Lost in Lahore

Two wars bookend Moni Mohsin8217;s lyrical debut

The bare branches of shisham and acacia trees bordering the road prompt eight-year-old Laila to tell her sister: 8220;Look, Sara, the trees are full of sky.8221; Laila8217;s imagination knows no bounds. When her grandmother prays for her, she pictures the Arabic words 8220;lift off the page of the book and flow towards her8230; the upright aliph pranced past her eyes, the fat-bellied laam rolled beneath her nose and the gay, heart-shaped hay skipped into one ear and out the other.8221; Moni Mohsin8217;s moving and lyrical debut novel goes on to describe just how Laila8217;s world gets destroyed, not least because of the role she unwittingly plays in it.

You could say it all began at the screening of Heer Ranjha, the story of star-crossed lovers, which grandmother Sardara Begum treats Laila and her friend Rani to. After crying copious tears, Rani is convinced to do a Heer with disastrous consequences. She doesn8217;t pay heed to advice that the 8220;kind of love that tears you away from your family8230; is dangerous8221;. No, not even a doomed banyan tree can bring back Rani to reality. Rani, already dreaming of big city lights, is lost forever. Laila, desperate to live the life of her favourite Enid Blyton characters, can8217;t help playing along. In the end, she is inconsolable: 8220;This was my doing, my burden.8221;

But Mohsin8217;s novel is not only about love and loss, it8217;s as much a reflection of the state of Pakistan and its society. She props up this tragic domestic tale alongside the impending division of Pakistan. The story plays out in the backdrop of war on the eve of 1971. For instance, Laila8217;s parents are forever tuned to BBC Radio, we are told by Laila. 8220;We weren8217;t meant to split, to shatter. I was there when the country was made,8221; Laila8217;s other grandmother, the posh Yasmeen, says wistfully. It begins and ends on the eve of 2002, when war clouds are gathering between the two neighbours again. 8220;There isn8217;t going to be a war,8221; her father tells Laila. 8220;I was wrong in 8217;71.8221;

Unlike the city novels of Kamila Shamsie and Mohsin Hamid, Mohsin sets her novel in lush, rural West Punjab, where in the privileged homes of the landed gentry, life is lived in leisure and delicious picnic hampers. But here8217;s where her father Tariq is engineering social reform rare in those regions. In this, he had a lot of help from his wife, the city-bred, educated, albeit self-centred Fareeda.

As for Laila, while she goes to convent school in Lahore, she spends her holidays in the country, at Sabzbagh, and is at home in both worlds. East and west meet seamlessly for Laila and her family of four. But not everyone is at home in her world. When her friend Rani strays, Laila can8217;t fathom the effect it will have on those around her to whom nothing is as sacrosanct as honour and family pride, especially in the face of forbidden love. For instance, with Mohsin, we try to understand what lies behind an honour killing, and how or why it is often justified.

In more ways than one, Mohsin8217;s eloquent novel is reminiscent of E.M. Forster8217;s world or, closer home, Attia Hosain8217;s Sunlight on a Broken Column, not least in the manner in which she draws up her characters in their social milieu, and why they behave as they do.