‘When a little woodpecker paused in its flight to
rest on a tall neem tree, it seemed that it had just delivered a letter to the
Queen of Sheba’s palace, and was on its way back to Solomon’s castle’
This trancelike idyll presented by Intizar Hussain
underscores something rather grave, an idea that the paradisiac space of
Rupnagar, seemingly unaffected by change has finally submitted to the corrosive
quality of time.
Zakir (the one who remembers) memorizes his
childhood town, one that is pristine, wholesome and representative of an
intricate balance between man and nature. Above all, it becomes a symbol of
religious peace and mythological balance. The town’s corporate identity can be
viewed as a cordial intermingling of the mixed Hindu and Muslim population, and
in the synergetic existence of two opposed visions of truth, as manifested in
the Hindu and Muslims tales about the origins of the world. Here, Hussain shows
the worlds of Hindu mythology and Muslim folklore could coexist in the form of
Bhagatji and Abba Jan respectively.
For me, the emphatic and sensual portrayal of
Rupnagar becomes synonymous with fiction which is unlike most other cities in
Zakir’s life. Rupnagar, translated as the city of beauty has no reality in
geography and only exists as a cranial representation of one’s imagination. It
can thus, be viewed as Hussain’s idealistic vision of utopic Hindu-Muslim
interaction. However, the outbreak of plague in Rupnagar, along with the
appearance of a black cat seems to resonate with the reader’s conscience
bringing about a sense of impending doom and disequilibrium.
With the coming of Partition, the annihilation of
Rupnagar as a haven (Panaah) of tranquility is complete. Communal violence and
anomie comes as a stark contrast to the peaceful Edenic quality of the opening
scene. Thus, Hussain uses two aspects of time and links them through Zakir’s
consciousness to intensify the tumultuous nature of Partition and that one can
use memory and a need for an idyllic past as psychological refuge. However, if one
reads the text more closely, the idyll, in a figurative sense, is also the hell
(Jhanam) because it is creation that essentially culminates in destruction.
If one reflects on the opening chapter, we realize
that the blueprint of the entire novel is compressed into this scene where
Hussain highlights the transitional flow of creation (Zakir’s first days in
Pakistan), immorality (the deterioration of Pakistan as a moral ideal) and
violence (Pakistan losing East Pakistan) and consequently, the death of Zakir’s
father.
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