Turan Mirhadi in Another Narrative

According to Khabaronline news agency, quoting ISNA, nine years ago on the eighteenth of Aban, the life of Turan Mirhadi came to an end; she was a master of children’s literature, a writer, an education specialist, and one of the influential cultural figures who worked for over 60 years in the fields of education and children’s literature. Her departure was not the end of her journey.

Her thoughts, her view of humanity, and her concerns about children’s education in society are still alive, and many strive to expand her ideas, one way being the creation of documentaries about her life and thoughts. Today, coinciding with the ninth anniversary of her passing, the documentary ‘One Was, One Wasn’t’, produced, directed, and filmed by Gholamreza Katal, which was made in 77 minutes in 2017 (1396 SH), premiered online for the first time on the Hashoor platform.

Turan Mirhadi, who believed that ‘great sorrows should be turned into great works,’ founded the Farhad Kindergarten in 1955 (1334 SH) in the name of her lost brother, and later the Farhad elementary and junior high schools. She managed it until 1980 (1359 SH). The documentary ‘One Was, One Wasn’t’ portrays this period of her life; the film, through a conversation and reminiscence with Turan Mirhadi in 2004 and 2005 (1383 and 1384 SH), reviews the story of her life and her professional and cultural activities from childhood to the establishment of Farhad School and her distinctive approach to education, the launch and establishment of the Children’s Book Council with a group of children’s literature enthusiasts in 1963 (1342 SH), and the formation of the idea of the Children’s and Young Adults’ Encyclopedia and how its articles were written and its volumes published.