On last weekend's reading list was A Doll's House. This weekend, I'm reading Donn Huchison's When I was a Girl and Not Very Pretty. This is a self-published novel, the first in a series of seven, that follows a Palestinian family saga through several generations from the early 20th century to the present.
Part I, which I have just started, tells the story of Salma, who, very young, marries Abdullah, and proceeds to bear him 19 children, fifteen of whom die before they are one, and the last of whom, Hasna, has red hair and blue eyes, making her anathema to her father, and the object of much ridicule from her sisters in law. The story is bleak, but beautifully told, and it weaves much historical detail into the narrative. The narrator is removed, but the characters are rendered lovingly.
Find his book (I'm reading the kindle version) here.
I had tea at Donn's house on Tuesday, and we spoke about how, when reading about past eras, injustices stick out egregiously to us (like Abdullah's blatant disregard for his daughter and ubiquitous preference for male children, or the stigmatisation of someone who doesn't look exactly like everyone else). It's tempting to settle back in the armchair and sigh a satisfied "well, thank goodness it's no longer like that." But upon reflection, the break with past practices is rarely as clean as we would like to believe.
After reading the chapter about how enthusiastically Salma's community responded to the birth of a son, compared to the rueful looks and disparaging comments mothers of newborn girls got, I thought "Thank goodness I live in a time when I'm not judged by the fact that I was born a girl, and won't be judged for having a girl myself." Not ten minutes after this self-satisfied meditation, I read the following email from a friend, announcing the sex of an unborn cousin:
Part I, which I have just started, tells the story of Salma, who, very young, marries Abdullah, and proceeds to bear him 19 children, fifteen of whom die before they are one, and the last of whom, Hasna, has red hair and blue eyes, making her anathema to her father, and the object of much ridicule from her sisters in law. The story is bleak, but beautifully told, and it weaves much historical detail into the narrative. The narrator is removed, but the characters are rendered lovingly. Find his book (I'm reading the kindle version) here.
I had tea at Donn's house on Tuesday, and we spoke about how, when reading about past eras, injustices stick out egregiously to us (like Abdullah's blatant disregard for his daughter and ubiquitous preference for male children, or the stigmatisation of someone who doesn't look exactly like everyone else). It's tempting to settle back in the armchair and sigh a satisfied "well, thank goodness it's no longer like that." But upon reflection, the break with past practices is rarely as clean as we would like to believe.
After reading the chapter about how enthusiastically Salma's community responded to the birth of a son, compared to the rueful looks and disparaging comments mothers of newborn girls got, I thought "Thank goodness I live in a time when I'm not judged by the fact that I was born a girl, and won't be judged for having a girl myself." Not ten minutes after this self-satisfied meditation, I read the following email from a friend, announcing the sex of an unborn cousin:
Johnson name continues.
Baby I is going to be a boy!
This email simultaneously affirms that two norms of Salma's time are alive and well in the 21st century.
1) The importance of men to carry the family name on, to proudly bear the legacy of men who have come before him.
2) The expectation that more babies will follow!
There is nothing wrong with these norms, necessarily. The point is that I can't pretend that I'm a modern, better and improved human to the extent that my ego would like.
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