In Other Rooms, Other Wonders
By Daniyal Mueenuddin
(W. W. Norton & Company, Hardcover, 9780393068009, 256pp.)
Publication Date: February 2009
Other Editions of This Title: Paperback
Categories: Short Stories (single author)
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Description
Passing from the mannered drawing rooms of Pakistan s cities to the harsh mud villages beyond, Daniyal Mueenuddin s linked stories describe the interwoven lives of an aging feudal landowner, his servants and managers, and his extended family, industrialists who have lost touch with the land. In the spirit of Joyce s Dubliners and Turgenev s A Sportsman s Sketches, these stories comprehensively illuminate a world, describing members of parliament and farm workers, Islamabad society girls and desperate servant women. A hard-driven politician at the height of his powers falls critically ill and seeks to perpetuate his legacy; a girl from a declining Lahori family becomes a wealthy relative s mistress, thinking there will be no cost; an electrician confronts a violent assailant in order to protect his most valuable possession; a maidservant who advances herself through sexual favors unexpectedly falls in love. Together the stories in In Other Rooms, Other Wonders make up a vivid portrait of feudal Pakistan, describing the advantages and constraints of social station, the dissolution of old ways, and the shock of change. Refined, sensuous, by turn humorous, elegiac, and tragic, Mueenuddin evokes the complexities of the Pakistani feudal order as it is undermined and transformed.
Wednesday, Nov 25, 2009
Writers use the phrase "back story" to mean the background or history of their characters. Morning Edition is asking three acclaimed writers for the back story of world events. All were finalists for this year's National Book Award. First up is Pakistani author Daniyal Mueenuddin, who set his book in Pakistan. He talks with Steve Inskeep about his book of short stories, In Other Rooms, Other Wonders. More at NPR.org
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