SHODH-TASLIMA NASRIN-FICTION
BY Harsimran Kaur ON June 29, 2021, IN BOOK REVIEWS, SHODH
A feminist writer truly reveals an unelectable agony a woman so poignantly entrenches in her heart. Taslima Nasrin always enlightens us with her writing on women issues which to some have been bracketed as iconoclastic. Nevertheless, her stories and articles delve deep into a woman’s mundane life bereft of spirit and compassion.
The book “SHODH” is an open heart of a woman deprived of her identity trenched deep in a hole of darkness, ambushed by a fear of abandonment, and is proffered mannerisms to accommodate her fragility to the amusive charade. The very spectacle leads to “SHODH” – getting even!!
Jhumur, the ebullient and effervescent girl, gathers the broken pieces when the essence of her life is scalped, for the tiny clots to flush out, left with an empty abode. Her marriage to Haroon, a man of chauvinistic attitude, goes through a blemish of trust and integrity. Jhumur is introduced to a different Haroon after marriage, a “yes mom” boy with close family ties and expects Jhumur to be subservient too. Perhaps, she is too young to camouflage herself with a pleasant smirk every day and feels lost in the ennui of household chores. Her freedom seems entrapped in a cage seldom met by an air of revival. Then, arrives a fresh breeze to sway her to a paradise where romance embraces the living thorns inside her. She rejoices in the new droplets of love, to wash away the betrayal and humiliation that left her spiritless.
The book targets the issue of morality. A man will scan her woman from head to toe, keep tab of her whereabouts and give judgments on her opinions. He wants her to be morally rhythmic to live with him. A woman will just pierce through a man’s heart to palpitate his love—she married him because she believed in him. Haroon and Jhumur’s canvas is painted with deception and disgrace as trust loses to morality, the entire emulsion baseless and dented.
TAKE AWAY
Shodh is about a woman who dares to walk the impermissible path to reconstruct the torn pieces of her heart, with a belief to challenge a man’s over-indulgence and hubristic attitude. Taslima Nasrin’s impeccable story telling opens a can of worms of how women are subjected to irrational directives as if their desires are of no consequence.