from which you treat us like slaves, listening to orders and taking orders? Persian BBC Works O Wisdom, why do you dwell in the minds of the wicked, if you are truly wisdom? Why do you aid them, so that mounted upon you, they strive in the shedding of others' blood «آه خِرَد، چرا در سرِ بددلان جای می‌کنی اگر خردی؟ چرا ایشان را یار می‌شوی، که سوار بر بارهٔ تو، در خون این و آن کوشند؟» https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/2260575 Yes, I too became suspicious like you. Why do we take every good thing for evil? Is it not because we have seen so much evil «آری من نیز چون شما به دل بد آوردم! چرا هر نیک را بد می‌گیریم؟ از آن نیست که همواره بد دیده‌ایم؟» https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/2260575 We thought ourselves wise in all things, while wisdom laughed at us. Foolish is the one who thinks he can outwit a world that forever outwits «خود را بینا شمردیم بر همه چیز؛ و خِرَد به ما می‌خندید! نادان آنکه شیوه زند به گیهانِ شیوه‌زن!» We are the losers of a world whose foundations were laid before we were born «آری، ما باختهٔ این جهانیم، که پیش از زادنِ ما پی ریختند!» https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/2260575 Have you thought about it? Your opposition makes me appear more frightening than I really am. That's actually useful, because then no one dares challenge me «هیچ فکرشو کردی؟ تو با مخالفتت منو ترسناک‌تر از اونچه هستم نشون میدی. این خودش خیلی خوبه. چون دیگه کسی جرئت نمی‌کنه با من دربیفته.» چهار صندوق (Four Boxes). What is the use of the name we attach to ourselves, when behind it we are someone else «چه فایده از اسمی که به خود می‌بندیم؛ وقتی پشت آن کسِ دیگریم!» تاراج‌نامه (Taraj-nameh). They speak of him endlessly; yet those who speak, why are they not like him themselves? «از او بسیار می‌گویند؛ و آنها که می‌گویند چرا خود چون او نیستند؟» روز واقعه (The Day of the Event). "Everything we have comes from the King." "But we have nothing." "That too comes from the King." «ما هرچه داریم از پادشاه است.» «ما که چیزی نداریم.» «آن نیز از پادشاه است!» Whoever you are — king or beggar — you came to our door, and now you are ours to answer for. https://bisheh-publishing.com/products/death-of-yazdgerd An arrow that carries a whole people's life cannot miss https://iranian-studies.stanford.edu/plays-bahram-beyzaie "A young falcon longed to fly; we ignored him, and Turan gave him wings." «بچه شاهینی پروازش آرزو؛ ما وی را ندیده گرفتیم، و توران بال داد.» https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/2260575 We all die with the antidote already in our hands. «ما همه نوشدارو در دست می‌میریم!» https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/2260575 What have I to offer this body but tears? With what shall I wash this wound, when it was made not by a stranger, but by my own? «جز اشک چه دارم ارزانیِ این پیکر کنم؟ به چه شویم این زخم را که نه از بیگانه، از خویش است؟» https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/2260575 External links Category:Film directors from Iran Category:Playwrights from Iran Category:1938 births Category:2025 deaths Category:Essayists from Iran Category:Translators from Iran Category:Children's authors Category:Stanford University faculty Category:Academics from Iran Category:Film producers from Iran Category:Screenwriters from Iran Category:Film editors Category:Theatre directors Category:Postmodern authors Category:Historians from Iran