Lamplight on HeartLamp
Cover reminded me of 'Traveling with Pomegranates' by Sue Monk Kidd and Ann Kidd Taylor', looks like both are in a way, spiritual journeys. One through short, searing fiction rooted in Kannada women's experiences, and the other through memoir, where a mother and daughter explore identity, faith, and transformation while traveling.
Layered, bold, and rooted in rich cultural soil. Banu Mushtaq's stories are known for exploring identity, womanhood, and resistance with quiet fire, and Deepa Bhasthi’s translation likely preserves that depth and dignity beautifully.
The pomegranate becomes this shared metaphor across cultures and genres—a fruit of memory, fertility, hidden complexity, and resilience. One book holds it like a symbol of womanhood across generations, the other as a lamp of layered inner lives.
While it is a critique of patriarchy, gender dynamics, poverty and inequality, the stories are leavened with a generous sprinkling of humour. The quirky characters like the Arabic teacher who loves cauliflower manjuri, the drunken painter Nisar and the little boy who plies his grandmother with Pepsi in the guise of the drink of heaven........
Reminds me of my feelings about much of contemporary fiction, that characters are often unidimensional. Banu Mushtaq is in another league with exquisitely drawn characters.
Much has already been said about the masterly translation, the effortless use of Kannada/Urdu words without italics. Masterly.
The last story.....here I have to quote -
Ultimately, Be a Woman, Once, O Lord is not just a poem—it is a protest. It calls for the dismantling of systems that normalize female suffering and demands that both the divine and society confront the reality of what it means to be a woman. Through this bold appeal, Mushtaq asserts the need for empathy, equality, and divine justice.
"Some of us step on the cindering balls of coal and carve a space for ourselves. Some of us learn to exist too close to the fire. None of us are left unscarred."
With piercing insight and a storyteller’s grace, Banu Mushtaq lays bare the raw, unspoken truths of womanhood in this relatable collection. Her characters are not just fictional—they are reflections, echoes, and realities drawn from every corner of the world. Written in an intimate, colloquial style, these stories resonate deeply, making them feel less like tales and more like shared experiences.
I read the book in a single sitting, not because it was easy, but because it was impossible to look away. Mushtaq’s background as a journalist, lawyer, and activist pulses through each page, infusing her narratives with authenticity, empathy, and power. Her sharp observations on human nature and emotional resilience make this collection unforgettable—both in its pain and its quiet triumphs.
🌟 **Heart Lamp – Discussion Guide**
#### 📚 General Themes to Explore:
* **Identity & Belonging:** How do the characters grapple with gender, religion, caste, or class?
* **Resistance & Silence:** What does resistance look like in the world of these stories—loud or quiet? Internal or external?
* **Body & Desire:** How is the body portrayed—as sacred, political, trapped, or liberated?
* **Women’s Inner Lives:** Do you notice moments when the characters' inner worlds speak louder than the plot?
#### 💬 Conversation Starters:
1. **Which story struck you most so far—and why?**
2. **Do you feel the translation carries the emotion and context well?**
*(This is a good way to appreciate Deepa Bhasthi’s work too.)*
3. **Did any story remind you of someone you know—or yourself?**
*(Personal reflections often lead to great conversations.)*
4. **How does the author portray faith or religion—personal, cultural, or critical?**
5. **What emotions did the stories leave you with—anger, tenderness, guilt, hope?**
#### 🕯️ Symbolism Clues:
* **The Pomegranate (cover)** – Might stand for the heart, secrets, or seeds of many stories. .
* **“Heart Lamp”** – What does it mean? Is it about keeping love, memory, or identity.
Am lucky—discussing books sounds like a rare treat.
Here is the review by Nandakishore Sir:
After being so much feted, I had expected something out of the ordinary from the author. What I got, instead, were a bunch of hackneyed and predictable stories written in extremely melodramatic prose. True, they tackle important social issues: but for me, literature means the impact of the tale as a work of art, and I could not find it here at all.
The translator says in the afterword that the author was a part of the Bandaya Sahitya movement.
Bandaya Sahitya started as an act of protest against the hegemony of upper caste and mostly male-led writing that was then being published and celebrated. The movement urged women, Dalits and other social and religious minorities to tell stories from within their own lived experiences and in the Kannada they spoke.
This has resulted in big challenges for the translator, as she openly confesses. Indian languages vary across regions, so it is impossible to catch all their nuances in translation: that must have happened with these stories too, I reckon. Much of the original beauty of writing could have been lost in translation. But unfortunately, as non-Kannadiga, reading translations is the only option I have.
But leaving the language part aside, there was nothing special about the content also. The author is a social activist, and her activism seems to have infected her fiction. Patriarchy in conservative Islam is obviously Banu Mushtaq's personal bugbear.
Come to think of it, for us, that is, for us Muslims, it is said that, other than Allah above, our pati is God on earth. Suppose there comes a situation where the husband’s body is full of sores, with pus and blood oozing out from them, it is said that even if the wife uses her tongue to lick these wounds clean, she will still not be able to completely repay the debt she owes him. If he is a drunkard, or a womaniser, or if he harasses her for dowry every day – even if all these ‘ifs’ are true, he is still the husband. No matter which religion one belongs to, it is accepted that the wife is the husband’s most obedient servant, his bonded labourer.
***
‘Che, che! You must not misunderstand me. God’s law says get married not just to one woman, but four. Should women give up their honour and dignity and come to the mosque? I waited for not one, but ten years. Did she give birth to even one boy? And the way she runs her mouth! Abbabbaa! Is that a sign of a woman from a respectable family? So I married another woman. So what? Should I not have? Didn’t I go visit her every time I felt like it? The other day, I was driving on the road when I saw Hasina. I dropped her off near the house in my auto itself, and placed ten rupees in her hands. Are we not humans? As a woman, if she can’t even adjust this much, then …’ Yakub said.
These are some samples of her rantings against patriarchy - there are many more. All valid, of course, but when such statements appear again and again, one starts to feel a bit bored.
The author does not condemn the religion as such, but rather, the men who have appropriated and corrupted it.
'...Why don’t scholars tell women about the rights available to them? Because they only want to restrict women. The whole world is at a stage where everyone is saying something must be done for women and girl children. But these people, they have taken over the Qur’an and the Hadiths. Let them behave as per these texts at least! Let them educate girls, not just a madrasa education, but also in schools and colleges. The choice of a husband should be hers. Let them give that. These eunuchs, let them give meher and get married instead of licking leftovers by taking dowry. Let a girl’s maternal family give her a share in the property. Let them respect her right to get divorced if there is no compatibility between the man and woman. If she is divorced, let someone come forward to marry her again; if she is a widow, let her get a companion to share her life with.’
‘Apa, Apa, what are you saying?’ Aashraf felt like she had lost her senses.
‘What I am saying is correct, Aashraf. All these rights are available for women in Islam...'
I agree with all of these. But when a piece of literature is used as a pulpit for pontification, it loses its charm.
There are some stories I liked. The Arabic Teacher and Gobi Manchuri was hilarious with its underplayed humour. Fire Rain, about a Muslim corpse mistakenly buried in a Hindu cemetery, enchanted with its biting satire. Another story I liked was The Shroud about the casual cruelties of the moneyed class towards the have-nots. But the rest were pretty much forgettable. And the title story, with its over-the-top melodrama, resembled an Indian movie from the sixties.
I have a feeling that this book won the Booker because it caters to West's Orientalist image of India and Islam. Reading this, privileged liberals in the West can lean back in their chairs and feel sympathy for the poor, backward citizens of the Third World and say to themselves: "There, but for the grace of God, go I."
