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Modernism and Ideology in Persian Literature: A Return to Nature in the Poetry of Nimá, by Majid Naficy. 138 pages, bibliography. Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 1997. $27.50 (Cloth) ISBN 0-7618-0862-0

Certain stories rise above the others. Tayeb Salih writes powerful magic realism. In one scene, his narrator converses with Satan (as a sexual gourmandizing Britisher), then in the next scene flees to a venerable, wholly realistic father figure. The story's meaning falls somewhere in a conceptual trench violently rent between the two worlds. Fantastic, gothic, memoirish, told at a rapid clip: Salih's tale is perfect for western readers. Poetry jumps cultures, too. The crypto-sensitive detail-gathering of Edward El-Kharrat in his tale of time, the sea, and the players on its stage (including himself—that memoirish element again) compels the reader through sheer beauty of language. When suddenly his brave, postmodern ending takes us to another level of reverie, it is nothing short of astounding. The good tales roll on with their plots, characters, scenes, and emotions, with the writing, except for El-Kharrat's, effacing itself. Not so with sentences like this from a lesser tale: "They asked of Hajj Ahmed that the Faki should meet the two of them first thing in the morning at their houses" (p. 12). Such arch constructions sound medieval. Another tale: "The boy went into the room and from it there emerged a man whom I asked for a room with a balcony" (p. 29). Is it possible to use more words? A reissue implies the original cannot be improved. What we need, though, is a single Denys Johnson-Davies' collection culled from all his anthologies, including this one.