#bahman aslan

[annafromuni]

The Stationery Shop Has My Heart

The Stationery Shop by Marjan Kamali is a masterful piece of life. I don’t even remember what I was expecting before reading this. All I know is that I will never be the same. This book is so beautifully written and the life contained within these covers is rich and inviting and heartbreaking and sombre. The food sounds mouthwatering and entices me to learn new recipes to get a taste of the…

[piness011]

"we will always be seventeen"

"she was a good wife, but she was not you."

"you tell anyone, that you were out walking with your beau "

*that part in the letter where he describes how much he misses her*

STOOOOOOOPPPPPP

[zelihatrifles]

The Stationery Shop of Tehran

When i was finishing this book, it was late into the night and i was supposed to have fallen asleep much earlier, but i stayed up because i simply had to know what happened to Roya and Bahman and Badri and Mr Fakhri and Zari and all the others, because i could not help conversing with and upbraiding Roya after learning each new information that was so beautifully unravelled by Kamali as i kept turning the pages hungrily. I could relate to Roya so much, for falling in love so young, for the rush, the accidents, the possibility and the reality of loss, and she felt so tangible as a character. Zari stayed a favourite of course for being so forthright to the point of rudeness, and for staying there beside Roya till the very end. I only complain that her affection for and relationship to Yousuf was never elucidated upon and surprisingly never quite recognised by her elder sister who was more if not equally stupidly and deeply in love which she very amusingly described like a tree having "fallen on your head".

My favourite romance was probably that of Ali Fakhri and Badri. Even if i could not completely smell the melon musk scent of those sultry summer afternoons in the bazaar, i could definitely feel the sweet secretiveness of the awakening of young sexuality in those coveted meetings. Fakhri seemed like a delightful person and i wanted more development for him and then suddenly i am too stunned by what he did, and more specifically, what he let happen.

Mrs Aslan's bitterness aligned in my mind with those of Tara in Burnt Sugar and the demented mother in The Almost Moon, but i could not quite understand why she was so acrimonious - what loss could have made her that? Only romantic loss or poverty, albeit gravely difficult, somehow did not seem enough to cause her rudeness. But the final revelation shook me completely.

When i read till Roya's move to California, i was telling myself that the writing is not very strong because Bahman seemed so very flat as a character. Just a stereotype of the politically active "siasi" who seduced a girl and promised her high hopes only to leave her dramatically at the altar for someone his mother chose? That seemed too cliche, and to tell the truth, i was a little disappointed. Then, suddenly, Bahman went from one-dimensional to seven-dimensional with that letter of his, and i couldn't be happier.

The coincidences in the novel happened as if by diktat of destiny, and were surreal rather than improbable. But what is so real is that the stirrings of young love which are so naive but so obstinate that they they freed them at the same time as anchoring them within each other all the more firmly. Their love story, spanning decades, can easily be dismissed as too utopic but i'd rather be foolish and optimistic and believe that "we'll always be seventeen" rather than be weighed down by age.

Food forms such a crucial part of who we are. It determines our sense of belongingness as well as of alienation, our sense of community as well as of individuality, our familiar traditions as well as the experimental novelties. Roya was comforted by her Persian food when she was in "easy-peasy" America, suffering from a diasporic racio-cultural dissociation. Always a powerful conversation starter, food saves face and our soul as and when required. The same goes for poetry. Rumi's eternal verses were not just a background score or carrier of more than one billet-doux, but a direct participant in the flourishing love stories. And i can vouch for that with my own life as well...!

The brutal accounts of political demonstrations were giving me Persepolis flashbacks, and i found myself wondering what that other Marji would have thought of Roya or Zari or everyone else.

There were too many parallels in Badri and Roya's stories - the role of the jilted lover, the character of the stationery shop, the child meeting the ex-beloved, and last but not the least, the baby who did not grow up. I do not claim that i understood all of Fakhri's motives, but i could not finally bear a grudge against him, because after all, he did pay a huge price for what he did. And Badri, oh Badri, my heart went out for her. She can be seen as the wronged woman figure, the one stigmatised as the wicked witch for her evil designs, but who can argue that it was not all because of their forehead-written fate? Having read this modern political fairy tale now would help me deal much better with grief and loss, whether it be romantic or familial or camaraderial. Thank you so much, Marjan Kamali.

[bibliophilebookreviews]

The Stationery Shop

The Stationery Shop by Marjan Kamali

This is a beautiful story about love, loss, and choice vs. destiny.

Here’s the spoiler-free premise: 17-year-old Roya is in her senior year of high school in Tehran, Iran. She’s a good student, and her father encourages Roya and her younger sister, Zari, to pursue further education, perhaps even becoming the next “Marie Curie” or “Helen Keller.” And Roya will do it to please him, even though she loves novels and poetry. She is especially fond of the stationery shop and visits every Tuesday after school where the proprietor often chooses another book he knows she will enjoy. One day, she meets a young Bahman Aslan there, and over a fairly short period of time, they fall in love. Even better, they are soon engaged to be married at the end of the summer following their graduation. However, Bahman is a young political activist and soon goes into hiding. Roya and Bahman remain in touch through the stationery shop and agree to meet one day and marry in secret; they can still have the celebration later. But Bahman never shows, and worse, Roya receives a final letter from Bahman stating that he never wishes to see her again. Heartbroken and confused, Roya slips into despair until her father arranges for Roya and Zari to learn English and apply to a special scholarship for a college in California, USA. They both get accepted and soon, Roya moves on and both she and Bahman live their lives. But neither of them has ever forgotten the other, and both of them desire closure they may never get. As luck (fate?) would have it, it is indeed a small world: Roya and Bahman find themselves in the same state decades later and discover that their love is stronger than either of them realized.

I’ll be honest and say that a book this wonderful is really hard to describe or write about. I just love it. One thing I think I appreciated the most was that the political backdrop wasn’t too overbearing. It was still very clear that politics and growing unrest in Iran played a large role in not only the story as a whole, but particularly in Roya and Bahman’s love story. And sadly, that political unrest kept them apart in more ways than one.

I also loved the little glimpses of backstory for some of the other characters. They were like little “aha!” moments through which Kamali allowed the readers to try to piece together the truth on their own, sometimes without confirmation. But they also served to help understand the motives and actions of some of the seemingly less-prominent characters. In fact, those characters and their roles became more important to the overall story.

Something else that really stood out to me was just how different things might have been if only. That’s the way of life, right? What if…? It begs the question: how much of our lives is based on our choices, and how much is fate? And if something is truly our fate, will our choices that take us away from that just prolong our arrival at our destiny? Can we change our fate? I really pondered these questions while reading this book. I certainly applaud an author who makes me think deeply while there’s a love story happening.

I loved the characters -- none of them were unlikeable to me (except Jack, and he’s a minor character, and he eventually gets his act together). But I think perhaps the best person in this novel is Walter. He’s so patient, kind, open, trusting, and just generally good-natured. I think that Roya really needed him in her life, even if they never married and were just friends (which would’ve been an interesting alternative). 

This is such a well-written novel, equal parts joy and sadness, much like real life. Roya experienced so much in her life, and as a reader, I got to experience many emotions along with her: I fell in love with Bahman as she did, I was angry for her when they broke up, I felt her confusion and loneliness in the years afterward, I cried with her over Marigold, I felt excited for her when she met Omid, and felt the same sense of both longing and the need for closure when she finds Bahman again.

As we know, the ending of a book is critical -- maybe even more important than the beginning and even all of the in-between -- and Kamali does not disappoint! I didn’t feel that it was rushed or that I needed more, and I didn’t have any lingering questions. It was perfect. The whole book is perfect! I would definitely recommend it to anyone (everyone!) and it is now among my favorite books ever.