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Is the hype around Fatimas Bhuttos latest work justified?

IT begins simply enough: a man in a pool gets word of a coup and will attempt, were told, to take over an airport. This is Fatima Bhuttos latest work of fiction a short story titled Democracy sold as a Kindle single. When Bhutto first announced the books release on Twitter and Instagram the impulse to lapse into pun-laden mockery was irresistible and many succumbed to temptation. Bhutto brings Democracy to Pakistan, was the resounding cry heard across the internet. After that there was mostly silence. Ill venture to suggest a couple of reasons for this disinterest. First, Kindles arent terribly ubiquitous in Pakistan so many people who wouldve liked to read the story werent able to. Second, Pakistanis who did read the story lived through the events of retired Gen Pervez Musharrafs 1999 coup and saw little reason to rehash the episode quite as literally as Bhutto insists we do.

This brings us to the first of several bones I have to pick with Democracy.

To those who argue that history, politics and religion are the very stuff of life and so cant be untangled from creative endeavours Id say yes: I wholeheartedly agree. Theres a world of a difference, however, between fiction that makes this symbiosis work that is, seamlessly blends character, history and plot into a thrilling narrative and fiction that doesnt. The latter is lazy, and depends almost wholly on externalities to lend it weight in the absence of beautiful prose and compelling characterisations.

Democracy is largely a lazy story. It ineffectively and unimaginatively co-opts history and politics for inspiration as much of mediocre Pakistani fiction in English has done before. It asks us to follow one Brigadier Azad for a few hours as he goes about securing Pakistan for military rule. Brigadier Azad is in Karachi, swimming in Sind Clubs pool, when hes instructed to take over and secure Karachis airport. This is whats happened: the president has decided to sack the chief of army staff (COAS) while hes abroad for military training exercises. The COAS has none of it and sends word to his commanders to initiate a coup while he flies back to Pakistan. As you can see, Bhutto hasnt set out to reinvent the wheel.

We dont stray far from Brigadier Azads thoughts, which reveal hes been cheating on his wife with a well-known TV presenter, Sharmila. We swing back and forth between the brigadier and Sharmila while hes taking over the airport shes announcing the coup on television under duress. We also get to see Major Jamshed, Brigadier Azads second-in-command, and the Brigadiers wife, Kiran, for a brief moment. So, the storys setting is familiar, but that isnt the only sticking point. The other problem is that Brigadier Azads internal monologue is painfully predictable.

Before Id seriously delved into the story I thought it curious that Bhutto would choose to try to pick apart the inner workings of an army man, a brigadier at that. Here I must admit my bias my first thought was: How uninteresting. Army men like the brigadier have no inner workings at all. Theyve had that stuff sluiced out of them decades of training ago. Recognising this thought for what it was prejudice I resolved to push on without judgment. I hoped to find Brigadier Azad a conflicted soul, or, if the opposite, I hoped hed be served to me with a heavy dose of irony.

Neither desire stood fulfilled. The brigadier was as I feared: a man of common interests and unified ambition. When thrust into the thick of a defining moment in Pakistans history he behaves exactly as is expected of him like a good little soldier. He is maddeningly predictable in his personal life too: he calls his annoyance of a wife darling and sleeps with a modern woman on the side. I suppose he likes his scotch neat and thinks feminism is a sanitary pad.

In the absence of a compelling character reading Democracy is like watching CCTV footage of jawans climbing over PTVs walls in 1999. Nothing is extraordinary, everything is known.

Which brings me back to my earlier point: isnt it time for Pakistani writers to move beyond such literal interpretations of the political? As for Bhutto yes, her experience of politics has been cruelly personal and devastating but I wonder if well ever see the woman behind the faade, a woman who can write beyond history and not to it, as an homage. Id like to see Bhutto write fiction drawn from the well of her experience of things other than high politics: to write intimately of families, of men and relationships, of sexuality and strong women.

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Rehashing the predictable: Review of Democracy by Fatima Bhutto - Magazine - DAWN.COM