M. R. Ghanoonparvar
Mohammad Reza Ghanoonparvar is a Professor Emeritus of Persian and Comparative Literature at the University of Texas at Austin. He is known for his work on Persian literature and culture, and his expertise includes writers such as Simin Daneshvar, Sadeq Chubak, and Sadeq Hedayat.
He grew up in Isfahan, Iran. He earned a BA in English Language and Literature from the University of Isfahan in 1966 and also received a German language certificate from the Goethe Institute. He studied English Literature and Sociology at the University of Heidelberg, then moved to the United States in 1967 to study Foreign Language Teaching at Saint Michael’s College in Vermont. He continued his studies in English Literature and Linguistics at North Texas State University through 1970 and earned an MA in English Literature from Eastern Michigan University in 1972. Ghanoonparvar completed his PhD in Comparative Literature (Persian and English) at the University of Texas at Austin in 1979.
Most of his career was at the University of Texas at Austin (1985–2015). He also taught at the University of Isfahan (1974–1975), the University of Virginia (1979–1985), and the University of Arizona. He served in leadership roles with professional organizations, including as president of the American Association of Teachers of Persian and of the Texas Association of Middle East Scholars. He organized the Fourth Biennial Conference of the Association for Iranian Studies.
Ghanoonparvar retired from active teaching in 2013 after about forty years and continues to publish studies and translations. He is married to Diane L. Wilcox, and they have two children. The couple translated The Fairies by Ahmad Shamlu in 1980. He has published extensively on Persian literature and culture as well as translation theory and practice, in both English and Persian.
This page was last edited on 3 February 2026, at 01:08 (CET).