Wednesday, January 8, 2014

The Shadow of The Crescent Moon by Fatima Bhutto

In the remote corners of a nation lies grief so profound and betrayal so abysmal it threatens to wrench your heart out. You, who are sitting beneath the azure of a peaceful sky, sipping comfort from a steaming cup, reading of the tempests that toss mercilessly the people in a land so far removed. You would feel the uprooting of their lives like a blow to your gut…and yet, you could never experience the true force of the impact.
These are the lives that Fatima Bhutto speaks about in her debut novel The Shadow of the Crescent Moon. Author of the famous Songs of Blood and Sword, this is her first work of fiction and, like her memoir, reflects what she has seen from close quarters—politics , blood and betrayal—all inextricable from her lineage.
The story is set in Mir Ali, a small town in Pakistan’s tribal region of Waziristan, and takes place during a span of four hours on a Friday that coincides with Eid. Three brothers are going to separate mosques for their prayers, because “it is too dangerous, too risky, to place all the family together in one mosque that could easily be hit.” That is the essence of life in Mir Ali: teetering on the edge.The brothers represent three different ways of life in the town, torn apart by military excesses and a desire for freedom, handed down generation after generation.
Hayat, the youngest, embeds the tales of suffering and takes upon himself to fulfil the dream. The eldest, Aman Erum, desires a way out, dreaming of doing business in a place that isn’t strangulated by this tussle of the past and present. Sikandar, the second, adopts what he believes is a middle ground—neither fleeing nor fighting; staying and serving by becoming a doctor. None of their choices, however, will protect them from the tragedy that is their destiny.
There are no heroes in this story, except the ones mentioned in passing. As Hayat says, “They killed our heroes so we stopped making them.” They are not incorruptible, they have to make choices while living in hell and the choices are those of a prisoner sentenced to death—one who would choose life at all costs, even by bartering the soul.
Bhutto’s female characters—Sikandar’s wife Mina and Samarra who loved Aman Erum— are more multi-layered. Mina, the lecturer of psychology, is a woman turned deranged by loss—barging in on the funerals of strangers, seeking solace in grief. Yet it is she who, in a fit of rage against injustice, causes the murderous Taliban to back down. Samarra is a woman betrayed by life many times over. What remains of her is a hardened shell. And yet, the final blow to that shell is so devastating, so repetitive in its cruelty that your heart bleeds for Samarra.
Political comment is strong in the novel, with references to the stamp of US control on everything Pakistan owns—from oil and airspace, to souls and futures. The bitterness against military dominance is obvious, too—“They were no one’s oppressors. They were everyone’s oppressors.”
But from a human angle, these could be the frayed edges of any nation—the militant areas of India’s north-east; the vales of Kashmir; or the Maoist-ridden heartland. Injustice, violence and strife belong to the same clan, feeding off each other.
Bhutto’s book is a universal—if deeply disturbing—story, set in the place she knows best. And even as you put it down with your breath knocked out, you can’t shake the feeling that somehow, through the unbroken seams of humanity, it connects you, too.



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