Mohammad Zohari

Who was Mohammad Zohari?

Mohammad Zohari Iranian Poet & Writer

He was born in Tonekabon a city in north of Iran. As the first son of Abdollah Khaan Zohari Khalatbari an activist in Iranian Constitutional Revolution who had received the honorific title of “Motamed-al-Soltan Zaigham-ol-Mamalek" from Ahmad Shah Qajar, in 1931 due to his father's disagreement with Reza Shah Pahlavi the family was exiled to Malayer and later to Shiraz. There he started his writing career in early teenage by writing articles and short stories for Toffan Magazine. After the end of Second World War the family returned to Tehran there Zohari studied Persian literature at Tehran University and later achieved a PhD in literature from the same university. After graduation Zohari worked as high school/University teacher and journalist for Ferdowsi Magazine, Fokahi and some others for some years before he became a government employee and worked in various positions such as Head of Media and PR for Ministry of Education and Vice Director of National Library of Iran.

Zohari in his work got inspiration from all his surrounding and most of his poems were about his social environment or love, however most published one was the one about the social circumstances. In 1953 he meet Nima Yooshij for the first time which ended up to many more visits in the following years to discuss poetry and modern literature that many believes influenced Zohari’s work and the modern poetry in Iran in general from many aspects.