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THE HOUSE OF BILQIS by Azhar Abidi

THE HOUSE OF BILQIS

by Azhar Abidi

Pub Date: April 20th, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-670-01941-0
Publisher: Viking

A noble family beset by shifting fortunes symbolizes political and social change, in a refined second novel by a Pakistani-born, Australia-based writer.

In his short book, Abidi (Passarola Rising, 2006) explores issues of time, class and culture via obvious, Upstairs/Downstairs-style polarities. Bilqis Ara Begum, the widowed matriarch of an illustrious and wealthy Pakistani family, represents old standards (“We are people of empire”) now under threat from external and internal forces. It is 1985 and General Zia’s recent rigged referendum has strengthened his grip on the country and its Islamization. Meanwhile Bilqis’s clever, Oxford- and Yale-educated son has opted out of tradition: Having chosen his own bride (an Australian lawyer), he plans to live overseas. The servant class is also being undermined. Beautiful, marriageable Mumtaz, trained to serve Bilqis since childhood, has begun a flirtation with Omar, a Muslim freedom fighter who questions her social submission and boasts of the duty to fight evil. Their affair leaves Omar guilty and perplexed about his desires, and he leaves Mumtaz to die fighting in Kashmir. Bilqis visits her son and new granddaughter in Australia but refuses to move there, instead growing frail in her old house, slowly losing her grip on power and order. Her death marks the end of an era, leaving her son and brother to contemplate a different future.

Structural simplification detracts from sensitive depiction in Abidi’s latest.