Pakistani Bride , livre ebook

Bapsi Sidhwa
The Pakistani Bride

PENGUIN BOOKS
Contents
About the Author
Praise for Bapsi Sidhwa
Dedication
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Copyright
PENGUIN BOOKS
THE PAKISTANI BRIDE
Distinguished international writer Bapsi Sidhwa lives in America but travels frequently to the Indian subcontinent. She has published four novels: An American Brat , The Pakistani Bride , The Crow Eaters and Ice-Candy-Man , and has been translated into German, French, Italian and Russian.
Among her many honours Sidhwa received the Lila Wallace-Reader s Digest Writer s Award in 1994, the U.S. National Endowment for the Arts grant in 1994, the Sitara-i-Imtiaz , Pakistan s national honour in the arts, and the Li eraturepreis in Germany. Ms Sidhwa has also held the prestigious Bunting Fellowship at Radcliffe/Harvard.
Sidhwa, who was on the advisory committee to Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto on Women s Development, has taught at Columbia University, University of Houston and Mount Holyoke College, and currently holds the Fanny Hurst position at Brandeis University.
Praise for Bapsi Sidhwa
Bapsi Sidhwa is a powerful and dramatic novelist who knows how to flesh out a story.
- London Times
The [Pakistani] Bride is fast moving and interesting enough. Sidhwa s genius, however, lies in her style. She has a rare sense of fun that is irresistible. The naturalness of her descriptions of the physical-be it the look, the body or the sexual act-is a unique feature among the subcontinent s women writers.
- Far Eastern Economic Review
Bapsi Sidhwa s The [Pakistani] Bride reveals to the western reader a way of life that is completely alien. Sidhwa writes with the same vivacity that made the author s first novel, The Crow Eaters so memorable.
- Telegraph
There is plenty of vivid and forceful writing here; the smothering rules of a repressive religion are seen in action-the fetid female cencanna , the suppressed and violent sexuality of the men.
- Sunday Telegraph
Sidhwa, a Pakistani, writes dramatically of marriage, loyalty, honor and their conflict with old ways in this well-told tale.
- Publisher s Weekly
With an entertaining, highly readable writing style, Ms Sidhwa draws the reader into Pakistan and its peculiar-and yet universal-problems. Her conclusion, not completely definitive, does what any good book does. It leaves us wanting more.
- Atlanta Journal & Constitution
There is a Kiplingesque quality to Sidhwa s writing, the congenital ability to make one feel the ambience of the locale: the stifling heat, the poverty, and yet the warmth which exists between families . . . There is an innocent eroticism in The [Pakistani] Bride which is both touching and illustrative of the complete na vete the child brings to the wedding bed.
- Houston Chronicle
For my children, Mohur, Koko, Parizad
Chapter 1
Qasim was ten when his father, squatting by a raucous little mountain stream, told him:
Son, you re to be married!
The pronouncement had little effect on Qasim, but a moment later, when his father placed a heavy muzzle-loader in his arms, Qasim flushed with pleasure.
Mine? he asked, wishing to run behind a rock and seclude himself with the precious gift.
His father nodded. Sit with me awhile, he urged, grinning at the boy s impatience.
You know of the bad feeling between me and Resham Khan? It is because of a loan I made him last year. He hasn t paid me yet.
The boy spat knowingly. Looking up from his ancient gun he met his father s gaze with theatrical intensity.
I will kill him with this gun, he announced, his hazel eyes flashing.
Chiselled into precocity by a harsh life in the mountains, Qasim had known no childhood. From infancy, responsibility was forced upon him and at ten he was a man, conscious of the rigorous code of honour by which his tribe lived.
His father laughed. Then, seeing the hurt in the boy s solemn face, he said: Haven t we settled enough scores? Anyway this will not lead to a feud. Resham Khan has promised us his daughter!
The sturdy, middle-aged tribesman knew just how generous the offer was. Any girl - and he had made sure that this one was able-bodied - was worth more than the loan due. His three older sons were already married and now it was Qasim s turn. The boy was still a little young, but the offer was too good to pass up.
To begin with, he had thought of marrying the girl himself. He had only one wife; but in a twinge of paternal conscience, he decided to bestow the girl on Qasim. It was his first duty.
He ruffled the boy s sun-bleached, matted hair. My young bridegroom, he said playfully, you ll be fetching home a lovely girl. How d you like that!
Qasim was delighted. Not only did he have a gun; he was to be married. As a prospective groom he was immediately festooned with embroidered waistcoats, turbans, and new clothes. Chickens and goats were slaughtered. The women bustled about, and he was the glorious centre of all their activity and attention. The envy of every unmarried fellow his age, he was the recipient of man-to-man ribaldry and advice. Above all, there was the prospect of a playmate he knew he would have the sanction to tease, to order about, and to bully!
A week later the marriage party danced and drummed its way over tortuous mountain paths to finalise the contract and bring home the bride.


Afshan sat amidst the huddle of women. Her head bowed beneath a voluminous red veil, she wept softly as befitted a bride. Her heavy silver bangles, necklaces and earrings tinkled at the slightest movement. She also wore an intricately carved silver nose-pin. Thrice she was asked if she would accept Qasim, the son of Arbab, as her husband and thrice an old aunt murmured yes on her behalf. Then the mountains reverberated with joyful huzzas, gunfire and festivity.
It was almost midnight when the sleepy bridegroom was told, Now, son, you are to meet your bride. Smarten yourself up: don t you want to impress her with all your finery? The crest of Qasim s turban was perked up, his eyes lined anew with antimony, and the gathers on his trousers puffed out about his legs.
The drowsy boy was propelled into the bridal chamber amidst a clamour of catcalls. He heard the bolt shot from outside and was on his own, suddenly terrified. For a while he stood backed up against the door, his eyes fumbling over the dimly-lit room: then they focused on the stooped and veiled form of his bride. She sat on a brightly-coloured quilt spread on a string bed, with her back to him.
Afshan knew her husband was locked in the room with her, and her body trembled with anticipation. Overwhelmed by modesty, she bowed her head still further. The edge of her veil almost touched her toes.
It had been drilled and drilled into Qasim that he was to walk up to his bride and lift the veil off her face. The docile, huddled form of the girl gave his frozen heart courage and he padded towards her in a nervous trance. Reaching down, he lifted the edge of the veil and threw it back.
He stood rooted in panic. Before him was the modestly slumped form of a young woman instead of the girl playmate he had expected. He had been instructed to tilt up her chin and look into her face, but he dared not.
His bride had shut her eyes in confusion. When in all that time there was no flicker of movement, she peered through slit lashes and saw the sandalled feet of her husband, and then the shalwar-clad legs. Her heart constricted with dismay: she was married to a boy! Hastily she looked up. She stared in amazement at the childish, frightened face and the slanting, cringing eyes watching her as if she were about to smack him.
Was this a joke? She glanced beyond him, fervently hoping to see the man who had pushed his small brother forward to tease her. But there was no one.
Are you my husband? she asked incredulously.
Qasim nodded with woebegone gravity.
The girl didn t know whether to laugh or cry. She had been told that her groom was very young, but she had thought that he would be, like herself, at least fifteen. She began to laugh, while tears of disappointment slid down her cheeks. She laughed uncontrollably and Qasim, stung to the quick, rushed for the door. He threw himself against the bolted door and, rattling it savagely, shouted, Open! Open! I want to get out. A distant sound of tired chatter crept in through the door. Flushed with anger and embarrassment Qasim sidled to a corner of the room. Sobbing angrily, he at last fell asleep.
Years later, Afshan recalled their marriage night to her husband when he asked her, But how did you feel? What had you expected?
I used to wander by streams, she said, or sit on some high place dreaming of my future husband. Gusts of wind enveloped me and I d imagine the impatient caresses of my lover. My body was young and full of longing. I d squeeze my breasts to ease their ache . . . she paused mischievously. Instead, I very nearly suckled my husband!
That first night Afshan had lifted the sleeping boy to her bed. Brushing his tear-streaked cheeks with her full red mouth, she had tucked his legs between her thighs and fallen asleep.
Afshan accepted her lot cheerfully. She helped her mother-in-law, chaffed the maize, tended and milked the two goats and frolicked her way through her chores. Occasionally, when his mother scolded her, Qasim felt wretched. He loved her vivacious, girlish ways and was totally won by her affection. He teased her and played pranks. When he was particularly unkind or obdurate, his wife and his mother combined to give him a thrashing. Then Qasim would shout, I am your husband. How dare you! and he would