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Search the Calgary Persian Library catalogue online and explore Persian-language literature, poetry, history, philosophy, memoir, children’s books, and translations of world literature.
Open the Book CatalogueThe library began as an act of care, memory, and cultural necessity.
What started in 2011 as a student initiative became a public home for Persian books and culture in Calgary.
In the summer of 2011, Iranian students at the University of Calgary began working to create a Persian-language library for Calgary. At the time, the city had no dedicated Persian bookstore and no established Persian library. For Persian-speaking students, immigrants, families, and second-generation Canadians, access to Farsi books was limited, expensive, and often dependent on what people could bring from Iran or share privately within the community.
Led in its founding period by UCalgary students Somayeh Goodarzi and Neda Moazen, and supported by students and members of the wider community, the library was built through fundraising, donations, volunteer labour, and a shared belief that Persian books should have a public home in Calgary.
The project emerged to change that.
On January 24, 2012, the Calgary Persian Library officially opened to the public inside the Women’s Resource Centre at the University of Calgary. Its first collection consisted of approximately 400 Farsi books on two shelves. It was modest in size, but significant in meaning: those shelves represented access, continuity, and belonging.
From the beginning, the library was never only about lending books. It was about creating a cultural home. It helped newcomers stay connected to Persian language and literature, gave younger generations a way to encounter their heritage, and created a public space where students, scholars, readers, writers, artists, and families could meet through books and conversation.
