Bookseller of Kabul, by Asne Reaction Paper

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As sometimes the author hints, their lives are not their own, but their path in life is what their family and society directs. As with the teaching certificate that Leila is trying hard to obtain, the more she got into the Afghan bureaucracy, the harder the process is, until it become almost improbable.

Selerstad offers the perspective of a world in which women and children have no or little say in their lives. What surprises is not the rules or customs that the Afghan Islamic world has, but the passivity of women, in this case. Although aware that things could and should be a bit more different, they do not act against the current because it is too hard. It seems that not only a sort of courage is missing here, but also a more common vision for the women in the Khan world for example. When a situation becomes more and more difficult, the women in Leila's family do not encourage her or help her in her courageous desires, but pull her back into the burka world. As Leila joins an English class, she discovers that in her class there are many boys. Her fear of talking without permission in public, her ingrained sense of humility makes her doubt her own capabilities and English knowledge. This, alongside with the pulling back mentioned before, make her quit another dream that she had.

One of the things that the author points in the book regarding family relations, with a strong effect on the societal relations, is therefore the weak or non-existent support that girl or young boys receive from family members. As Leila encounters a young man that also believes in her dreams of continuing education and working, her family does all that they can to push her away from a different type of life than the one inscribed on her. Mansur, her brother, works together with her mother, Sharifa, to push the young man away from Leila and to introduce in Leila's life one of her cousins, a man that would offer her the same life she had until then.

Women, even in the liberated non-Taliban world, were not liberated at all. Although the author describes only one family, one could extrapolate and think that if women in a relatively upper-middle class with a family head considered to be an intellectual with some liberal views are treated in this manner, than other women are treated worse.

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In the non-urbanized huge space of Afghanistan, were books, foreigners or electricity (to name a few) have not arrived in a proper manner, women, most likely have amazingly hard times. As many of the stories that the book describes, women can be humiliated, beaten up or even killed if they don't follow the traditional way of living. As a relative of the Khan family was caught to have been involved in a secret affair she was killed by her two brothers on the request of their mother. Another striking story is that of a girl that started to have a relationship with a young man and was almost killed by her family for that.

The wall that surrounds the free mind of Afghan women can be synthesized as the burka. They are covered as if their ideas, dreams or thoughts are to be kept inside. Their role and influence, as described by Seierstad, is limited to the boundaries of society and anything that is outside of this can be punished. The book does not tell only the story of a book seller from Kabul. It tells the story of how religion, society, dogmas and culture have an effect on what other cultures perceive as normality. It tells the story of how women and children are stuck in a system that keeps them inside their minds in a fearful and hopeless way.

Seierstad, Asne. The Bookseller of Kabul. New York. Back….....

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