Or the Daughter of Not Without My Daughter
By Sheila Orysiek
SAN DIEGO — One day in 1991, a huge “skyscraper” size portrait of Iran’s Ayatollah Khomeini was draped on full display in Israel and as can be imagined caused quite a bit of consternation. Police arrived on the scene to find that it actually was a “scene” being filmed for the movie version of the book Not Without My Daughter by Betty Mahmoody (1987); an international best seller. A number of Israeli actors portrayed Iranian characters.
Mahmoody’s book related the story of her husband’s determination to turn a two week visit to his family in Iran into permanent residency. After Betty protested, he agreed to allow his wife to leave, but would not allow their daughter to go. Betty refused to leave without the child and after tremendous difficulties miraculously found help and fled over the mountains in midwinter into Turkey. Both she and her daughter, upon returning to the United States, spent the next twenty-five years on guard against the father’s continuing harassment and threat to abduct his daughter, Mahtob. The mother immersed herself in actively trying to help others similar situations; petitioning for changes in the legal code to address the problem of parental abduction.
In My Name is Mahtob by Mahtob Mahmoody, Nelson Books, 2015, the story continues through the pen of the daughter. She begins by relating from the point of view of a five-year-old child, the events described in her mother’s book. Hearing her mother’s screams and watching her father repeatedly savagely beat her mother, while Iranian relatives and friends looked on, is even more horrific than when these events were related by the mother.
In one particularly gripping scene (among many) as mother and daughter are standing on a street corner in Teheran they must make the decision whether to flee or return to the father’s home. Betty gives her young daughter the choice. Mahtob chooses to return to the United States.
The story continues as Mahtob grows up and the difficulties she faces because of her father’s religious radicalism; he declares she must embrace Islam. She is not only afraid of being abducted and taken back to Iran, but also being the victim of an “honor killing” since she is an actively religious Christian.
It is a difficult story and, sadly, not at all unusual. The legal code in the United States at the time did not address the problem of parental abduction and only recently has begun to change.
The book is engrossing.
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Orysiek is a freelance writer who specializes in the coverage of dance and literature. She may be contacted via sheila.orysiek@sdjewishworld.com. Comments intended for publication in the space below must be accompanied by the letter writer’s first and last name and by his/ her city and state of residence (city and country for those outside the U.S.)