Unmarriageable

by Soniah Kamal

  Alys thought of the fictional Bennet daughters: Jane, Elizabeth, Kitty, Mary, and Lydia. She thought of Mrs Bennet and Mr Bennet. Mr Fitzwilliam Darcy. Mrs Lucas and Mr Lucas and Maria and – her favourite character – Charlotte. Mr Collins. Mrs and Mr Gardiner. Aunt Phillips. Of Charles Bingley. Caroline Bingley. Mrs Hurst and her husband. Catherine de Bourgh and Anne de Bourgh. Colonel Fitzwilliam. She thought of the servants: Mrs Hill and Mrs Jenkinson and Mrs Reynolds, the housekeeper at Pemberley, whose high praise of Mr Darcy had made all the difference.

  Alys thought of Jane Austen in this living room, at this small round wooden table, her inkpot, her paper, the gliding of her fingers, her mind conjuring up lives, story after story, smiling, laughing even, at something Mrs Bennet said, something she’d made Mrs Bennet say. Mrs Bennet, the world’s worst mother but also perhaps the best mother because all she wanted was for her daughters to live happy, successful lives according to her times.

  Alys looked up at Darsee and she wondered how this had happened, how he had got so lucky to have her marry him (oh, how lucky was she). Then they were in front of the cabinet displaying different editions of Jane Austen’s novels. Her gaze rested on the first page of the universally beloved novel Pride and Prejudice. Alys took Darsee’s hand and together their fingers traced over that most famous of first lines, the one she still assigned students in her literature classes to reimagine as they saw fit:

  It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.

  PRIDE AND PREJUDICE AND ME

  I first immersed myself in Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice when I was sixteen years old. As interesting as its marriage plot was, I was spellbound, rather, by Austen’s social criticism and how it was conveyed through her pithy wit. Here was a centuries-old English writer who may as well have been writing about contemporary Pakistani society. As a postcolonial child who grew up in the 1980s and was educated in Pakistan’s English medium system, I was well versed in classic English poets and novelists. For fun, I read Enid Blyton, and because I studied for some years in an international school in Saudi Arabia, American authors such as Judy Blume. While these storytellers spoke of boarding-school midnight feasts and bras and busts, it was Jane Austen’s wit and wisdom that first encouraged me to think critically about patriarchal society; a woman’s traditional role; the ties of family, friends, and frenemies; and the cost of keeping up appearances. As her stories skewered pretentious hypocrites, Austen’s sharp pen drew a map for what marriage and compromise, silence and speaking up, meant, and her satirical insights on how to acknowledge drawing-room duplicity while still finding a way to laugh afforded comfort and solace.

  Mrs Bennet was like too many mothers I’d grown up around, those obsessed with getting their daughters married off because that was what ‘good mothers’ did. As for ‘good girls’, they obeyed their mothers, regardless of what they themselves wanted. But Elizabeth Bennet was a girl we wanted to be like, to arrive at a Netherfield Park in a muddy gown without a care for Pakistani society’s quintessential cry of Log kya kahenge?, ‘What will people say?’ In a country where marriages continue to be arranged on the basis of convenience, pedigrees, and bank balances, Elizabeth’s spurning of the self-righteous Mr Collins and the pompous Mr Darcy were defiant acts we could look up to. According to Pakistani society, both ‘boys’ would have made very suitable matches for Elizabeth, but – gasp – she said no, because she didn’t believe they were right for her. Yes, Austen’s novels end in the happily-ever-after of marriage, but these were marriages of the heroine’s own choosing, after the hero had earned her respect, and they were based on both bride and groom liking each other. The marriages in Austen’s novels gave me hope that there were good men to be found, and I wanted to pay tribute to that.

  There were also other characters and situations in Pride and Prejudice that leapt out as mirroring Pakistani society. There was Lydia, who’d run off with Mr Wickham, and whose whole family was terrified that if he didn’t marry her, she’d be ruined and so would they. Was there any worry more Pakistani than the concern about what might bring a family honour or dishonour? There was sensible Charlotte Lucas, who made an expedient marriage for every reason but love. Was there anything more Pakistani than her calculated, ‘arranged’ marriage? And there was Caroline Bingley, a snob disdainful of anyone who was not landed gentry or who hadn’t inherited money – never mind that she herself was not landed gentry, since her wealth came via trade. Was there anything more apropos to Pakistan than class issues, snootiness, and double standards?

  As I read and reread Pride and Prejudice, Elizabeth Bennet and every other character ceased to be English – to me, they were Pakistani. That I was imagining characters and scenarios in a Pakistani setting was nothing extraordinary. Ever since I could remember, I’d been engaging in literary transference/transplantation/translation from one culture to another. Growing up on English literature, I taught myself to see my daily reality reflected in my reading material, while plumbing its universal truths in search of particulars. Not just particulars in food and clothing, which were easily recast – dupattas instead of bonnets, samosas instead of scones – but rather in thematic content and characters’ emotions. Thus Jane Bennet became just another Pakistani girl watching out for her reputation by being reticent instead of flirtatious, and her sadness at being spurned is no different from anyone’s anywhere. In reading English literature through a Pakistani lens, it seemed to me that all cultures were concerned with the same eternal questions and that people were more similar to one another than they were different. As Alys Binat says in Unmarriageable, ‘Reading widely can lead to an appreciation of the universalities across cultures.’

  But Valentine Darsee says, ‘We’ve been forced to seek ourselves in the literature of others for too long.’ In Pakistan there are seventy-four living languages, and Urdu and English are both official state languages. However, English, and a good accent, remains the lingua franca of privilege and opportunity. As an adult, I came across Thomas Babington Macaulay’s ‘Minute on Education’ (1835), in which he sets the colonised Subcontinent linguistic policy for creating ‘a person brown in colour but white in sensibilities’. It was then that I realised what the origins were of the emphasis in the Pakistani educational system on learning English and English literature at the cost of exploring our indigenous languages and literatures. History has made it such that my mother tongue, for all intents and purposes, is the English language. I wanted to write a novel that paid homage to Jane Austen and Pride and Prejudice, as well as combined my braided identification with English-language and Pakistani culture, so that the ‘literature of others’ became the literature of everyone. Therefore, Unmarriageable.

  NOTES AND RESOURCES

  Dilipabad is a fictional town in Punjab, Pakistan, created by the author.

  The play Ismat Apa Kay Naam, ‘In Ismat Apa’s Name’, was performed in Lahore in 2012. The author’s setting it in 2001 is intentional.

  For a list of books, authors, films, and people mentioned in Unmarriageable, go to the author’s website, soniahkamal.com.

  Charity Organisations in the Novel for Which Nona Bakes

  Edhi Foundation (Edhi.org): a social welfare organisation which also saves abandoned infants by placing ‘cradles’ outside their offices for the babies to be put in.

  Darul-ul-Sukun (Darulsukun.com): a welfare organisation for people with disabilities.

  Depilex Smileagain Foundation (depilexsmileagain.com): an organisation that provides acid-attack survivors with medical care, rehabilitation, and opportunities.

  Literacy Organisations Mirroring Jena’s Venture

  Developments in Literacy (dil.org): an organisation that educates and empowers underprivileged students, especially girls.

  The Citizens Foundation (tcfusa.org): a charity group that educates and empowers underprivileged students.

  Jane Austen Literacy Foundation (JALF) (janeaustenlf.org): a fo
undation that supports literacy through volunteer programs, and funds libraries for communities in need across the world.

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  To Jane Austen, for the stories you wrote that speak across centuries, for being blunt, impolite, funny, and honest. For skewering ‘good society’.

  To my husband, Mansoor Wasti, thank you for your support in every way. I simply would not be here without you.

  Shikha Malaviya, kindred spirit, for chai-scones-samosas, old age on a beach, for reading this novel, email by email, as it was being written, all original 160,000 words of it, and then helping me see the trees for the forest. Your friendship is everything in every language.

  My parents, Musarrat Kamal Qureshi and Naheed Kamal, née Pandit, whose joy and pride is everything.

  My children: Indus, who has been reading my work and giving feedback since she was eleven years old; Buraaq, Indus, Miraage, my heartbeats, who really, at the end of it all, just want to know, Mum, what’s for dinner? To the One who should have stayed but even went Unnamed, and to Khyber, and all lost to miscarriages – not a day goes by when your mother doesn’t think about you: you are in this book, my babies, because you live in me.

  My literary agent, Al Zuckerman: truly your belief in my writing has meant the world and is why I am still writing. Thank you for keeping faith and restoring mine; for loving and championing An Isolated Incident as ferociously as you do; you are my blessing. Thank you also, Samantha Wekstein at Writers House.

  Anne Speyer, my wonderful editor, from your very first email I knew you got what I was trying to write with Unmarriageable. A billion shukriyas for making my vision possible and, in acquiring this novel, making my big fat dream come true, and for loving all these characters, and for your wisdom and guidance. Thank you, Jennifer Heuer, for a gorgeous cover. Thank you with all my heart to Janet Wygal, Melissa Sanford, Allison Schuster, Kara Welsh, Kim Hovey, Jennifer Hershey, Marietta Anastassatos, Kathy Lord, and everyone at Penguin Random House–Ballantine.

  My niece Jahanara, thank you for being my very first reader. I was so scared to hand it to you, and then you got back to me to say you’d read it twice, back-to-back, and it was your favourite novel in the world – there are no words to ever tell you what your words meant to me. My sister, Sarah, for literally letting me take your copy of Pride and Prejudice out of your hands because I needed to make notes that very moment, for your Iqbal Hussain painting story, and fact-check responses. My brother, Fahad, for grace under frantic fact-check emails, for your unwavering belief in my writing and this novel. Sobia, sister-in-law, also first reader of the epilogue and then the novel; your laughter at the characters, the situations; your encouragement – gifts that kept me going. Nephew Samir, you are my lucky star, born on the very day the cover was finalised and the launch date decided – your birth will be forever linked to this book. To my niece Ana for your input on the cover and for the cute – ‘but Soniah Khala, it’s so long, I promise I’ll read it when it’s published.’ My Khalas and Mamoos – Tahira, Haseena, Mahira, Nisar, Mushtaq, you are in this book because you live in my heart, one way or another. My aunt Helen for giving me books as gifts, including my first Pride and Prejudice.

  When I joined Georgia State University to embark on a four-year full-time academic MFA with closed-book exams, with three kids at home, I really did not know what I was getting myself into. This novel became my MFA thesis and was written in two months, and I truly believe that if it wasn’t for that MFA-induced time crunch, I may still (perhaps forever) have been dreaming of writing it. Sometimes you can’t help but believe that there is rhyme and reason behind every hard thing. To my inspirational creative writing professors: Josh Russell for your class on flash fiction, Sheri Joseph for your emphasis on novels; John Holman for your class on radical revision. Thank you all for your belief that this novel would sell. To Megan Sexton for being the best boss ever at Five Points: A Journal of Literature and Arts and for our fun conversations. My literature professors: Marilynn Richtarik for teaching me to write, which has made all the difference, and for William Trevor’s Felicia’s Journey. Jay Rajiva for postcolonial discussions and my soul text, Attia Hosain’s Sunlight on a Broken Column. Tania Caldwell for talks on memory and Jill Ker Conway’s The Road from Coorain. Scott Heath for Harlem and Jessie Redmon Fauset’s Plum Bun. To the admin staff at GSU, for all you do.

  To all my well-wishers – you know who you are – too many to name, who repeatedly cheered me on and kept asking when the novel was coming out. Hira Mariam for my beautiful website, so many jokes and laughs, and your love for An Isolated Incident. Meeta Kaur for your hospitality, passion, and encouragement. Zari Nauman for your feedback and giggles over Lahore. Manju Shringarpure, for your valuable texts: Get off Facebook and finish your novel! Sharbari Zohra Ahmed and Sadia Ashraf for weighing in on the cover and so much more. Kataryna Jakubiak for being the first to read the opening chapter and for your feedback. Devoney Looser for all your support and enthusiasm. Sonya Rehman for hope and more. Thrity Umrigar for hope and more. Sonali Dev for hope and more. To Pratima Malaviya for her delicious sketches of my Binat girls and more. Thank you: Kathleen A. Flynn. Jennifer S. Brown. Jessica Handler. Nandita Godbole. Dipika Mukherjee. Maheen Baqai. Rebecca Kumar. Nina Gangadharan. Saadia Faruqi. Kwan Holloway. Swati Narayan. Missale Ayele. Priya Nair. Connie Buchanan. Laurel Phenix. Reema Khan.

  To Janeites the world over and Jane Austen Society members everywhere, especially Jane Austen Society of North America (JASNA), where I first discovered fellow Austen fans and scholars. To JASNA Georgia Janeites: Erin Elwood. Renata Dennis. Kristen Miller Zone and everyone. To the Jane Austen Literacy Foundation, where I serve as a literacy ambassador.

  To libraries everywhere, who are such a blessing, and especially to Fulton County libraries and Northeast/Spruill Oaks Branch, Georgia, for so much, and for weighing in on the cover: Laura Hoefner, Jayshree Sheth, Stephanie Gokey, Karen Swenson, Eva Mcguigan, and Gillian Hill.

  To the baristas at Starbucks (store # 8202, Georgia), where much of this novel was so frantically written: Elise Watts, Brandon Ross, Emma Denney, Brittany Meekan, John London, Amberley Ferguson, and Beatrice – for keeping this immigrant writer in coffee (which is chai away from home), ice-cold water, and bright smiles daily for those two frightening, exhilarating months (for mothering me).

  Thank you to all the following in Georgia and everywhere: independent bookstores and all others, literary organisations, book festivals, arts and culture magazines and websites for all you do for writers and for welcoming me into your fold.

  Because there is always the kindness of strangers, to all in Georgia who I literally stopped on roads and in stores, who so willingly gave this author the time of day to weigh in on the cover: thank you – we went with the teal one.

  To: Sultan Golden, who makes his appearance in this novel as Dog and Kutta, and to Yaar, our cat, who made it to year nineteen.

  To: Pakistan. Jeddah. England. America.

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  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  SONIAH KAMAL is an award-winning writer whose debut novel was a finalist for the Townsend Prize for Fiction and the KLF French Fiction Prize. Her work has appeared in many publications including the New York Times, The Guardian and Buzzfeed. She was born in Pakistan, grew up in England and Saudi Arabia and currently resides in the US.

  soniahkamal.com @SoniahKamal

  By Soniah Kamal

  Unmarri
ageable

  COPYRIGHT

  Allison & Busby Limited

  11 Wardour Mews

  London W1F 8AN

  allisonandbusby.com

  First published in Great Britain by Allison & Busby in 2019.

  This ebook edition published in Great Britain by Allison & Busby in 2019.

  Published by arrangement with Ballantine Books, an imprint of Random House, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York, NY, USA.

  All rights reserved.

  Copyright © 2019 by SONIAH KAMAL

  The moral right of the author is hereby asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  All characters and events in this publication other than those clearly in the public domain are fictitious and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent buyer.

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  ISBN 978–0–7490–2451–2