Book Review: The Swallows of Kabul

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Book Review: The Swallows of Kabul

Reader Rating: 8.5/10

Salaams! Just finished up a short novel called The Swallows of Kabul, originally published in French by an Algerian writer (he published under the name "Yasmina Khadra" while still in the military to avoid censors). The novel's setting is the hyper-fundamentalist Taliban regime, where public executions were commonplace. The story follows the intertwined lives of an older prison guard and his sickly wife, and a younger, university-educated, middle-class couple. Both of the couples, in different ways, struggle with the daily effects of the repressive Taliban regime, questioning their sanity and desire to go on living. It all comes to a very tragic end after the younger man's wife ends up under the watch care of the older man in the prison he is responsible for guarding. This story is not a happy one and leaves the reader with a classic Central Asian tragic ending which serves to accentuate the despair and plight of its characters.

The author's writing style (and the translation) is notable, at times feeling more like poetry than prose. His sentences are densely packed with powerful and evocative imagery, painting pictures that leave a lasting impression on the mind. Notice the various techniques of metaphor, alliteration, and carefully chosen (loaded) words used in this early passage of the book which I feel needs to be quoted in length:

"In the middle of nowhere, a whirlwind spins like a sorceress flinging out her skirts in a macabre dance; yet not even this hysteria serves to blow the dust off the calcified palm trees thrust against the sky like beseeching arms....The Afghan countryside is nothing but battlefields, expanses of sand, and cemeteries. Artillery exchanges shatter prayers, wolves howl at the moon every night, and the wind, when it breathes, mingles beggars' laments with the croaking of crows. Everything appears charred, fossilized, blasted by some unspeakable spell. Erosion grinds away with complete impunity, scratching, rasping, peeling, cobbling the necrotic soil, erecting monuments to its own calm power. Then, without warning, at the foot of mountains singed bare by the breath of raging battles, rises Kabul, or rather, what's left of it: a city in an advanced stage of decomposition."

As wonderful as the writing in the book is, I felt at times that there was a lack of authenticity in some of its descriptions of the setting. I was left with the feeling that the writer has never actually been to Kabul or Afghanistan, and that he simply cloaked his North African experience with a Taliban setting. Even in the passage quoted above, which I feel is very evocative of Afghanistan in general, the author mentions "palm trees," as though they are to be found everywhere across the country (as they are in most of the Middle East). There were also other Arabic word choices that indicated the writer based his setting on a middle eastern foundation ("coffee houses," chilam smoking, "La hawla," and even the names of many of the characters).

Nonetheless, the book is worth reading and is very powerful in its imagery depicting the conflicts and hopelessness and despair that descended on people as a result of the Taliban's extremist policies.

The Swallows of Kabul : A Novel
by YASMINA KHADRA

Product Details
• Hardcover: 208 pages
• Publisher: Nan A. Talese; 1st Us edition (February 17, 2004)
• ISBN: 0385510012
• Average Customer Review: based on 18 reviews. (Write a review)
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Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
Khadra is the nom de plume for Algerian army officer Mohamed Moulessehoul (In the Name of God; Wolf Dreams), who illustrates the effects of repression on a pair of Kabul couples in this slim, harrowing novel of life in Afghanistan under Taliban rule. Gloomy prison guard Atiq Shaukat is tired of his grim duties, keeping watch over prisoners slated for public execution. Life at home, where his wife, Musarrat, is slowly dying of a chronic illness, is no better. Mohsen Ramat, meanwhile, clings to the remains of his middle-class life together with his beautiful, progressive wife, Zunaira, after the Taliban strip them of their livelihood and dignity. Khadra's storytelling style recalls that of Naguib Mahfouz in the early chapters, in which the tense dissatisfaction of both couples is revealed. The pivotal event occurs when Ramat discharges his frustrations by participating in the brutal stoning of a female Taliban prisoner. The incident changes the dynamic of his marriage; after an extended argument about the incident, Ramat persuades Zunaira to go for a stroll in downtown Kabul and the couple is harassed and nearly brutalized by Taliban soldiers. Zunaira continues to bridle at her situation, and when their next argument turns physical, Ramat falls and dies after hitting his head on the wall. Shaukat is given the assignment of guarding Zunaira after she is arrested and charged with murder, and his instant infatuation with her sets off a remarkable chain of events. Khadra's simple, elegant prose, finely drawn characters and chilling insights ("Kabul has become the antechamber to the great beyond") prepare the way for the terrible climax. Like Khaled Hosseini's The Kite Runner, this is a superb meditation on the fate of the Afghan people.
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