Today on The PEN Pod, we spoke Iranian writer and translator Ali Araghi. He is the author of the novel The Immortals of Tehran and the founding editor of the online literary journal PARAGRAPHITI. Currently, Ali is a PhD student in comparative literature at Washington University in St. Louis, and alongside his second novel, he’s also working on Persian, Translated, a database of Persian literature translated into English. We spoke with Ali about how he’s dealing with the uncertainty of this moment, the process of writing The Immortals of Tehran, and the comforts that translation can provide, especially during a time when the world feels especially closed off.