Jason Rezaian on Imprisonment in Iran

The New Yorker Radio Hour

WNYC Studios and The New Yorker

Politics, Arts, News, Wnyc, Books, David, Storytelling, Society & Culture, Yorker, New, Remnick

4.2 • 6.2K Ratings

🗓️ 25 January 2019

⏱️ 45 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Jason Rezaian was born in California to an Iranian father and an American mother. After a failed effort to enter the Persian rug trade, he moved to Tehran to be a reporter, and was working for the Washington Post when he was arrested by Iranian authorities. Rezaian was held at the notorious Evin Prison, and was interrogated for more than five hundred days. He was a pawn in an intrigue within the government: he believes his arrest, as an American journalist, was an attempt by hard-liners to interfere with the ongoing nuclear negotiations between Iran and other countries. Rezaian’s memoir of that time is called “Prisoner: My 544 Days in an Iranian Prison—Solitary Confinement, a Sham Trial, High-Stakes Diplomacy, and the Extraordinary Efforts It Took to Get Me Out.” He spoke with David Remnick about his experiences on January 22, 2019, at “Live from NYPL ,” the New York Public Library’s premier conversation series.

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is a special podcast bonus of the New Yorker Radio Hour.
0:10.8	This week, David Remnick spoke with Jason Rosian, the author of a new memoir called Prisoner.
0:16.6	Resion was born in California to Iranian immigrant parents.
0:20.6	He moved to Tehran as a reporter and was working for the Washington Post when he was arrested by Iranian authorities.
0:27.4	Rezion was held and interrogated for more than 500 days.
0:32.2	Here's David Remnick talking with Rosian at the New York Public Library.
0:37.3	So how did you maneuver your way,
0:40.3	journalistically and in terms of your career,
0:43.1	to get to go to Iran for the Washington Post?
0:46.1	How did this all happen?
0:47.3	I moved there without any job or any kind of clear sense of who I'd be writing for.
0:54.5	You just lifted stakes, quit your job, where were you before?
0:58.5	So, as those of you who are the children of immigrant entrepreneurs know, if your father was
1:06.5	in a business, you end up in that business.
1:08.1	So, you know, I...
1:09.2	And the family, what did they do for a living?
1:11.6	The Persian rug trade. And I had a time in the trade, and I'm looking at this nice rug down here.
1:18.7	It's all right. It's okay.
1:21.4	Special price. Special price for you, my friend. Yeah.
1:25.9	How much you think this rug would go for on the open market? On the open market.
1:30.2	Tony Mark says it's not for sale. Tony Marks is lying, everything for sale. Every rug has a price.
1:37.5	Yeah. So I open my own rug shop. Good, good move. I see some people here tonight that have been in that
	...

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