Lenka S. reviewed Sultana's Dream: A Feminist Utopia and Selections from The Secluded Ones on + 832 more book reviews
ABOUT THE BOOK: This little book was more than just an extraordinary short story written by a woman in 1905 who examined and questioned purdah by turning the issue into a humorous "dream" sequence (in a place where the men are in purdah!) - it is also a compilation of other materials in the examination of what purdah is and means. Relatively unknown and not understood in the West, "purdah" ("parda" in Hindi, meaning 'curtain') is the seclusion and segregation of women (even from other women, not of the family) and is a tradition that is thrust upon women of many Middle Eastern and Asian societies. In the West we confusedly belief it is only Muslim when in fact other religions undertake it as well.
MAIN STORY 1: Rokeya Hossain wrote Sultana's Dream at the urging of her husband who was quite forward-thinking (for an Asian male in the early part of the last century!) and who believed that by writing, she would be able to perfect her English skills. The Dream is brilliantly simple and clearly written. The idea that a woman in purdah should suddenly find herself in a place where it is the men in the society who are hidden away and where life is peaceful and intellectual thought and political balance are the norm is a interesting even to a contemporary Western reader.
SPOILERS/DETAILS: It's set in a conservative part of India (or somewhere near), where strict segregation of men and women remains the norm. Depending on how strict, this could approach imprisonment for the women. It's for the women's own good, of course, because mean can be so dangerous and unpredictable. The women, in their gender-exclusive research universities, have been developing solar energy, electric vehicles, weather control, and other such fripperies - useless to the men, interested only in more powerful weapons. Then a war breaks out, and the men lose badly. Beaten and in retreat, they retreat to the city and await conquest. At this point, the women offer to give it a shot, reasoning that nothing they do could make things worse. In order to maintain the segregation, this means the men must take to seclusion while the women try to defend the city. They do this brilliantly, or course. Their mastery of solar energy adapts readily to use as a heat ray. It scorches the enemy where they stand, without ever putting the women's frailty in harm's way. The men's seclusion endures after the war is won - after all, doesn't it make more sense to put the dangerous animals behind bars and let the decent citizens walk freely? It's a very short story, but an interesting Utopia of women in charge.
SECOND SECTION: of this book is a section complied by Roushan Jahan in which Hossain's writing about purdah (from a book called "The Secluded Ones") is reproduced in the form of various 'reports' all of which demonstrate something fundamentally absurb or violent about being in purdah.
THE THIRD SECTION: is a piece by a Western woman named Hanna Papanek who examines how much more complicated purdah is than just a means by which men in a given society control and suppress women. That definition is certainly valid, but Papanek also examines a case where a woman raised in purdah finds "exposure" (after a life of purdah) to be fraught with fear and discomfort.
In all, a fascinating, if short, and in a strange sense appalling cultural phenomena that is basically unknown to the West, purdah is handed here to the reader in a way that makes it possible to examine it without generating the viseral anger that the idea raises in most educated women.
MAIN STORY 1: Rokeya Hossain wrote Sultana's Dream at the urging of her husband who was quite forward-thinking (for an Asian male in the early part of the last century!) and who believed that by writing, she would be able to perfect her English skills. The Dream is brilliantly simple and clearly written. The idea that a woman in purdah should suddenly find herself in a place where it is the men in the society who are hidden away and where life is peaceful and intellectual thought and political balance are the norm is a interesting even to a contemporary Western reader.
SPOILERS/DETAILS: It's set in a conservative part of India (or somewhere near), where strict segregation of men and women remains the norm. Depending on how strict, this could approach imprisonment for the women. It's for the women's own good, of course, because mean can be so dangerous and unpredictable. The women, in their gender-exclusive research universities, have been developing solar energy, electric vehicles, weather control, and other such fripperies - useless to the men, interested only in more powerful weapons. Then a war breaks out, and the men lose badly. Beaten and in retreat, they retreat to the city and await conquest. At this point, the women offer to give it a shot, reasoning that nothing they do could make things worse. In order to maintain the segregation, this means the men must take to seclusion while the women try to defend the city. They do this brilliantly, or course. Their mastery of solar energy adapts readily to use as a heat ray. It scorches the enemy where they stand, without ever putting the women's frailty in harm's way. The men's seclusion endures after the war is won - after all, doesn't it make more sense to put the dangerous animals behind bars and let the decent citizens walk freely? It's a very short story, but an interesting Utopia of women in charge.
SECOND SECTION: of this book is a section complied by Roushan Jahan in which Hossain's writing about purdah (from a book called "The Secluded Ones") is reproduced in the form of various 'reports' all of which demonstrate something fundamentally absurb or violent about being in purdah.
THE THIRD SECTION: is a piece by a Western woman named Hanna Papanek who examines how much more complicated purdah is than just a means by which men in a given society control and suppress women. That definition is certainly valid, but Papanek also examines a case where a woman raised in purdah finds "exposure" (after a life of purdah) to be fraught with fear and discomfort.
In all, a fascinating, if short, and in a strange sense appalling cultural phenomena that is basically unknown to the West, purdah is handed here to the reader in a way that makes it possible to examine it without generating the viseral anger that the idea raises in most educated women.
