Waiting for sun to shine in a battered land: book review A thousand splendid Suns
Afghanistan, the name brings images of war-inflicted, Bin Laden’s hiding heaven, America’s war on terror-labeled BBC or CNN documentary or news dispatches. Unless of course one reads Khaled Husseini’s A Thousand Splendid Suns. The book puts colour to the black and gray picture of the war-demolished country drawn by the world media. He dedicates the book to Haris and Farah and to the women of Afghanistan. Even though the country has been in war for almost three decades and around eight million refugees spread all over the world have been away from their motherland, Husseini draws the picture of new beginning for the country.
The novel begins with Nana calling her daughter harami, a word the daughter was not familiar with. It was only years later she could relate the word with her husband’s co-wife who had an illegitimate child. Marium was in her late 30s when her around-50 husband married a young girl of fifteen who was the only survivor of the neighboring family. As Laila’s house, along with her parents, was blown apart by a bomb, she was rescued by her next-door neighbour Rasheed. Only to ask her to marry him when she got better. Laila knowing she was pregnant with her childhood friend’s child which was conceived by her only communion with Tariq, a boy she grew up with.
The novel has a distinct voice, a woman’s voice, a mother declaring doomsday for her daughter, as she was a harami, a bustard child who wouldn’t be accepted in the world as a normal person. The women of Afghanistan give their entire lives to the family’s welfare only to be maltreated by their male counterparts. Husseini draws the picture of city, mourning for the youth who sacrificed their lives for the freedom of their motherland. Only to be ruled by one invader after the other. The revolution of 1978 left Kabul in the hands of Air Force Colonel Abdul Quader who defeated Daud loyalists. The Afghans thought that the communists of Soviet Union would save the country from the oppression that the people suffered. But they were only greeted with the atrocities of the war with its landmines and the conflict between the Tajiks and the Pushtuns.
Laila’s mother had her two sons joining the Mejahedins and she waited for the day the Soviets would leave so that the Mujahedin could declare Kabul free. The ancient city, the Red city of Chengiz Kahn. Khaled goes back in history to trace Afghanistan’s past it had, in turn, been invaded by the Macedonians, the Saussanians, the Arabs, the Mongols and then the Soviets.
The ethnically diverse Afghanistan with Tajiks, Pushtuns, and the most oppressed Hazaras were always in conflict with one another. Husseini draws his characters with utmost sincerity. A devastated country was superbly sewn together with the colours of his imagination. As he takes the readers through the narrow lanes of Kabul he shows how religion can be used as a tool for punishing the already distressed and the weak.
From 1978 to 1992 freedom and opportunities of women were gone. In 1992, the Mujahehedin took over when even the Supreme Court was controlled by hardline mullahs and they were done with the communist era. In 1996, the Taliban came. They called it “Islamic Emirates of Afghanistan”. They introduced the Shariah law in the country.
Through Laila, one of the protagonists of the novel, he shows hope still makes the people go back to live in the battered and bruised country, how the women of Afghanistan fight for their existence. The Taliban maltreated the women who had already been oppressed by the society. A woman couldn’t come out of the house with out a Muharrom or a male family member with whom she couldn’t be married. If they did they would beaten with TV antenna or sticks. There was no way a woman could go to work outside her home. So the families who lost their male members to the war had the only option of begging. There were a few hospitals where women could go for their treatment and these hospitals, too, were in deplorable conditions. The surgeon had to perform her work with her headscarf on in the scorching heat otherwise she wouldn’t be allowed to work.
Marium and Laila’s husband Raheed mistreated them even though he was nice to Laila, his younger wife for the first few years of their marriage. They once tried to run away with the child but the Mujahedins brought them back. Their repeated plea that there is no telling what their husband might do to them if they return couldn’t stop them. They only said:
” what a man does in his home is his business.”
when Laila asked them about the law the officer answered:
“ As a matter of policy, we don’t interfere with private family matters........”
As with Hosseini’s books A thousand splendid Suns has a well-developed plot, the characters are lifelike and the city though, he says, is a fictional one nowhere does one get this impression.
Even though the writer lives in the US he has a strong sense of belongingness to Afghanistan, his native country. Hosseini latest work gives an insight into a war-battered land where people still toil for living with a silhouetted hope.
The novel begins with Nana calling her daughter harami, a word the daughter was not familiar with. It was only years later she could relate the word with her husband’s co-wife who had an illegitimate child. Marium was in her late 30s when her around-50 husband married a young girl of fifteen who was the only survivor of the neighboring family. As Laila’s house, along with her parents, was blown apart by a bomb, she was rescued by her next-door neighbour Rasheed. Only to ask her to marry him when she got better. Laila knowing she was pregnant with her childhood friend’s child which was conceived by her only communion with Tariq, a boy she grew up with.
The novel has a distinct voice, a woman’s voice, a mother declaring doomsday for her daughter, as she was a harami, a bustard child who wouldn’t be accepted in the world as a normal person. The women of Afghanistan give their entire lives to the family’s welfare only to be maltreated by their male counterparts. Husseini draws the picture of city, mourning for the youth who sacrificed their lives for the freedom of their motherland. Only to be ruled by one invader after the other. The revolution of 1978 left Kabul in the hands of Air Force Colonel Abdul Quader who defeated Daud loyalists. The Afghans thought that the communists of Soviet Union would save the country from the oppression that the people suffered. But they were only greeted with the atrocities of the war with its landmines and the conflict between the Tajiks and the Pushtuns.
Laila’s mother had her two sons joining the Mejahedins and she waited for the day the Soviets would leave so that the Mujahedin could declare Kabul free. The ancient city, the Red city of Chengiz Kahn. Khaled goes back in history to trace Afghanistan’s past it had, in turn, been invaded by the Macedonians, the Saussanians, the Arabs, the Mongols and then the Soviets.
The ethnically diverse Afghanistan with Tajiks, Pushtuns, and the most oppressed Hazaras were always in conflict with one another. Husseini draws his characters with utmost sincerity. A devastated country was superbly sewn together with the colours of his imagination. As he takes the readers through the narrow lanes of Kabul he shows how religion can be used as a tool for punishing the already distressed and the weak.
From 1978 to 1992 freedom and opportunities of women were gone. In 1992, the Mujahehedin took over when even the Supreme Court was controlled by hardline mullahs and they were done with the communist era. In 1996, the Taliban came. They called it “Islamic Emirates of Afghanistan”. They introduced the Shariah law in the country.
Through Laila, one of the protagonists of the novel, he shows hope still makes the people go back to live in the battered and bruised country, how the women of Afghanistan fight for their existence. The Taliban maltreated the women who had already been oppressed by the society. A woman couldn’t come out of the house with out a Muharrom or a male family member with whom she couldn’t be married. If they did they would beaten with TV antenna or sticks. There was no way a woman could go to work outside her home. So the families who lost their male members to the war had the only option of begging. There were a few hospitals where women could go for their treatment and these hospitals, too, were in deplorable conditions. The surgeon had to perform her work with her headscarf on in the scorching heat otherwise she wouldn’t be allowed to work.
Marium and Laila’s husband Raheed mistreated them even though he was nice to Laila, his younger wife for the first few years of their marriage. They once tried to run away with the child but the Mujahedins brought them back. Their repeated plea that there is no telling what their husband might do to them if they return couldn’t stop them. They only said:
” what a man does in his home is his business.”
when Laila asked them about the law the officer answered:
“ As a matter of policy, we don’t interfere with private family matters........”
As with Hosseini’s books A thousand splendid Suns has a well-developed plot, the characters are lifelike and the city though, he says, is a fictional one nowhere does one get this impression.
Even though the writer lives in the US he has a strong sense of belongingness to Afghanistan, his native country. Hosseini latest work gives an insight into a war-battered land where people still toil for living with a silhouetted hope.
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