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TOMB OF SAND , A BIG BIG BOOK

Tomb of Sand is a book written by Geetanjali Shree, originally in Hindi and translated by Daisy Rockwell. The book won the International Booker Prize in 2022. The book,  if I describe it vaguely, is a book about a depressed old woman and her story of overcoming that depression and revisiting her teenage trauma from the India-Pakistan partition.

But this is not just a long book. This is a big book, huge. It tells the story of a woman, two women and women in family, women who are not 'women', of men and grown children. It tells the story of a family, of a country, two countries, the border and the old woman.









The book is more than 700 pages long and is written in three parts. The first part starts with the old woman facing the wall after she lost her husband. She is grieving, the entire family is grieving. The family tries to pull her back, but she is deliberate and stubborn , saying "nahi hi uthungi" which later turns into "nayi hi uthungi", "I will rise anew". The first part introduces the reader to the tragedy and the family. There is the Ma (the old woman), the Beti and Bahu. The eldest Son and his grown-up children. The book raises the question of feminism on how it translates into the lives of different women in different manners. It questions the modern woman on her limits of liberal acceptance of others. 

The second part of the book shows the life of Ma in her daughter's home, her friendship with a transgender woman and her transformation into a new person. The book portrays the beautiful dynamic of the mother-daughter relationship, the growing old daughter and the growing older mother. The phases of realization the daughter goes through as she watches her mother battle her depression. 

The third part of the novel follows the mother-daughter duo beyond the border, in Pakistan. where the mother revisits her childhood trauma of the partition. The partition is told not from the eyes of the historians but the people who lived through and after it. 

The book has serious themes, but the writing is light and funny.  It does not have a fixed plot from the beginning and thus demands the reader's patience. The chapters are small, even a few lines sometimes. The writing demands the reader to let go of the rules of grammar and understand the story through sounds and vibrations. This is a special and beautiful thing about the writing of this text. There are a lot of characters, some that stay throughout the book, some who fade away as the story progresses. The author has also used birds as characters in a way that blurs the lines of reality and myth.

The story tells itself and it is indeed a beautiful one. It was an interesting read. I felt really small reviewing this book since it has already been critically acclaimed. I usually avoid reading lengthy books and the 700 pages intimidated me, but the page count is increased because of the formatting of the book, which is has been done very beautifully, the chapters are short and interesting. The writing felt queer when I first started the book but as I kept reading, it grew on me. It took me a long time to finish the book, but I'd say it was for the better. Slow reading has its own benefits. 

I will try to read the original text in Hindi; however, it is being said that the translation does complete justice to the original writing. Let us see if I manage to read that along with my growing pile of "to be read" books. Happy reading!





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