Dr. Fatemeh Shams is a Persian poet, literary scholar, and translator. She currently teaches Middle Eastern literature and history at the University of Pennsylvania. Her work focuses on the intersection of literature, politics, and society. Fatemeh is interested in the evolution of poetry and patronage in the Persian literary tradition and the representation and transformation of this relationship in modern Iran. She previously taught poetry at Oxford and SOAS Universities in the UK. She has published three award-winning poetry collections in Persian and English. In her academic research, she concentrates on the intersection of poetry and politics in past and present Iran. Her book, Revolution in Rhyme: Poetic Co-Option Under Islamic Republic (Oxford University Press), explores the role of poetry and poetics in the political ideology of the Islamic Republic.