Today, I begin my project with the nation of Afghanistan. (For more information on what I'm doing, see below).
Oddly, my search in the local Borders Bookstore for books on Afghanistan turned up little of interest. I expected to find a slew of books, but maybe people in this area just aren't that interested. Interestingly, a search of Borders online turns up something like 34,000 books related to Afghanistan.
Anyway, I did find a book that turned out to be very compelling, and in many ways perfectly suited to my interests. The book is entititled "The Places In Between," and is by Rory Stewart, a journalist-type from Scotland.
Mr. Stewart's book chronicles his time walking across Afghanistan, shortly after the fall of the Taliban, in January 2002. Previous to his time in Afghanistan, he had already walked across Iran, Pakistan, India and Nepal. His trip, if you can imagine the geography, was broken up shortly after he began walking by the refusal of the Taliban to allow him to enter the country. And so, after walking across Iran, then hopping over to Pakistan to continue his walk to Nepal, he returned to finish the middle section of his route.
Now, as for a few basic facts regarding Afghanistan:
- Afghanistan shares borders with the following countries: China, iran, Pakistan, Tajikstan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan.
- There are a number of ethnic groups in Afghanistan, including Pashtun, Tajik, Hazara, Uzbek, Aimak, Turkmen, and Baloch.
- Afghanistan is approximately 80% Sunni Muslim. Most of the rest of the population is Shia Muslim.
- The languages of Afghanistan are:
Afghan Persian or Dari (official) 50%, Pashtu (official) 35%, Turkic languages (primarily Uzbek and Turkmen) 11%, 30
minor languages (primarily Balochi and Pashai) 4%, much bilingualism.
(Source: CIA Factbook)
Considering the number of languages and ethnicities of Afghanistan, as well as the sheer physicality of the country, it really is amazing to see the route that Mr. Stewart took across the country. He started in Herat, on the western edge of the country, and walked straight across, through mountain ranges (in January) to Kabul. It would seem that his previous travel and work experience had provided him with a basic knowledge of Afghan Persian, so this was obviously helpful, but it obvious throughout the book that linguistic troubles were not absent from his journey.
Even more incredible is trying to imagine the absolute hubris of nearly any attempt to control this country by outside powers. Along the way, Stewart stays in villages, accepting (sometimes demanding) the hospitality of the local leaders. What emerges as he moves from one settlement to the next is a vision of a land in which local leadership is of the gravest importance, inter-community squabbles and struggles are omnipresent, and any sense of nationhood is often completely absent.
What also emerges is a picture of a rich, ancient and extremely diverse history and culture; one which can in no way be contained within cheap prejudices or facile stereotypes. What also emerges is the fact that Rory Stewart is ridiculously cool.
See also: The Kite Runner, the tale of a Pashtun boy and his Hazara servant in the 1970's.
Coming soon: Albania.
What a great idea! Thanks for sharing your knowledge so I can vicariously learn through you. Happy New Year!
ReplyDeleteThe Kite Runner, not a bad book, though the ending was totally cheezy and sort of ruined it for me. Crazy how the kite strings are studded with broken glass. Hosseini spoke in NY about a year ago, I wanted to go but he was charging $25 bucks or so...or the venue was...But let me say this, the prose was very spare, and it's not because he was mimicking Hemingway, it's because his mother tongue is Dari. I should have done the book in Dari and then had it translated. I just finished a book that you might be interested in by a woman named Laila Lalami, from Rabat, and she wrote too in English. The outcome: spare, sometimes juvenile prose. Ok, I look forward to Albania.
ReplyDeleteOr maybe that "spare" prose is evidence of the "democratization" of literature, and the "growth" of the literay canon, meaning, people getting their stories published not because they are good writers, but because they are "the other", I think academics call it "the subaltern"...yep, I had to learn all that garbage too as a Liberal Arts undergrad.
ReplyDeleteLalami's book was good, very good, but I was left wondering how an Arabic>English or French>English translation would have sounded as opposed to her writing it in English. I know she was educated in the Lycee system in Morocco, so it's unlikely she learned English (at least well enough to write novels in English) until she did her undergraduate degree in the UK, and later her PhD in California.
Another book comes to mind where the story was more important than the prose, and one in which I think "subalternity" had a factor. Actually, the entire book is about him being a subaltern, the other. And it's recommended, to whoever is reading Bond's blog, and whoever cares about my opinion (anyone?). "Drown" by Junot Diaz. It's about Dominicans in NJ, NY, and in D.R. Diaz is from Edison, NJ a grad of the New School's writing program (I think). Diaz's native tongue is English, but the prose is...spare. Coincidentally, he was one of the critics who wrote "words of praise" for Lalami's book. Anyway...
Ciao.