SARA SULERI, MEATLESS DAYS:
An engaging post-colonial memoir
I have read this memoir twice, and really enjoyed it.
Sara grew up in Lahore, Pakistan, the daughter of a gentle Welshwoman, and an irascible Pakistani father (who had left his first wife, and first cousin, to marry her).
Her mother taught English, and presumably Sara grew up immersed in literature. I like her style, and twisted, contorted, almost Shakespearean diction.
Her memoir is elegiac, and imbued with sadness. Her beautiful and beloved sister Ifat was murdered (rumour said she was run over by her husband), her mother was also run over and killed. Her father was imprisoned. Tragedy stalked the family much as it did the Bhuttos.
But, through it all, runs vivid memories of a vivid childhood, her camera lovingly focusing on gol-guppas, the long wait to see the first sliver of moon at Ramadan, or the obscenities of Pakistani cuisine–she discovers a favourite dish is actually the balls of goats!! Her father, gently mocked, rebelled against, but loved and admired is the most vivid figure in the book.
Her memoir loving renders a third world childhood in a prose of her own, which owes much to the stylists of the English Renaissance, Thomas Browne, John Donne, and Mr. Shakespeare, of course. It is not an easy read, since she deliberately opts for a strange, pretzel like style–but it is a delicious and rewarding read. It is one of my favourite subcontinental memoirs.
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