Mahmoud Dowlatabadi

Mahmoud Dowlatabadi
Born	Sabzevar, Iran
Occupation	Novelist
Literary movement	Persian literature
Notable work(s)	Kalidar Missing Soluch

Mahmoud Dowlatabadi (Persian: محمود دولت‌آبادی) (born 1940 in Dowlatabad, Sabzevar^[1]) is an Iranian writer and actor. He is known as a realist writer of stories of rural life, in which he largely draws on his own experiences.

Biography

He was born in Dowlatabad, a village in the Sabzevar, north-western part of the Khorasan Province, Iran, and spent his youth helping his father with farming and tending the flocks, and reading tales of Persian folklore. He attended high school in Tehran but failed to attain a degree. He later joined the Anahita Drama Group. In 1975, he was arrested and spent a year in prison.

Dowlatabadi started writing in the 1960s and has published several novels, novellas, short story collections and plays for theatre. Hist first story, The Pite of Night, was published in 1962 in the Anahita Literary Magazine. Other significant works include his 1968 novel The Tale of Baba Sobhan, which was made into a motion picture by Masud Kimiai entitled "Khak" (Earth/dust; 1972) and his magnum opus, Kalidar, which he wrote between 1977 and 1984.

Awards and honors

• 2011: Man Asian Literary Prize, longlist, The Colonel

Translations

• In Norway, Den tomme plassen etter Soluch is translated into Norwegian by N. Zandjani. Oslo, Solum forlag 2008.

Notes

1. ^ Interview with Hamshari Newspaper

References

• Interview with Mahmoud Dowlatabadi
• About Mahmoud Dowlatabadi
• Interview with Mahmoud Dowlatabadi
• Interview with Mahmoud Dowlatabadi (in Persian), Radio Zamaneh

Persondata
Name	Dowlatabadi, Mahmoud
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	1940
Place of birth	Sabzevar, Iran
Date of death
Place of death