Blog Archives

Joseph Emin: a temporary parting note

In deciding to focus only on Joseph Emin’s early days in England, I am obviously leaving out large parts of his life as an intellectual and liberation activist. I may return to this, perhaps to incorporate one of his many

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Posted in Character notes and sources, Reflections

Week in review: May 10 – 16

Along with Zainab Amadahy I participated in an interview on CIUT radio with the Vibe Collective on the 10th. Short interview so I didn’t get to explore the relations between art and healing, though embodiment and breath were discussed. On

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Joseph Emin, 2: landed in paradise

Excerpts from Emin, Joseph. Life and Adventures of Joseph Emin, An Armenian, Written in English by Himself. Retrieved from Archive.Org 10/02/2014. Corrected through comparison with Emin, Joseph. Life and Adventures of Joseph Emin, An Armenian, Written in English by Himself.

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Posted in Archival material, Knowledge base, Script

Joseph Emin, 1: the ship sets sail (1751)

Excerpts from Emin, Joseph. Life and Adventures of Joseph Emin, An Armenian, Written in English by Himself. Retrieved from Archive.Org 10/02/2014. Corrected through comparison with Emin, Joseph. Life and Adventures of Joseph Emin, An Armenian, Written in English by Himself.

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Joseph Emin: notes and sources

Joseph Emin (1726-1809) was born in Hamadan, Persia, in an Armenian family that, according to his memoirs, were uprooted from Armenia, a few generations before Joseph’s birth, by one of Shah Abbas’s campaigns. When he was a child of five,

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The “Other” ambassador and the “Fascination of Persia”

In addition to getting overshadowed by Robert Sherley’s figure and posturings, Sampsonia/Teresia‘s narrative gets mixed with the story of Naqd Ali Beg, a Persian who showed up in England as ambassador from Shah Abbas. His presence totally messed up Robert’s

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Posted in Image, Knowledge base

Sampsonia, 5: the “honourable company”

Excerpts from Wright, Denis. The Persians Amongst the English: Episodes in Anglo-Persian History. London: I.B. Tauris & Co., 1985. Pp 1-9 A note on the source: Perhaps because this book was published in 1985, height of anti-Iran sentiments in the

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Week in review: May 3 – May 9

I’m posting this late. I was simply too tired on Friday, May 9th, to do a weekly review. The week’s content production was focused on Sampsonia aka Teresia Sherley. This has been the hardest so far, harder even than I’tisam

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Sampsonia, 4: and Shakespeare

Excerpts from Ghani, Cyrus. Shakespeare, Persia, and the East. New York: Mage Publishers, 2007. In 1600 Queen Elizabeth had chartered a commercial company named the East India Company, which was given monopoly of trade between East and West. In 1615

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Sampsonia, 3: thrice worthy and undaunted lady Teresia

Excerpts from Shirley, Evelyn Philip. The Sherley brothers, an historical memoir of the lives of Sir Thomas Sherley, Sir Anthony Sherley, and Sir Robert Sherley, knights (1848). Retrieved from Archive.Org 05/04/2014 That Robert Sherley had attained a competent knowledge of

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