Soheila Beski, 1953–2015
Memorial Supplement
Soheila Beski — writer, translator, university lecturer, managing director of Memar Magazine, and one of the founders and organizers of the Grand Memar Award, and the most influential non-architect woman in the field of Iranian architecture — passed away on Wednesday, May 27, 2015 (6 Khordad 1394), after years of battling illness, at the time of her last visit with loved ones in Istanbul. She was laid to rest in Gonbad-e Kavus, the city of her childhood, beside her mother. Biography of Soheila Beski: After completing high school (Hadaf), she entered the Guilan School of Higher Management. Her love of reading, writing, and management, which had begun in childhood, crystallized during this period. In those years she played an instrumental role in publishing the student journal Baran, and with tireless perseverance continued the journal's publication for three years. After completing her bachelor's degree, she went to Michigan State University to study economics. She returned to Iran in 1977 and began teaching at Bu-Ali Sina University of Hamadan. With the closure of universities during the Cultural Revolution, she came to Tehran. This period of professional leave coincided with her marriage and the birth of her child. Even during this time at home, she remained active and took up translation, the fruit of which was the translation of two invaluable books: the biography of Virginia Woolf, and Living My Life, the autobiography of Emma Goldman. After some time, she began working at the Center for Urban Development and Architecture Studies, where she became responsible for publishing the journal Abadi, holding that position from 1990 to 1997. She was one of the founders of the Memar-Nashr Institute, Memar Magazine (1998), and Shahr Magazine (1999). Over 17 years of managing Memar Magazine and 4 years of managing Shahr Magazine, she published 91 issues of Memar and 28 issues of Shahr without interruption and on schedule. In 2001, she was also among the founders and organizers of the Grand Memar Award, and oversaw 14 of its editions. Soheila Beski was also a pioneer in humanitarian and social endeavors, including relief efforts for the Bam earthquake victims (2003), construction of public health facilities in several parks of that city, providing a van and equipment for waste collection in the historic city of Left, and creating a website to publicize the city's resources and needs, among other projects. One of her cultural activities was organizing the "Iran Literature Award" for selecting the best novel and best short story collection published in the 2000s, a prize intended for the author, along with the translation of the selected book into English. She also won the Golshiri Award in 2003 for her short story collection A Small Fragment. The body of Soheila Beski's work in literature comprises a collection of published and unpublished stories and novels. Fiction and novels: • Short story collection A Small Fragment (Agah Publications, 2002) • Short story collection Bibi Peyk (Niloufar Publications, 2005) • On the Tale of Building a Restroom in Bam (Forough Publications, 2006) • Novel Zarre (Particle) (Forough Publications, 2008) • In Waning — and There Is a Past That Will Not Pass (Niloufar Publications, 2009) • Short story collection Instant Photographs (Qoqnous Publications, 2014). Translations: • Virginia Woolf (biography), by Quentin Bell (Niloufar Publications, 2006) • Living My Life (autobiography), Emma Goldman (Niloufar Publications, 2009). Perhaps her life can be summed up in two words: a passion for living. A passion that even the severe illness of her final years could not extinguish, and that kept her, until her very last moment, preoccupied with the future of her family, friends, colleagues, and the endeavors she had set in motion. Soheila Beski, 1953–2015