About the Author

Dr. Shirin Ebadi was one of Iran’s first female judges and served as the first female chief magistrate of one of the country’s highest courts until the 1979 Islamic Revolution stripped her of her judgeship. In the 1990s Ebadi returned to the law as a defender of women’s and children’s rights, founding a human rights center that spearheaded legal reform and public debate around the Islamic Republic’s discriminatory laws. She has defended many of the country’s most prominent prisoners of conscience and spent nearly a month in prison in 1999 for her activities. For many years she was at the center of Iran’s grassroots women’s movement. In 2003 she was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for her work. Since the election uprising of June 2009 she has lived in exile.

Reviews

 “This is the riveting story of an amazing and very brave woman living through some quite turbulent times. And she emerges with head unbowed.”—Archbishop Desmond Tutu
 
“The safety and freedom of citizens in democracies is irretrievably bound with the safety and freedom of people like Shirin Ebadi who are fighting to reassert the best achievements of mankind: universal human rights. One of the staunchest advocates for human rights in her country and beyond, Ms. Ebadi, herself a devout Muslim, represents hope for many in Muslim societies that Islam and democracy are indeed compatible.”—Azar Nafisi
 
“A moving portrait of a life lived in truth.”—The New York Times Book Review
 
“A riveting account of a brave, lonely struggle . . . [Iran Awakening] reads like a police thriller, its drama heightened by Ebadi’s determination to keep up the quotidian aspects of her family life.”—The Washington Post Book World
 
“A must read . . . may be the most important book you could read this year.”—Seattle Post-Intelligencer
 
“As a testament to how a single, inspired voice can rise above the cacophony . . . the book should be required reading.”—The Nation
 
“Some of her admirers in Iran call her a woman of steel. Sure, the Iranian human rights champion also has a heart of gold. But it is Shirin Ebadi’s unbending will that explains how she has become the conscience of the Islamic Republic.”—Time
 
“[Ebadi] has come forward with professional force and unflagging courage, and she has defied any danger to her own safety. She is truly a woman of the people!”—Ole Danbolt Mjos, chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee
 
“[Ebadi] has risked her freedom and her life to defend democracy, free speech, and the rule of law.”—The Boston Globe