Burnt Shadows: Kamila Shamsie

Image Credit: Penguin Books India

Novels spanning decades, following family histories definitely catch my attention. So when I picked up Kamila Shamsie’s “Burnt Shadows,” I expected a rich story and more. Here is a glimpse into what the novel is about –

Hiroko Tanaka loses her soon-to-be fiancé, Konrad Weiss, in the Nagasaki bombing of 1945. Shattered in more ways than one, she travels to Delhi to seek out Konrad’s family, to treasure any links to Konrad she might find. Hiroko though falls in love with Sajjad, an employee at Konrad’s sister Elizabeth’s house. From Delhi, Shamsie takes us to Pakistan, Afghanistan and New York, as we follow two families and their lives.

The faint whiff of romance hangs perpetually throughout Burnt Shadows, which contains few people but many places and many emotions. Konrad and Hiroko’s union is shortlived as within the opening pages, the German dies an untimely death. Theirs is a friendly, open relationship. Quite the opposite of the relationship between Konrad’s sister and her husband James. We meet them soon, as Hiroko lands in Delhi and is taken in by Konrad’s family for a few days on account of her ill health. Shamsie gives us peeks into a romance turned sour over the years, through Elizabeth’s short, wistful reminiscences.

“Elizabeth looked at his jaw. There was still a spot of blood there. For a moment all she wanted to do was lean in and place her mouth against his skin, feel the tingle of aftershave against her lips and hear him sigh in satisfaction and relief as he used to do during their early married life when some expression of physical desire was Elizabeth’s signal that whatever squabble had sprung up between them was now ended.”

Against this crumbling marriage that reflects the dying embers of the British Empire at the time, Shamsie brings new hopes and desires in the form of Hiroko and Sajjad. Though considered a near impossible union by James and Elizabeth due to the vast differences in culture and geography, Hiroko and Sajjad defy all assumptions and get married. But they are united by different things. Since Sajjad’s family is torn by the ongoing Partition of India and Hiroko has already undergone a partition under different circumstances, they haven’t seen each other in their “true world(s),” which anyway “doesn’t exist anymore,” for either of them. Sajjad defines the undercurrent of their attraction beautifully,

“I have to learn how to live in a new world. With new rules. As you have had to do. No, as you are doing. Perhaps it would be less lonely for both of us to have a companion. Some constancy is comforting during change.”

Such brilliant writing and elaboration of thoughts dominate Shamsie’s novel and these are the same tools she uses to leap over time and space smoothly. We are rapidly introduced to Hiroko and Sajjad’s son Raza and then later on Henry, James and Elizabeth’s son and even Henry’s daughter Kim. Not only are we given an inside look into their marriages, friendships and parental roles but also into their individual characteristics.

Apart from this, Shamsie also tackles politics, particularly that of the US with the rest of the globe, which was a bit too deep for me to grasp completely. A lack of interest in politics did not help me in furthering my understanding of this aspect of the novel as well.

As you can see Shamsie’s canvas is huge, but the book is a slow read. Without much of an ending to speak of, Burnt Shadows becomes a simmering pot of travesties crossed by these people and by the entire world itself. Case in point is the way the 9/11 tragedy is softly dropped in the background of conversations to heighten its impact on people in the novel as well as the world.

Shamsie’s writing must be lauded for techniques such as these, which provoke the shrewd reader into thinking. I am afraid I am not shrewd enough for this book so after a point it began to drag. It was only Shamsie’s superb wordage that sustained me till the end, as I stumbled through her worlds without a map.

Verdict: Read it for the wonderful language

Rating: 3/5