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A review by bites_of_books
The Locust and the Bird: My Mother's Story by Hanan Al-Shaykh
5.0
This memoir spoke to me in so many ways! Let's explore them:
Literacy: I have the privilege to be able to write these words, and you have the same privilege in being able to read them and understand them. I can communicate with people who are thousands of miles away just through a piece of paper and pen or electronic means. There are people in this world who don't have those privileges and who don't have ways to tell their stories other than by narrating them. This memoir is basically a daughter giving her mother a voice through her ability to write. It's a beautiful memoir because it encompasses everything that her mother wanted to tell to the world, her story of hardship but also of deep and unbreakable love.
Mother & Daughter Relationships: As I said above, it's a story where the daughter tells her mother's story, and she does so at the insistence of her mother. Hanan has always thought that she knew her mother's story of how she divorced her father and gave up both Hanan and her sister Fatima. What Hanan doesn't know is the rest of the story, the parts that show her mother's reasons for leaving her behind. We sometimes assume that we know what happened, and that might be true, we might know a fact or two, but the context can make all the difference. In this memoir, that context is everything.
The power of women: Even when at their lowest, the women in this memoir found ways to get what they needed and wanted. It wasn't always the best way to go about things, lying, stealing, blackmailing, but they found a way. I found myself judging these women for doing these things but then I thought "what other way was there?" and I couldn't find an answer. It's an incredibly difficult situation they lived in, one where they had no power, where men dictated everything that they got to do in their lives, and where only other men could save them (in most situations).
Lebanon: I had never before read a book set in Lebanon, through this book I got to know a bit about the culture and history of Beirut and what happened there from the 1930s to the 1970s. History is usually focused on the "big" players, the United States, Germany, the UK, etc., but the histories of other countries is just as important, as well as the perspectives of the people who lived during those times and who were not exactly in the middle of the action.
This book really got me thinking, it's a story of hardship yes, but also of overcoming every obstacle and hanging on to love as best as you can.
I highly recommend it to everyone.
I was never to read and write as I am now, if for no other reason but to write my story.
Let me tell you how it hurts when a piece of wood and a piece of lead defeat me. -Kamila,
Hanan's mother
Literacy: I have the privilege to be able to write these words, and you have the same privilege in being able to read them and understand them. I can communicate with people who are thousands of miles away just through a piece of paper and pen or electronic means. There are people in this world who don't have those privileges and who don't have ways to tell their stories other than by narrating them. This memoir is basically a daughter giving her mother a voice through her ability to write. It's a beautiful memoir because it encompasses everything that her mother wanted to tell to the world, her story of hardship but also of deep and unbreakable love.
Mother & Daughter Relationships: As I said above, it's a story where the daughter tells her mother's story, and she does so at the insistence of her mother. Hanan has always thought that she knew her mother's story of how she divorced her father and gave up both Hanan and her sister Fatima. What Hanan doesn't know is the rest of the story, the parts that show her mother's reasons for leaving her behind. We sometimes assume that we know what happened, and that might be true, we might know a fact or two, but the context can make all the difference. In this memoir, that context is everything.
The power of women: Even when at their lowest, the women in this memoir found ways to get what they needed and wanted. It wasn't always the best way to go about things, lying, stealing, blackmailing, but they found a way. I found myself judging these women for doing these things but then I thought "what other way was there?" and I couldn't find an answer. It's an incredibly difficult situation they lived in, one where they had no power, where men dictated everything that they got to do in their lives, and where only other men could save them (in most situations).
Lebanon: I had never before read a book set in Lebanon, through this book I got to know a bit about the culture and history of Beirut and what happened there from the 1930s to the 1970s. History is usually focused on the "big" players, the United States, Germany, the UK, etc., but the histories of other countries is just as important, as well as the perspectives of the people who lived during those times and who were not exactly in the middle of the action.
This book really got me thinking, it's a story of hardship yes, but also of overcoming every obstacle and hanging on to love as best as you can.
I highly recommend it to everyone.