Former President of the Iranian Writers’ Association, nominated for a Nobel prize in literature in 1999 and 2002, she modernized the traditional Sufi ghazal poetry form, producing some of the most significant Persian literature of the 20th century. Fearless in her outspoken criticism of Iranian government, she continued to write poetry half-blinded by macular degeneration, recording her poetry vertically, down the edge of the paper.  Even in her 80’s, her words had teeth. Older, half-blind, Iran’s politicians still feared her, refusing to let her board a plane to France, interrogating her half the night and taking away her passport. Still, she spoke the truth and never gave in to fear and silence.

“Simin Behbahani always supported civil liberties, the right to freedom of speech in particular. Once, in front of a group of women’s rights activists, she spoke of her hope for a free homeland: ‘Our poets, writers and artists are venerated only on the day when there are no more authors in prison, when poets are not in trouble, when students are not jailed, when our journalists are free and so are their pens, when poverty and despair and oppression have ceased to exist [in this country.]’” 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/persian/arts/2014/03/140321_l93_simin_behbahani_interview_short.shtml

“Farzaneh Milani,  professor of Middle Eastern and South Asian Studies at the University of Virginia and the translator of Behbahani’s poetry into English, comments: ‘She’s a poet who has worked hard for our dear country for nearly seventy years, and has paid the price for it: she never submitted to the rule of any power, never sold her pen to anyone, and has lived on with admirable dignity.’”  http://www.bbc.co.uk/persian/arts/2013/08/130830_l93_behbahani.shtml