Arash Dabestani

Arash Dabestani is an Iranian-American writer and MFA graduate of New York University. He holds dual B.A. degrees in Middle Eastern Studies and English Literature from UC Berkeley, where he wrote his honors thesis on frame narratives and layered storytelling. He is the author of five short story collections in Persian. His most recent work is a four-volume series of interviews with contemporary Iranian authors, the first volume of which was published in November 2025. A recipient of the Sadegh Hedayat Fiction Award, he is also the founder of Ifrit Podcast and Radio Nebeshteh. His writing moves across borders of language and history, tracing exile, inheritance, and the quiet negotiations of identity.

Who Can I Dance With?

By February 15, 2026
From sneaking into underground basements in Tehran [...] to learning to dance with almost no words in Northern California, I had done everything I could.