The Priest and the King: An Eyewitness Account of the Iranian Revolution

by Desmond Harney

Overview

The author, a former British diplomat, was living in Tehran during the build-up to the Iranian Revolution and kept a day-to-day account of the events he witnessed, as the priest and the king - the Ayatollah Khomeini and the Shah - squared up to each other. The author's faithfully recorded responses - of hope, fear, confusion, scepticism and ultimately despair - reflect with substantial accuracy the spirit in Iran as the country swung from being a docile, Western-orientated ally to an unpredictable, brooding, revolutionary state. Harney had access to all elements of Iran's political elite, including the Shah, and was able to capture the atmsophere of Iran in revolution. This diary is, therefore, an important document: a day-to-day account kept by an outsider who was intimately familiar with Iran, a crucial contribution to our historical understanding of events.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781860643194
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Academic
Publication date:	12/31/1997
Series:	British Academic Press Series
Edition description:	Rev ed.
Pages:	224
Product dimensions:	5.88(w) x 8.76(h) x 0.92(d)

About the Author

Desmond Harney lived for more than a decade in Iran, both as a senior British diplomat and as a banker. He currently lives in London.

Table of Contents

Introduction
• January-September 1978: The Gathering Revolutionary Storm
• September 1978: The Great Marches and the Jaleh Square Massacre
• October 1978: Khomeini Declaims in Paris; the Shah Dithers in Tehran
• November 1978: Riots and Military Government
• December 1978: Moharram Marches and the Foreigners' Exodus
• January 1979: 'The Shah Has Gone'
• Epilogue: An Islamic Revolution and Its Aftermath
• Notes
• Further Reading
• Index

Editorial Reviews

Captures with a wonderful sense of immediacy the excitement and bewilderment of those days.” —Gary Sick, editor, The Persian Gulf in the New Millennium

“[An] extraordinary and riveting diary of events that led to the Shah's overthrow...Harney conveys superbly the ups and downs, the rumours and speculations, the paranoia...as the old order was undermined.” —William Shawcross, The Sunday Times (London)

From the Publisher