A Fine Debut
Esther Davids debut novel traces the life of a Jewish family in Ahmedabad. Its an interesting novel in that it offers an insight into the daily life pattern of a community that has been reduced to a mere handful in India. Told through the eyes of a young girl, it is the story of a familys struggle to retain its Jewish identity in an alien land and also its struggle to keep the very family together at a time when the old values are crumbling.
The book also depicts the oppressed face of womanhood all over be it the women circumscribed by the strict Jewish customs, the neighbouring Hindu girl Subhadra who commits suicide rather than marry an unknown man arranged by her parents, or the family maid Mani, alias Mumtaz Begum.
The novel opens in the 1950s in the old city of Ahmedabad. The narrator, in her early teens lives with her parents, grandmother, uncle, aunt and two cousins Samuel and Malkha in the walled city. Born as she is in the Gujarati city, she finds the Jewish rites and rituals at home difficult to comprehend. For her the Hindu temple with its noise and clamour and an identifiable idol is an easier place to pray than the synagogue with its heavy silence.
As she grows up, she realises the turbulent relationship between her working mother Naomi and her housebound granny and Aunt Hannah.
The conflict is brought home when her parents move out of the joint family set up at Dilhi Darwaza and move to Naomis fathers house at Shahibagh.
There are conflicts here too as Naomi cannot come terms with her father Daniel who she feels is responsible for her mother Leahs suicide. Rather strict about her religion, Naomi cannot comprehend Daniels attraction to the Hindu festivals and customs. She even takes umbrage when he presents her daughter a pair of silver anklets. According to her Jewish girls should wear no ornaments except perhaps a brooch or a watch.
Meanwhile all is not well at the Dilhi Darwaza house either. Aunt Jerusha, Germanys eldest daughter, has returned from England, a qualified doctor. She moves out with her mother as soon as she finds a good job. Granny is heartbroken at the family breaking up thus but feels beholden to be with her daughter. Mani, the maid who has been with the family for years and years is shunted between the three houses, constantly thrown out and taken back. Both Malkha and the narrator are at the threshold of womanhood and have their share of suitors among their cousins but the family elders decree that intermarriage is no longer a healthy practice. With the family keeping both girls on a tight leash, not allowing them an iota of freedom, they know they are doomed to spinsterhood and will have to take care of their parents juts as Aunt Jerusha does.
After all the sons, Samuel and the younger Benjamin have fled the family folds for ever, one embracing drugs and the other seeking his salvation in the Promised Land. The elders, broken and embittered, are hard pressed to remember their Jewish rites.
At first, the book with its staccato style of writing and sudden jumps in line of thought is a bit difficult to digest. However, after a while, once one gets used to Davids writing style and identifies the members of the large Jewish family, it picks up. David, who herself belongs to a large Bene Israel Jewish family, leading one to the belief that the book must be largely autobiographical, paints a graphic portrait of life within the walled city of Ahmedabad and the riots and curfews which have become part and parcel of the city. All her characters ring true and must certainly be based on real life personas.
A pleasant surprise is the books production. Beautifully illustrated (by the author herself) the book is tightly edited and neatly designed.
At first, the book with its staccato style of writing and sudden jumps in line of thought is a bit difficult to digest. However, after a while, once one gets used to Davids writing style and identifies the members of the large Jewish family, it picks up
The Walled City Esther David Manas (an imprint of East Weat Books) Distributed by Rupa & Co Rs 135/204pages