Until his ascension to the office of Grand Librarian, Šan Paršatar was a highly-respected member of Aatem Nal and occasional advisor to the government; he was also a member of the Reijihan Herad clique and served in the Tuhran Bel in the 1990s, helping to support Herad’s reformist program. His support for the introduction of direct democracy made his complicity in the Hantili coup of 2014 all the more shocking; his willing acceptance of the position of Grand Librarian after the deposition, imprisonment, and mysterious death of previous Grand Librarian Andrew Holbrook was cause for scandal, both within Aatem Nal and Snefaldian society at large. Whatever outrage might have arose, however was muffled by the censorship, arrests, and deaths that ensued during the first months of the Hantili coup.

Paršatar emerged, as Grand Librarian, a very different man than the one who had spoken hopefully of democratic liberalization in Snefaldia during his tenure on the Bel in the 90’s. From his position within the Supreme Council, he strenuously promoted the central role of Aatem Nal in Snefaldian life and culture, argued that Snefaldian culture was incompatible with direct democracy and required the guidance of a strong hand to rule the country, and that the Faith was required by history and law to play an important and inseparable role in the life of the nation. In short, he had transformed from a man who zealously worked to promote liberal freedoms and democratic norms to a traditionalist reactionary who believed that the pendulum had swung too far.

This change was perhaps not unsurprising; born in 1944, like many others born in that era he witnessed as a child the disorder caused by the breakdown of the democratic process of the Republic and the inability of popularly-elected officials to solve the problems of the people who had voted for them. He spent most of his early life in service to Aatem Nal, first as an Assistant Librarian in his hometown of Isaärdland (itself a conservative bastion), then receiving a promising position as a Wing Prefect and special lecturer at the Grand Library. By 1975, he had been called to the Northern Conclave, one of the regional governing bodies of Aatem Nal, where he was a supporte of the influential Grand Librarian Aduma Hantili. He cultivated a friendship and connection with a young Anzapahhadû Mugałlu during that time, who was a regional bureaucrat in Sring Issa.

Through the influence of Hantili, he rose in rank, becoming an Inquisitor 9th Grade and receiving the Librarianship of Taygattë. In the 1980s he became associated with Jeroen Seefeikh, a veteran of the March on Sargedain, and was appointed to the Tuhran Bel in 1988, just days before his patron Hantili’s death. Aware that without his support his role was in danger, he made quick allies of Seefeikh and his comrades Reijihan Herad, Yu Renchiech, and Niuhuru Sigiyanu. When Herad came to power in the 1990s, Paršatar supported them, evolving from the crony of the powerful Hantili to become a relatively independent and influential Bel shahry. Despite his willingness to work with Herad, he was always distrusted by the paramount leader, and in 1997 Herad orchestrated his departure from the Bel, whereupon he became the ambassador to the World Assembly, where Snefaldia was an observer. He was later recalled and replaced with Harmalan Shandreth, and on his return to Snefaldia became a Loremaster and remained in Serasarda, acting as an advisor to Andrew Holbrook. He secretly despised Herad, however, but never revealed this publicly. He remained quiet through the liberalization years, quietly supporting his friend Mugałlu, but his conservatism grew and he was openly critical of Ren Dirh and his administration, for which he lost his position with Grand Librarian Holbrook. There were rumors he was involved with the Homeland Front, the right-wing ultranationalist party of Khoung Davijic Tukka, and possibly even with the Restoration Front that nearly assassinated Ren Dirh.

Regardless, in 2014 he joined the Hantili rebellion, and was suddenly elevated to the Grand Librarianship by military order. He has been a constant ultraconservative ally of the current government, drawing on his many years of experience in government and sterling credentials in the Faith; privately he views his involvement with the Supreme Council as the ultimate repudiation of Reijihan Herad, the man who spurned him, and his goals.