The Real, the Imaginary, and the Symbolic: A Lacanian Reading of Ramita Navai’s City of Lies

Contemporary life writings of Iranian diaspora are often censured for promoting a universalizing, dehumanizing and hegemonic image the nation. The common misgiving is that narratives project women as archetypal victims their male counterparts essentially powerful subjects. present study aims at problematizing this assumption by arguing Ramita Navai’s City Lies (2014) portrays an anti-essentialist character sketch individuals with diverse identities complex subjectivities. To pursue line argument, article examines titular characters’ development in face existing tensions between different psychic social realities. Lacan’s triadic model Real, Imaginary, Symbolic used relation to his notion mirror stage analyze ways which characters traverse three orders process forming sense selfhood. selfhood explored light latent desires, anxieties, feelings loss determining factors behind each within prevailing normativities heteropatriarchal government. findings reveal while Amir, Leyla, Asghar, Bijan, Farideh find themselves permanently lost unconscious orders. Dariush, Morteza, Somayeh break into order reassert subjectivity. In manner, writing challenges grand about Iranians homogenous group people it offers equal chance attaining subjectivity both female characters.