56 pages • 1 hour read
Monica AliBrick Lane
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2003A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 7-9Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 7 Summary
This chapter consists entirely of letters from Hasina about her fate as a single woman pursued because of her beauty. During the course of this one-way correspondence about the ups and downs of her life in which she insists on flaunting the Muslim codes restricting women, we learn that Nazneen now has two healthy daughters.
Hasina’s letter about the strike in her garment factory mirrors Chanu’s unemployed status. Six months later, Hasina reveals she has lost her job due to her friendship with a man that appeared lewd and jeopardized the reputation of the factory. In the next letter, Mr. Chowdhury comes to her rescue and in the following letter she reveals that he accused her of being a whore and raped her. She feels cursed, her words indicating she has succumbed to her fate and reveals for the first time awareness about her role in her downfall. In the next letter she is desperate, stating she has gone to every factory in Dhaka but cannot find a job.
In March 1995, Hasina writes that she has received a proposal of marriage. In the next letter, arriving a month later, Hasina is living with her husband and taking pride in being a good housekeeper. Her husband, Ahmed, works in a shoe factory. Two months later, she reveals that her husband has turned on her. A year later, Nazneen receives a letter that says Hasina is leaving her marriage. There is no letter until January 2001, which has the good news that she has been rescued from “the home of fallen women” to be a maid in a good house with kind employers.
Chapter 8 Summary
In February 2001, Chanu and Nazneen are still living in Tower Hamlets in London raising their daughters, Bibi and Shahana. The girls have a physically abusive relationship with their father in the confines of the apartment, where the daily cycle is carried out in the same familiar space. And so this space also becomes one of the collusion of opposites: Chanu teaches his daughter to recite “The Golden Bengal” from their ancestral land, but takes out his frustrated dreams by beating them.
Nazneen longs for her sister and wants to bring her to live with them. Chanu’s response is to announce that they are returning home. He teaches his daughters about the exploitation of their ancestral land by imperialists.
The family moves to a larger flat, with a second bedroom, two floors above Razia. Chanu is no longer taking courses; he is devoting his attention to his family as an instructor of their ancestral heritage. The reader learns of the history of Bangladesh from the local perspective and how the railroads were only constructed to extract the natural wealth for the British Empire.
Chanu comes home with two products that will change the family’s life: a computer and a sewing machine. Nazneen wonders where her husband got the money for their new technology. As he discovers a new pastime of surfing the internet, she learns to sew.
He doesn’t tell her how he acquired the goods, but Nazneen discovers he purchased it through a loan from Mrs. Islam, who is now demanding repayment.
Chapter 9 Summary
Chanu entertains the girls with internet searches on favorite topics. Nazneen struggles to balance the competing needs of her children and husband in their small apartment. Chanu applies for new jobs only to be disappointed, quickly becoming depressed. One day, he comes home with a batch of clothes to be sewn. Nazneen now begins her path to authentic independence through a home cottage industry as a textile worker. Chanu then comes home and says he has a job driving a taxi.
Chapters 7-9 Analysis
This section covers a lot of ground, the years from May 1988 to January 2001, through a chapter consisting solely of Hasina’s letters. Through her passionate ups and downs, we learn that Nazneen has given birth to two girls.
When the plot picks up again in Chapter 8, it is February 2001. This chapter provides insight into how the immigrant poor live their daily lives in such close quarters. There is unimpeded emotional interchange heightened in this family because of Chanu’s love for literature. He widens his daughters’ education by teaching them to recite poetry, yet he also beats them. The girls rebel against their father by denying their heritage through their pursuit of English food and music. The tragedy that Chanu spoke about with the Azads has entered his home. He responds with beatings that his wife observes as inept; she feels fortunate that he is better with words than action.
Nazneen’s reaction to the tension is externalizing her inner masculine side by putting on her husband’s trousers. The ritual expressing her desire to take a more active, masculine role in life will come into play in her dealings with Mrs. Islam.
In the cramped home space, Nazneen learns about community and external balance as an extension of her inner balance. By having a family, she no longer has to cope with loneliness. Yet, her small but solid venture into the community has provided her with a new opportunity; she now wants to follow Razia’s example and go to work. She has the opportunity to work at home when Chanu appears one day with a sewing machine and a computer.
The encounter with Mrs. Islam’s evil black bag that ends this section is how Nazneen comes to understand that her husband took out a loan from this usurious woman, a debt that can never be repaid. The gaping void inside is a symbol of the attachment through debt that can only be finished with the irrevocable cutting of ties.
