Jasmin Darznik is the ''New York Times'' bestselling author of three books, ''The Bohemians'', ''Song of a Captive Bird'', a novel inspired by the life of

Forugh Farrokhzad Forugh Farrokhzad ( fa, فروغ فرخزاد; 28 December 1934 – 14 February 1967) was an influential Iranian poet and film director. She was a controversial modernist poet and an iconoclast,* feminist author.Forugh Farrokhzad died at the age ...

, Iran's notorious woman poet, and ''The Good Daughter: A Memoir of My Mother's Hidden Life,'' which became a ''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' bestseller. A ''New York Times Book Review'' "Editors' Choice" and a ''Los Angeles Times'' bestseller, ''Song of a Captive Bird'' was praised by ''The New York Times'' as a "complex and beautiful rendering of vanished country and its scattered people; a reminder of the power and purpose of art; and an ode to female creativity under a patriarchy that repeatedly tries to snuff it out

''The Bohemians'' was selected by ''Oprah Daily'' as one of the best historical novels of 2021. Darznik's books have been published in seventeen countries. She is the chair of th
MFA Program in Writing at California College of the Arts
in San Francisco.

Biography

Darznik was born in Iran and came to the United States at the age of five. She graduated summa cum laude with a BA from the

University of California Los Angeles The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a teachers college then known as the southern branch of the California ...

in 1994 and a JD from the

University of California, Hastings College of the Law The University of California, Hastings College of the Law (UC Hastings) is a public law school in San Francisco, California. Founded in 1878 by Serranus Clinton Hastings, UC Hastings was the first law school of the University of California as ...

in 1997. She later received a PhD in English literature from

Princeton University Princeton University is a private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and one of the ...

in 2008 and an MFA from

Bennington College Bennington College is a private liberal arts college in Bennington, Vermont. Founded in 1932 as a women's college, it became co-educational in 1969. It claims to be the first college to include visual and performing arts as an equal partner in ...

in 2014. Her first book,
The Good Daughter: A Memoir of My Mother's Hidden Life
' was described by Kirkus reviews as "an eye-opening account that disturbs with its depiction of the place of women in Iranian society, but warms the heart in its portrayal of their gritty endurance." Her other two books are works of biographical fiction. ''Song of a Captive Bird'' (2018) is a fictional account about the trailblazing Iranian poet,

and ''The Bohemians'' (2021) imagines the life of a young Dorothea Lange in 1920s San Francisco. She is now an associate professor and chair of the MFA and Writing and Literature programs at

California College of the Arts California College of the Arts (CCA) is a private art school in San Francisco, California. It was founded in Berkeley, California in 1907 and moved to a historic estate in Oakland, California in 1922. In 1996 it opened a second campus in Sa ...

in San Francisco. She previously taught at

Washington and Lee University , mottoeng = "Not Unmindful of the Future" , established = , type = Private liberal arts university , academic_affiliations = , endowment = $2.092 billion (2021) , president = William C. Dudley , provost = Lena Hill , city = Lexington ...

, the

University of Virginia The University of Virginia (UVA) is a public research university in Charlottesville, Virginia. Founded in 1819 by Thomas Jefferson, the university is ranked among the top academic institutions in the United States, with highly selective ad ...

, and the

University of San Francisco The University of San Francisco (USF) is a private Jesuit university in San Francisco, California. The university's main campus is located on a setting between the Golden Gate Bridge and Golden Gate Park. The main campus is nicknamed "The Hil ...

Awards

Darznik is a recipient of a 2012 fellowship from the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities and an Outstanding Faculty Award from the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia. She has received fellowships from the Steinbeck Fellows Program, The Bennington Writers Seminars, and the Corporation of Yaddo. Her work has also been nominated for a Pushcart Prize. ''Song of a Captive Bird'' won the Writer's Center first novel prize and was long-listed for the 2018 Center for Fiction First Novel Prize. Her first book, ''The Good Daughter'', was a finalist for the Library of Virginia's 2012 People's Choice Award and was shortlisted for the William Saroyan International Prize in Creative Nonfiction.

Bibliography

* ''The Bohemians.'' Penguin Random House. April 6, 2021. * ''Song of a Captive Bird.'' Penguin Random House. February 2018. *''The Good Daughter: A Memoir of My Mother's Hidden Life''. Grand Central Publishing. February 2011.

References

External links

Official Website

Random House Author Page

Faculty webpage
at the California College of the Arts {{DEFAULTSORT:Darznik, Jasmin Living people 1973 births 21st-century American women writers American writers of Iranian descent Iranian emigrants to the United States Bennington College alumni Princeton University alumni University of California, Los Angeles alumni University of California College of the Law, San Francisco alumni California College of the Arts faculty Princeton University faculty University of San Francisco faculty University of Virginia faculty Washington and Lee University faculty