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Abstract Although Ṣādeq Hedāyat’s works were first published in Iran more than eighty years ago, he remains one of the much-discussed and analyzed modern Iranian authors, both in Iran and abroad. The premise of this article is that the continuing fascination with Hedāyat and the intense focus on his most enigmatic works is partially due to his ability to cast well-established Persian cultural paradigms in novel, unfamiliar moulds. That preconception is tested in two ways: First, by examining trends in the literary discourse about Hedāyat (in Persian, in Iran; and English-language academic publications in the West); and secondly, through textual analysis of a short story, which demonstrates his ability to “defamiliarize the familiar”, thus using traditional templates to modern ends.
