Kartography - Kamila Shamsie

Kartography - Kamila Shamsie Kamila Naheed Shamsie was born on 13th August 1973. She is a Pakistani novelist who writes in the English language. She was brought up in Karachi where she attended Karachi Grammar school. She has a BA degree in creative writing from Hamilton College; here she was influenced by the kashmiri poet Agha Shahid Ali. Her first novel In the city by the sea, was shortlisted for the mail on Sunday John Llewelly Rhys prize and her second novel Salt and Saffron was successful in winning her a place on Orange’s list of 21 writers for the 21st century. In 1999 Kamila received the prime ministers award for literature in Pakistan. KARTOGRAPHY which was published in 2004 explores the strained relationship between soul mates kairm and Raheen. The story is set against a backdrop of ethnic violence. Broken verses was published in 2005 and Burnt Shadows in 2008 in the UK and 2009 in the USA, she lives in London and Karachi. Kartography The two most important characters of the novel Karim and Raheen are crib mates raised together from birth. Raheen the narrator of the story and her best friend Karim dream each other’s dreams, finish each other’s sentences and speak in a language of anagrams. They share a pleasant childhood in upper class Karachi with parents who are also best friends. They even got engaged to the other once, until they rematches in what they jokingly call the fiancée swap. The night Karim’s family migrates from Karachi to London, Raheen knows that some of my tears were his tears and some of his tears were mine. But as distance detachment and youth tear them apart, Karim takes refuge in the rationality of maps while Raheen searches for the secret behind her parent’s exchange. the truth that she finds out takes us back two decades to reveal a story not just of a family’s chaotic history but that of a country and brings us forwards to a grown up Raheen and Karim who were once again, drawn back to each other in the city that is their true home. The violence and the persistent inheritance of the civil war of 1971 is the background for the story of Raheen and Karim, a girl and boy who grew up together in the 1970s and 80s.their lives are devastated when a family secret is revealed. The trauma of war is typically measured by loss of lives and poverty, not broken hearts, but the microcosm is often as powerful an indicator of loss as the macrocosm and that is what Shamsie seems to say in her novel, Kartogarphy. The novel is a shining quick witted lament and love story. Karachi, Pakistan’s largest city is a place under continuous siege; ethnic, factional and simply random acts of violence are the order of the day. The two friends Raheen andd Karim and their families in its superficiality by family members like Raheen’s arrogant aunty Runty and in guilty social conscience by Karim himself. this is a multifaceted and intricate novel, skilfully accomplished and rich in emotional highly decorated music and wordplay. the title is inspired by Karim’s escalating fascination with mapmaking, and spelled with a ‘K’ after the City’s name. The book is essentially a coming-of-age novel of the two protagonists, Karim and Raheen. They have an idealised childhood, sharing a unique bond, a friendship that few people have the reality of experiencing. they finish one other’s sentences. One summer day both are sent to uncle Asif’s farm to be shielded from the growing ethnic violence in Pakistan. Here Karim decides to become a cartographer. this decision seemingly random, seems to be inspired by Uncle Asif’s idea of formulating East and West Pakistan. the idea of cartography holds the book together; maps hold not just places, but also people together with the memories that each of these places stores in them. The holiday becomes important for Raheen too. She begins to take an active interest in their parents past after reading the deep inscriptions on the tree with the initials of her father and Karim’s mother. Although she already knew that Karim’s parents and her parents had swapped partners before the wedding, the inscription acts as a channel and drives her into digging deeper. Shamsie’s novel deals more with ghosts than cities; ghosts of relationships, ghosts of childhood, ghosts of love. a ghost is said to haunt a tree where Raheen’s father who was once engaged to Karim’s mother carved their initials long ago. Two ghosts representing Karim and Raheen walk an invisible city in Raheen’s dream. As someone said to Raheen; There’s a ghost of a dream, you don’t even try to shake free of because you’re too in love with the way she haunts you’. During their childhood, Raheen is close to Karim as if he was her twin brother, rather than the only son of her parents best friends. Although she knows that Karim,s mother a Bengali was once engaged to her father, Raheen assumes that what they refer as the fiancée swap was not of no great importance. When as teenagers Raheen and Karim seem romantically interested in each other, their parents’ hope that sooner or later they will marry. Nevertheless the friends are estranged when there is another outbreak of violence in Karachi. Karim’s parents take him too safely in London. Although Raheen keeps Karim informed about her life in Karachi and at her American college, Karim seems unsympathetic or unreceptive toward her. He becomes infatuated with what he calls Kartography as if by mapping his world, he could achieve some control over his own destiny. At last Raheen finds out what has motivated Karim to move away from her. He had discovered that her father broke off with his mother because she was a Bengali. Primarily Raheen wants nothing more to do with her father; yet she finally forgives him. The novel ends with Raheen and Karim together as they were meant to be. Nevertheless there is nothing sentimental about Kartography. The main significance of this impressive work is its realism. Kamila Shamsie reveals the weaknesses in some of her most attractive characters. the personal flaws that explain how a family or a country can be consumed by discrimination and factionalism, while at the same time Shamsie affirms her sincere faith in the redemptive power of love. .

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