Shahnameh book becomes one of the most searched books on Divar
According to the IDEA, in its latest issue, Andisheh Pooya magazine went to the book ads on Divar and checked them, and extracted the most popular books and the most advertised cities and other interesting data from this topic.
Divar users, apart from searching for property or cars and household appliances, also solve their other needs through this platform; Like a book. For example, in the last year, at least 63 thousand times “Shahnameh” and 45 thousand times “Divan Hafez” were searched on Divar. Of course, this is only a part of the statistics related to the book in the world of user ads of this site.
Book ads on Divar are published in the “entertainment and leisure” category and the “book and magazine” subcategory. This subcategory includes “educational”, “literary”, “historical”, “religious”, “magazines” and “other” subcategories. In the past year, 53% of the books advertised on Divar have been second-hand, and after “educational” books, the “literary” and “historical” book market has also been hot among the users of this platform.
Divar statistics show that among these categories, the supply of educational books, like the real book market, is very hot and in the last year, nearly 80% of all ads have been published in this category. The “Literary”, “Religious”, “Magazines” and “Historical” subcategories are located after that.
Divar book offers, like other items and categories, include both new and used items. 53% of the advertised second-hand books and of course most of them were “as new” according to the advertisers. The other items belonged to the advertisements of “new” books.
Publication of book ads does not seem to know a particular season in many of the mentioned categories. Divar data shows that book supply is similar in almost all months of the year; Of course, with one exception. Educational books in the months of August and September are significantly different from other months, which is not too far from the expectation.
Approaching the beginning of the academic year makes the market for educational books hotter. The proof of this is that in the second half of September, more than twice as many educational book ads were published on Divar as in the first half, and this trend has accelerated in the month of September compared to August.
Sistan and Baluchistan, the most book-reading province
During this one year, the book has been published in a total of 369 cities, that is, almost all the cities covered by the advertisement Divar. But which provinces and cities have been more open to books?
Book readers of Sistan and Baluchistan, Khuzestan and Kerman provinces have visited each of the book ads in their province more than others. Among the cities, the users of Zabul (with an average of 183 visits), Abadan (with an average of 163 visits) and Zahedan (with an average of 148 visits) commented the most on the book ads on Divar. It is interesting that Zabul and Abadan users are more interested in historical books and Zahedan users are more looking for religious books.
Which books and which names have Iranians searched for the most?
Examining the words and phrases that users have searched for in these sub-categories on Divar platform shows interesting results and can be an image of their taste and degree of interest in certain book topics and titles.
It should be mentioned that this review was conducted on the 100 most frequent words in the search of each of these subcategories, which were repeated more than 9 million times in total during this one year.
The most diverse searches were done in the category of historical books. In this category, Tabari’s history, Will Durant’s civilization history, two centuries of silence (Abd al-Hossein Zarinkoob), Beyhaqi’s history (which of course is more known as a literary work), Cambridge Iran’s history, and Jacob’s history are all searched works, which are mainly related to They teach the history of Iran. It is interesting that the name “Tarikh Tabari” is repeated more than 10,500 times among these searches.
In addition, in this category of historical books, the names of two people are also visible, the first one is “Hashem Razi”, one of the prominent specialists in Iranology and Zoroastrian religion, and the other one is “Shah Abbas” Safavi. Of course, there are other names that apparently should not have been searched.
In this category; First of all, “Guthrie”, who most likely should be William Keith Chambers Guthrie, the author of “History of Greek Philosophy”, which was translated into Persian by Mehdi Qavam Safari and Hassan Fathi. The reason for our guess is that the name “Capleston” (the author of “History of Philosophy”) and the phrase “History of Philosophy” are also seen in these searches, and probably because of the word “History” in these works, users search for the names of these authors in the subcategory of history.
These are not the only names that apparently should have been searched for in another category. “Sadegh Hedayat”, for example, is a popular name for Divar users; But perhaps more interesting is the name “Zabioullah Mansouri” and several titles of his translated/adapted books. As if in the book market of Iran and among the native book readers, Mansouri is a man for all seasons. His books “Sinoheh”, “Sarzamin Javid”, “Khajeh Tajdar”, “Se Tofangdar” and “Khodavand Alamut” have been searched by users among history books, respectively.
Shahnameh, the all time favorite of Iranians
Shahnameh and Divan Hafez, which were also searched in the historical category, should naturally have more enthusiastic applicants in the literary category. The data of Divar is also a witness to the same claim. Shahnameh has been searched more than 63 thousand times and Divan Hafez more than 45 thousand times during this one year, most of which were in the literary category.
This amount of search shows that the identity works of the Persian language have their own large number of applicants as always. In addition, the exquisite versions of both books have many fans among those interested in Persian literary works.
Among Persian classical literary works, after these two works, the attention of users has been more towards the works of Rumi (“Mathnavi” and “Divan Shams”) and of course “Sharh Masnavi” as well as the works of Saadi (“Golestan” and “Kaliat”). After them are “Khayyam’s quatrains” and “Tarikh Beyhaqi”. “One thousand and one nights” has been searched among the old stories.
In the contemporary Iranian literature, however, the only searched work “Kelider” (with nearly 5,200 searches) and among the names of people, only “Sadegh Hedayat” (with more than 4,000 searches) has been of interest to users.
The users of Divar also seemingly had a glimpse of commentators and literature experts: Kazem Bargnisi, commentator, proof reader and specialist in Persian and Arabic literature, as well as the book “Sharhe Shogh”, commentary and criticism of Hafez’s sonnets by Saeed Hamidian.
Apart from Persian literary works, Dante’s Divine Comedy (with more than 6400 searches) is eye-catching. Mellat Eshgh (by Elif Shafak), which has been reprinted many times in Iran and its sentences and passages are republished in virtual groups, is in the next rank of these books.
It seems that this book is still attractive to Iranian audiences. Maybe because of the story line related to Shams and Rumi and that the author links it to the sufferings of modern human life.
Divar users, audience of classic works
A number of masterpieces of world literature are among the other works whose search rank is significant on Divar, including Les Miserables (Victor Hugo), Crime and Punishment, The Idiot and The Brothers Karamazov (all three by Dostoyevsky), Don Quixote (Cervantes). , In Search of Lost Time (Marcel Proust), War and Peace (Tolstoy) and The Thibaut Family (Martin Duggar’s acclaimed novel and Nobel laureate).
In this category, the two famous books of Zabioullah Mansouri, namely “Seh Tofangdar” and “Sinoheh” have also attracted the attention of users both by searching for the name of the translator and the name of the books.
Among the books for children and teenagers, Harry Potter is popular, and the fact that the users of Divar have searched for his name 28,000 times also shows this.
The story of religious books and magazines
Among religious books, prayer books (with a share of 51% of searches) have been more popular among users than other books. After supplication, users searched for “Qur’an” and “Qur’anic pen” in this subcategory, which accounted for 31% of these searches. Apparently, there is a lot of interest in the Koranic pen among these users.
This phrase has been searched nearly 81,000 times in total, which includes one-third of all “Quran” searches. In the next stage, there are various interpretations of the Qur’an, books of lamentation and praise, Nahj al-Balagheh and seminary books. The only name among the religious and seminary figures in these searches is “Motahari” and no other name is found among them.
Searching in the “magazines” category, but on Divar, is a little different from other categories. 80% of these searches are general words and phrases and topics that do not refer to any specific magazine or newspaper. The names of searched journals are detailed and varied. From specialized magazines such as “Bukhara” and “Film” to humorous magazines such as “Tawfiq” and “Gol Agha” can be seen in this list.
The interesting thing is that it goes back to the most popular magazines. “Borda” magazine, which is a magazine in the field of sewing and fashion, is at the top of the most searched magazines with more than 12,500 searches. After that is the “Car” magazine, which is in the next place with more than 6,800 searches.
Divar users are also comics
Some books are also searched in “Other” category. Among these books, popular children’s books have been very popular. Tintin with more than 30,000 searches and Harry Potter with a total of 28,000 searches (16,000 times in this category and 12,000 times in the literary category) have been the most popular.
Manga (or Japanese comics with 7,700 searches) and Tom Gates (with nearly 4,000 searches) were all the most searched titles for children and teenagers in the Other category.
In this subcategory, two names appear among the searched terms, which is interesting in its own way. Title “Shariati books” (with 1073 searches) and “Dehkhoda” (with 1009 searches).
How much is a book per kilogram?
The wholesale market of books and magazines is a hot and profitable market. Some of the employees of this market are apparently looking for the owners of books or magazines on Divar, whose bookshelves are full of volumes that they have bought over the years and for whatever reason they intend to sell.
The terms “kilo book”, “buy junk book”, “personal library”, “junk newspaper” and so on have been searched on Divar more than 185 thousand times in the past year.
And the difficult times of culture
Data from the Iranian Statistics Center says that the share of “entertainment, entertainment and cultural services” expenses of every Iranian urban household last year was only 1.6% of the total household expenses on average.
Not long ago, the European Commission Statistics Department reported that the share of spending on “entertainment and culture” of households living in EU member states increased from 7.8% to 8% by 2021, and the share of basic expenses such as housing and energy decreased. . These figures express the meaning of the word in the clearest possible way. If only someone listened!
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