Book Review ‘Lajja’, author Taslima Nasrin

About the Book

A savage indictment of religious extremism and man’s inhumanity to man, Lajja was banned in Bangladesh but became a bestseller in the rest of the world. This brand-new translation marks the twentieth anniversary of this controversial novel. The Dattas Sudhamoy and Kironmoyee and their children, Suronjon and Maya have lived in Bangladesh all their lives. Despite being members of a small Hindu community that is terrorized at every opportunity by Muslim fundamentalists, they refuse to leave their country, unlike most of their friends and relatives. Sudhamoy believes with a naive mix of optimism and idealism that his motherland will not let him down. 

About the Author

Taslima Nasrin, an award-winning novelist, celebrated memoirist, physician, secular humanist and human rights activist, is known for her powerful writing on women’s oppression and unflinching criticism of religion, despite forced exile and multiple fatwas calling for her death. Her thirty-seven books have been translated into thirty different languages.

The courage of her conviction has resulted in her being banned, blacklisted and banished from Bengal both from Bangladesh and West Bengal, India. She has been prevented from returning to her country of birth for the last twenty years.

Taslima Nasrin’s works have won her the prestigious Ananda Puraskar in 1992 and 2000. She has been recognized with the Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought from the European Parliament, the Kurt Tucholsky Award from the Swedish PEN, the Simone de Beauvoir Prize and numerous other awards and doctorates. Anchita Ghatak works with development organizations on issues of poverty, rights and gender. She has translated Sunanda Sikdar’s prizewinning Bengali memoir Dayamoyeer Katha into English as A Life Long Ago.

Book Review

The idea of writing on the religious sentiments of two different and dominating religion of the world i.e. Hinduism and Islamic is in itself quite idiosyncratic and daring.

Taslima Nasrin in her book LAJJA brings out the voices of many on the overpowering issue of religious sentiments through the world of fictional genre. Lajja is a splendid tale of what follows when religious extremism holds ground.  It was initially written in Bengali in the year 1993 and then got translated into the English language in the year 1997.

The narrative bluntly criticises religion ruling the government and the plight of the minority. The deadpan delivery of grave and heinous acts is so effective that it leaves a chill in your spine and makes your stomach turn.

LAJJA is one of the contemporary historical fiction that hails from the land of Bangladesh. However , everything that happens in the book is the aftermath of the demolition of the Babri masjid in India.  The Indian dispute stretched a long way to Bangladesh resulting to riots ,massive fire breakouts and mass killing.

The storyline in LAJJA talks about a family where the protagonist being a true patriot and also an atheist who had once invested his youth for the Bangladesh independence is now been denied their survival in their own motherland . Despite of this cruel time that destiny through upon them the protagonist Sudhamoy  is still hoping that his terror – stricken country will be secular and United one day .

Taslima Nasrin , a heroic female writer who didn’t bother about the controversy that would happen after writing on such a sensitive issue holds the matter in the gut, dissects it brutally, and is never afraid to call a spade a spade.  Probably, that’s why her extreme criticism of the Bangladeshi government is brought out beautifully in the characters of Sudhamoy or Suranjan ,who believed that they were Bangladeshi and human before Hindus. 

Nasrin through her writing never feared to speak about the truth  and post genuine facts of the issue took up and that later led to the biggest controversy of that era resulting in banning of LAJJA in Bangladesh.

Book Review by Deboleena Bhattacharjee

Book Details

• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Penguin (22 September 2014)

• Language ‏ : ‎ English

• Paperback ‏ : ‎ 328 pages

• ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0143419218

• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0143419211