A Golden Age

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Rehana Haque is a woman born in Kolkata, widow of a Pakistani, and mother of Bangladeshi freedom fighters stuck in a war for a country she struggles to identify with. Mujib was prevented from taking office by President General Yahya Khan, of West Pakistan, who along with many of his fellow Punjabis and Pathans held the Bengalis in low regard. I enjoyed this first novel, which relates the struggles of the widowed Rehana Haque to support and protect her grown son Sohail and daughter Maya, during the Bangladesh War of Independence in 1971. A little bit of culture, a little bit of politics, a little bit of betrayal and the dark side of human desire, a little bit of the horrors of war and torture, and a lot of family loyalty.

In 2022, the novel was included on the " Big Jubilee Read" list of 70 books by Commonwealth authors, selected to celebrate the Platinum Jubilee of Elizabeth II. Our protagonist, Rehana, is an unintentional hero, pushed by circumstance to be extraordinarily courageous when all she wants is a life of wholeness and peace. The denouement left me slightly annoyed, but despite that, it was a beautifully written story in prose that flowed like music on paper. I just can't get enough of it, especially when it's about something I know nothing about, like the 1971 Bangladeshi struggle for independence from Pakistan. She grew up listening to the stories of her grandmother harboring freedom fighters and hiding guns and weapons in the family garden.

At first, I was lulled into thinking that Rehana was an innocent in a sea of turmoil, but as the tale unwinds, I learned that she also harboured secrets, some of which had nothing to do with the invasion of Yahya’s forces. This one is told from the view point of a widow during the war between east and west Pakistan and the birth of Bangladesh and her experiences.

The first third was a bit slow and harder to get through, with the confusing characters and historical situation. The language, the pace and the restraint from providing too much graphic detail added up to make this a surprisingly easy read for me. Food features prominently, which always makes me happy: crispy samosas, dal, biryani cooked all day. Povestea incepe inainte de 1971, atunci cand Rehana isi pierde temporar copiii, dupa moartea sotului.I now understand why the Bengali people did not want to be ruled and exploited by the government of West Pakistan, 1,000 miles away. The children grow up and into their own lives: Maya, always less loved and prickly for it; Sohail, spoiled, headstrong with a fatal obsessive love that will cost them all dearly. The Dhaka university students had been involved in the protests from the very beginning, so it was no surprise Sohail had got caught up, Maya too.

The central character, Rehana Haque, widowed mother of two children, was originally from Lahore in the western half of Pakistan, but has lived in Dhaka, the eastern Bengali capital since her marriage.Rehana is drawn into their high-risk, underground world, and ultimately it is she who makes the decisions and takes the heroic actions that affect the lives of those around her. Rehana's devastation and her obsession with regaining her children is the defining event of her life and shapes many of her later choices. Even Rehana could see the logic: what sense did it make to have a country in two halves, posed on either side of India like a pair of horns?

With the conflict taking its bloody course in the East, Rehana realises she cannot stop them from joining the Bangla effort as freedom fighters. But after having interviewed more than a hundred survivors of the Bangladesh War for Independence, I realised it was the very small details that always stayed in my mind- the guerilla fighters who exchanged shirts before they went into battle, the women who sewed their best silk saris into blankets for the reugees. It is loosely based on a similar story told to the author by her grandmother who had been a young widow for ten years already, when the war arrived. Rehana's sisters in Karachi and sister-in-law in Lahore are, in contrast (although they all grew up in Calcutta), contemptuous and racist towards Hindus. The novel is well written and easy to read; the main strength is the family drama and there is a good bit of tension as well.The civil conflict is the backdrop to the story of Rehana as she tries to do the best for her family, and to keep her children safe, while acknowledging that her freedom fighter son Sohail and idealistic daughter Maya, young adults now, are determined to live by their own principles, no matter what the cost. Sohail and Maya were born in Dhaka and their native tongue is Bengali and have an easy loyalty to Bangladesh. As she recited the pickle recipe to herself, Rehana wondered what her sisters would make of her at this very moment. Anam, choosing the zoomed in scenery of an upper middle class family, brilliantly connected the conflict and struggle at familial level to the much bigger story of revolution.