The fact that I'm a woman is as important to my work as a poet as the fact that Ahmad Shāmlu was a man was important to his work as a poet. Basically, gender shouldn't be viewed as an advantage in art. If a poem or a piece of writing is good, what difference does it make whether it's by a woman or a man? And, if it's bad, why should its writer's gender make it good?

No one can create a noteworthy work without knowing the tenets of their own language and literature. Language is renewed but it never changes its essence, because the contracts that have come about over time for communication cannot be rescinded so easily.

Literature rests on language. It is a linguistic art. So it cannot sever its relationship with the past. But it can create new methods and styles that differ in structure, form, and content from the past.

The more stringent the rules and the more limiting they are, the more the poet and writer is forced to resort to special techniques and intricacies to escape them. And these techniques and intricacies adorn the writing and make it more beautiful. But, in the modern world, linguistic intricacies and embellishments do not attract much attention anymore, and the more sincere and intimate the relationship between a work and its reader, the better.

Old I may be, but, given the chance, I will learn.

Democracy is the product of human thought and reasoning. It's true that philosophers and thinkers have always imagined a utopia in which everything is as it ought to be and the people live in freedom and comfort. But this was not achieved until recent centuries.

The fact that I'm a woman is as important to my work as a poet as the fact that Ahmad Shāmlu was a man was important to his work as a poet. Basically, gender shouldn't be viewed as an advantage in art. If a poem or a piece of writing is good, what difference does it make whether it's by a woman or a man? And, if it's bad, why should its writer's gender make it good?