January 13, 2008

Uzma Aslam Khan remembers days past and celebrates the natural beauty of Pakistan in her latest novel

Can you tell us something about your upcoming book?

The Geometry of God begins with a child named Amal, who discovers something — I won’t say what — in the Salt Range, while on a fossil dig with her grandfather. But this astonishing find happens the same day her baby sister Mehwish is blinded, and it falls on Amal to look after her. Amal grows up to become Pakistan’s only woman paleontologist but her work is hampered. Enter Noman, who unwittingly sets in motion a devastating chain of events for all of them.

Amal, Mehwish and Noman grow up in the shadow of General Zia’s rule, when history and science books were rewritten (teaching evolution was banned), intellectual curiosity was stifled, and the right to theological debate was completely eradicated. So the book deals partly with the pain of creative repression under a dictatorship backed by the US ‘in the interest of freedom and democracy’.

In what ways is it different from yet same as your previous novels?

Though it explores some heavy issues, it’s my funniest book. All three characters speak in the first person (unlike my previous books). I’ve played with their voices, the telling is mischievous. But like Trespassing, it’s partly set during the Zia years, when I grew up. I spent my youth listening to speeches about ‘true Islam’ and ‘national interests’. We are still hearing them.

What inspired you to write the book?

The natural beauty of our country. On all my trips into the Salt Range, I’ve thought, ‘I have to set a book here.’ The spareness of the beauty, the fact that these mountains were once beneath the Tethys Sea, evidence of this lost world in the shape and colour of mysterious rocks, and the way this evidence can magically fall into your hands, when least expected — all of it inspired me. I followed the fabulous discoveries of whale evolution made in this area, and spoke with many of the scientists involved. Their work has shown that whales evolved on land, not in water. This reverse evolution is quite a metaphor, isn’t it?

I wanted to set my entire book outdoors. You know, I’m so tired of books written by diaspora authors depicting women here as helpless. Few depict us struggling daily to buck conventions, or having any kind of intellectual life. There’s an insidious ‘West saves East’ undertone here: only those who assimilate in the West have a chance at life, the rest are generic, burqa-clad. I wanted the story I write to unfold outside the chaar diwar of the house and in the wide expanse of the mountains. But I wasn’t able to do it. My own mobility was severely restricted because the area is army-controlled and I’m an ordinary middle-class woman without powerful contacts. I wove these restrictions into the story, which is now set in the mountains, and in Islamabad and Lahore.

Overall, in all three of my books, what’s deeply moved me is the contrast between natural beauty and man-made conflicts. Somewhere in this fission lie the truths that keep eluding us.

Has it been difficult to get your books published?

Very. The Story of Noble Rot took four years to find a home. My next book Trespassing was bought in the UK by Flamingo. But six months after buying my book, Flamingo shut down in one of those ugly multinational layoffs.

India, Italy, France, Spain and Portugal will publish The Geometry of God, but in the UK, I’ve had to start again. But the UK is increasingly only interested in immigrant literature, or at least one with an obvious East-West link (either the characters are immigrants or the writer lives in the West and acts as the ‘bridge character’). I live in Pakistan, and my book is entirely set here.

It hasn’t been easy in Pakistan either. For Noble Rot, I first tried a Pakistani publisher. They sent me to an Indian one. Trespassing is now published by Alhamra, but it took a long time.

How can book publishing improve in our country?

It won’t improve till more Pakistanis read. Currently, those who read prefer non-fiction. We’re a very social people with social events peppered by recitals of ‘current events’. Fiction doesn’t lend itself to public recital. Unless it’s a bestseller, it doesn’t make good khabrain. Sadly, fiction is dismissed as an escape from life rather than a way to engage more deeply with life, which is what it is.

Another reason is our love/hate relationship with the English language. English is dismissed as ‘elitist’, but the same people who complain about this send their children to English-medium schools and universities to become doctors and engineers and computer technicians. They spend thousands of rupees at McDonald’s every week, to eat in front of English-language cable TV. In Pakistan, English is but a tool for earning enough to consume foreign products. Our prejudices have to end before publishing here can improve.

What do you gain or lose by living in Pakistan, and not writing from the diaspora?

Writing is a sedimentation process. By living here, I feel the place every day. When I write, I tap into these unconscious layers. Because The Geometry of God is in part about ‘digging’, this is the metaphor I’m reaching for, but I could also talk about writing fiction as ‘fishing’. You drop the hook, wait for years for that eel that lurks somewhere to take the bait, and at last show itself. By living here, I build a fecund internal sea to ply.

However, I’m often unable to tap the external sea. As I said earlier, my mobility is frustratingly limited.

Also, I lose out on publicity. There’s immense pressure on writers today to network, and living in the US or UK helps immeasurably. Although living here has helped me develop my aesthetic, writing fiction in English while living in Pakistan means sailing a lonely boat.

What was the best remark you ever received?

Tariq Ali asking if events in Trespassing were real, because the book was so felt. I invent stories as much from the heart as the head, so when this comes through, it means a lot. Especially from a writer of his stature.