Dancing In The Mosque by Homeria Qadari Book Review

The novel is a memoir on the experiences of Homeira Qadri an Afghan women living through various tumultuous events in the history of Afghanistan.

The story covers the Russian invasion And occupation, The Mujahideen era, and the eventual takeover of the country by the Taliban regime.

Perhaps the most prevalent theme in the novel is the life of women in an extremely suppressive patriarchal society in Afghanistan.

In a way this novel can be seen as an example of a Feminist writing from Afghanistan.

The women in the author,s life including herself are staunchly rebellious towards the unreasonable restrictions and shame women are forced to endure in the country.

There is a universal theme of ‘shame’ women are forced to feel just for existing. Nothing a women does is considered noble. Even the knowledge of a women,s name outside family circles or her name being included in the birth certificate of her child is considered shameful.

This treatment or rather ‘rejection’ of women from Afghan society makes many characters make the following statements

“It,s better to be a stone in Afghanistan than being born a women in Afghanistan”

“ Being a women is like being trapped in quicksand the more you struggle the deeper you sink in”

In addition to the the Taliban regime,s persecution of any and all forms of creative expression reminded me of the novel ‘Fahrenheit 451’ where the government burns books. And the movie equilibrium where the gov has banned emotion.

Fahrenheit 451 is the temperature at which paper burns, in the novel people,s ignorance leads to the current situation.

People only watch gov sponsored Entertainment and Propaganda. People speak in short syllabus unable to express their thoughts and feelings into words.

I noticed something similar in Afghanistan where in addition to forbidding girls groom receiving education, the Taliban only taught boys in school Taliban propaganda and religious sermons. Not teaching them valuable subjects like Mathematics and painting.

Even their persecution of art and music and banning of dance and movies is reminiscent of the dystopian gov in the movie ‘equilibrium’.

Shockingly if you are found on possession of a novel in Russian Literature you could be subject to an execution by the Taliban.

The novel also contains ‘letters’ which the author  wrote to her son after she was separated from him by a sudden divorce.

Her Husband divorces her with the infamous “Triple Talaq”  through the Viber messaging app (An equivalent of WhatsApp). The reason why her husband divorces her is because she refused to allow him to take a second wife.

She is forcefully denied custody of her child because Afghan culture considers the child as belonging to the ‘man’.

On top of that even the family courts in Afghanistan are against her, because in Afghan culture a women appearing in the court was considered shameful. Therefore regardless of whether the women was the defender or prosecutor she was considered  ‘guilty’ by default.

In addition at the beginning of her letter she tells her son how girls liked her were often told stories of ‘Demons’ and ‘Monsters’. Girls would be told that these creatures would come to eat them alive if they ever behaved in way that was considered shameful for a women.

In contrast her younger brother was told stories in which there existed ‘genes’ who could fulfil any wish he had.

In conclusion the novel gives a cross sectional view of women in Afghanistan. Their lives are showcases through the perspective of a single family over several decades and through multiple period of strife, political instability and regime change.

This can perhaps help us understand why Afghanistan has one of the ‘highest’ rates of female suicide and self immolation cases.

If you are not even allowed to breathe how can you even survive to ‘live’.