Avadh’s Quotidian Past
Kirti Narain
Love And Life In Lucknow: An Imaginary by Mehru Jaffer Niyogi Books, New Delhi, 2018, 200 pp., 290
August 2018, volume 42, No 8

The book Love and Life in Lucknow: An Imaginary Biography of A City, is   a work of fiction, narrated in the first person by the author. Every nook and corner of the city has a story to tell. It comprises twenty stories, each forming a different chapter. Some stories have been told and retold since times immemorial. The author was born and brought up in Lucknow and many generations of her family have lived in the city. Hence, she has grown up with her own experiences and those recounted by friends and family. They are intricately woven into a narrative, popularly known as Dastangoi, which is the most popular form of extempore story-telling in Avadh. What makes the book interesting are narrations by characters like her household help, Bano Bua, the endearing bully; the temperamental Tamboli Begum; or the lovable Jamila Jan. The author has claimed that the stories have been assembled from different regions of Avadh—‘From its imaginary past to records preserved in Archives and in history books…The stories are inspired by local heroes and villains in Avadh, a corner of the country that has been unique since prehistoric times. I am sure that extraordinary cultures exist in other parts of the world too, but my world is Avadh.’

The underlying assertion in the book is the harmonious existence of communities that is the composite culture of Avadh. The protagonist hopes that the Ganga-Jamuni culture that Lucknow is known for will not be eroded. The story ‘Lakshman Tila’ refers to a mound in the vicinity of the Gomti that has several folk tales woven around it, and is visited by people of all faiths. It is the abode of the miracle saint of the next story, ‘Baba of the Bottle’, a saint patronized by all. When she shifted from a predominantly Muslim neighbourhood to a cosmopolitan one, the protagonist reiterates the ease she feels with people of different faiths. She feels pity for the relatives who decided to go to Pakistan. Social and religious harmony is the predominant strain in subsequent stories like ‘Muharram and a Marriage’ and ‘Trouble on the Street’. The personification of the Gomti River is beautifully done to lament the pollution of the river whose luxuriant waters once gurgled with life and joy—the pollution suggestive of the cracks in the social and communal bonhomie in Lucknow. An interesting observation is made about the jinx of number 7—1857, 1937, 1947 and now 2017, ‘When Muslims in Avadh are again at sea over their future.’

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