Heroes to Hostages: America and Iran, 1800-1988

It is easy to forget, given the oppositional dynamic between Iran and the United States of the last 50 years, that these two countries once shared productive partnership. Tracing US-Iran relations over two turbulent centuries, Firoozeh Kashani-Sabet considers when and how this relationship went awry. With careful attention to social and cultural as well as diplomatic developments, Kashani-Sabet shows that the rift did not originate in flashpoints of crisis, like the 1953 coup or the 1979 Is...