ĀZĀDĪ (Freedom) was the name of the following Persian journals: (1) A journal published at Tehran during the estebdād-e ṣaḡīr (lesser autocracy, June 1908-July 1909). No copies have been found and no details are available. (2) A journal published at Istanbul in 1909. No copies are known to have been preserved, but some facts are on record. The first issue, consisting of four printed (not lithographed) pages of three columns each, was dated 8 Moḥarram 1327/30 January 1909 and edited by Ḥasan Nājī Qāsemzāda, an Iranian from Ḵoy. Its declared purpose was to be “a defender of constitutionalism and the country’s policies and rights, and a propagator of the ideas of those who seek freedom for Iran.” Two issues per month were promised, but his journal did not survive beyond its first issue. (3) A Political-satirical weekly of reformist outlook published at Tehran in the months of Jawzā and Saraṭān, 1302 Š./June and July, 1923. The license-holder and editor was Maḥmūd Āzādī. After the seventh issue dated 30 Saraṭān/23 July, further publication was banned. Nevertheless Maḥmūd Āzādī brought out another issue under the title Bohlūl, using the license of a political-satirical journal of that name which had been published at Tehran in 1329/1911 by a licensee named Ḥasan Khan Meʿmār. The same Ḥasan Khan was the licensee, and Maḥmūd Āzādī was the editor, of the Bohlūl, which presented itself as Āzādī’s successor. Āzādī consisted of four printed pages measuring 36 x 49 cm with four columns per page. Its price was four šāhīs. Copies are preserved in various national libraries in Iran. (4) A Journal of news and social comment published initially at Mašhad in Šahrīvar, 1304 Š./September, 1925, and subsequently at Tehran from 1313 Š./1934 to 1314 Š./1935. It was intended to be a daily, but no more than four issues per week were ever achieved in practice. The publication license was held by ʿAlī Akbar Golšan-e Āzādī (1319/1901-1353 Š./1974), a poet and writer, formerly home news editor of the newspaper Fekr-e āzād. In Bahman, 1321 Š./February, 1943 Āzādī was banned, but after a long pause publication was resumed in the autumn of 1344 Š./1965. Now a weekly, Āzādī came out irregularly until the winter of 1352 Š./1974. Its size and format varied in its successive phases, but most often it had four pages measuring 45 x 49 cm with six columns per page. Its price was 35 dīnārs in the first phase and two rīāls in the last year of its existence. Copies which it has been possible to examine contain small numbers of illustrations and large numbers of official notices. Āzādī’s political comments were always more or less favorable to the government of the day.
Outside Iran, an incomplete set of this journal is held at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C.
Bibliography:
E. G. Browne, The Press and Poetry of Modern Persia, Cambridge, 1914, p. 30.
M. Ṣadr-Hāšemī, Tārīḵ-ejarāyed wa majallāt-e Īrān, Isfahan, 1327 Š./1948-1332 Š./1953, nos. 104-107.
L. P. Elwell-Sutton, “The Iranian Press, 1941-1947,” Iran 6, 1968, p. 75.
Ali Norouze, “Registre analytique annoté de la presse persane,” Revue du monde musulman 60, 1925, p. 57.
R. Lescot, “Notes sur la presse iranienne,” Revue des études islamiques 2-3, 1938, p. 273.
M. Barzīn, Sayr-ī dar maṭbūʿāt-e Īrān, Tehran, 1344 Š./1965, p. 155.
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(N. Parvīn)
Originally Published: December 15, 1987
Last Updated: August 18, 2011
This article is available in print.
Vol. III, Fasc. 2, p. 177