Pakistani writer Mohammed Hanif is known for his subversive, darkly humorous novels that critique Pakistani politics. His first novel A Case of Exploding Mangoes, was long-listed for the Booker and focused on General Zia u-Haq’s death in a plane crash widely believed to be an assassination.
In Rebel English Academy, he takes us into the early years of the Zia regime when his predecessor, Zulifikar Ali Bhutto, was hanged. The novel begins with the death of Bhutto and the task faced by an army officer named Gul to document the death. Gul has been charged with photographing the dead man’s genitals because the government hopes that he would be uncircumcised and thus unmasked as a non-Muslim. Gul, who does not read the political tea leaves well, provides an honest report and is banished to OK town where he leads an army intelligence mission. OK is where Bhutto is buried and his loyalists (called Jiyalas) believe that Bhutto is alive and set themselves on fire to prove this point. Gul is charged with rooting out Bhutto loyalists and putting an end to their beliefs.
OK town also has a gay, communist English teacher named Baghi who runs a Rebel English academy where he teaches the next generation just enough English that they can become bureaucrats. Baghi’s best friend is Molly, the local Imam, who conducts a funeral service for Bhutto, secretly supports jiyalas, and hosts Baghi’ s school in the mosque’s compound. Molly asks Baghi to shelter Sabiha Bano, a young widow, whose husband has died in a mysterious house fire and suspicion falls on her. Her parents are political prisoners for having been Bhutto loyalists in OK city. The narrative alternates between Baghi, Gul, and Sabiha and also has a supporting cast of several characters.
Hanif does not hold back on his criticism of religion, the authoritarian state, and patriarchal society. Imam Molly quotes the Quran regularly but ultimately uses it to justify his desire for a second wife, namely Sabiha Bano. Baghi is a communist who got into trouble with the government for his political views and now tries to live a quiet life as an English teacher. His sexual escapades in dark movie theaters makes him vulnerable to blackmail and violence in a homophobic society but his pupils and his community practice a “don’t ask don’t tell” approach to his life.
Gul represents the utter violence of the state as he arbitrarily threatens people with death by burning for their political views and tortures prisoners to gather intelligence. He is also a sexual predator who treats women shabbily including abandoning a girlfriend who is pregnant with his child. He is enamored by Sabiha having seen her in a homemade porn video where she is clearly drugged and he is determined to rescue her.
Sabiha writes her life story in notebooks as homework assigned by Baghi to keep the ruse that she is staying with him to learn English. Through Sabiha’s narrative we learn of how women are regularly assaulted, raped, and beaten in society with very little recourse to justice.
The novel’s plot is dark and yet Hanif’s gallows humor keeps the reader’s attention on the satire. There are no easy solutions or happy endings in the novel but mostly a laying bare of how religion and an authoritarian state victimize vulnerable people.
For readers familiar with Hanif’s fiction, this novel affirms his talents as a writer. For those who have not read Hanif, this novel will be a good place to get acquainted with his satirical fiction.
Nalini Iyer is a Professor of English at Seattle University where she teaches courses in Asian American, Postcolonial, and South Asian Studies. She is the author/editor of several books in literary criticism. She lives in Kirkland. WA.
