Beautiful dead women. Thus was the focus of my Master’s thesis.

I concentrated on how 19th century male-authored European paintings – specifically “Le Jeune Martyre” by Paul Delaroche (1855) and “Ophelia” by John Everett Millais (1852) – suggested that only in death could a female be forever remembered as a young, beautiful, silent, pious and subordinate (using Barbra Welter’s term) “True Woman.”

How “turn-of-the-century” female-authored American texts – “The Awakening” by Kate Chopin (1899) and “The House of Mirth” by Edith Wharton (1905) – refuted this image. How by “killing” their heroines (or having their heroines kill themselves), they created a necessary martyr; reinvented a revolutionary symbol whose death illuminated the social and aesthetic hypocrisies assigned to women by men; a symbol that exposed one implicit cultural regulation: “women must follow the rules or die.”

To my great surprise and awe, I came across “Ophelia” at the Tate Britain while in London. Since I spent the better part of a year studying online print offs of the painting, I couldn’t help gawking at the authentic one.

Standing about an inch away from the paint, something complicated rustled inside me. I was troubled by unanswerable questions: was William Shakespeare attempting to make a revolutionary character when he wrote “Hamlet”? Why did Millais choose to paint this specific scene? Is Ophelia a haunting figure because her death was a suicide? Do people just want something pretty to look at?

While walking around the city that same day, the front page of a London magazine caught my attention. There was the face of Neda Agha Soltan – the beautiful 26-year-old philosophy student who was shot dead by a militiaman – staring out from the cover.

Because I was on vacation (and subsequently not reading the newspaper on a daily basis), the magnitude of this woman’s death came as a shock; shock and some incommunicable haunting feeling comparable to my run in with “Ophelia.”

I immediately found an Internet café and googled her name.

Videos of Neda’s death – the blood seeping from her nose and mouth while onlookers shouted in Farsi, “Do not be afraid, Neda. Do not be afraid” – had circulated to Youtube, Twitter, Facebook and Myspace by this point.

The same day she died, at least nine other protesters were killed.

Now, two weeks later, I can’t help but wonder why Neda was chosen to be the revolutionary symbol of the struggle for freedom in Iran?

Is it because the others were not beautiful women? Is it because Neda literally means “voice” or “call” in Farsi? Many stories have been published that Neda predicted what would happen to her. When a friend pleaded with her not to join the protesters, Neda said: “It’s just one bullet and it’s over.” Like Ophelia, did her suicidal-esque death mean something more? Was she just hot?

Events leading up to and following the June 12 Iranian presidential election between former Prime Minister and defeated presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi and current President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad replayed in my head.

Especially the role of their wives, Mousavi’s wife Zahra Rahnavard (who many have dubbed the “Iranian Michelle Obama”) and Ahmadinejad’s nameless and almost invisible wife – referred to only as Mrs. Ahmadinejad – whose dark eyes are mostly drowned out by thick black cloth.

Zahra had many zealous public discussions about her and her husband’s reform agenda on women’s rights. She urged, “Women must feel both secure and liberated. In other words, they must be allowed to freely choose their career, work environment, and clothing [in compliance with Islamic dress code].”

A code that Ahmadinejad’s wife abides by as she stands behind her husband faithfully, silently.

Columnists such as Kathleen Parker have suggested that Neda was killed and made a martyr because she was a “modern woman” (Neda was wearing jeans and sneakers rather than the traditional dress of hijab or chador) who “chose to ignore the government’s preference that women hide their feminine features.”

She was killed because she didn’t “follow the rules.”

Even though Neda knew the potential consequences of her actions, and Parker rightfully pointed out that, similar to Chopin and Wharton’s fallen heroines, this kind of death did in fact expose the many injustices done onto women, and that is why Neda will forever remain a figure of freedom for Iran and women in general, it’s hard not to elude that haunted feeling.

She – Neda, Ophelia, Mrs. Ahmadinejad, Wharton and Chopin’s heroines – they’re all symbols of some sort. And yet, they’re all dead.

Originally published Sunday, July12, 2009