Margret is a very interesting heroine in the sense that she has both stereotypical feminine and masculine traits about her, well, at least in the context of the modern time period. I talked a little in class today about feminine side, but here I want to talk about her more masculine qualities.

I went back and I looked at my notes and highlights and I noticed that Margret had a lot more authority and “power” then her mother. I have many examples

1. she knew about her father’s lack of beliefs before her mother, and her father entusted her to tell her mother about the move to the city and about his questioning

2. Margret arranged for her mother and Dixon to stay on an island (I believe it was an island) until they were fully situated in the city

3. She took a hit for Mr. Thorton and basically played the role of the “knight come to the aid of the damsel in distress” and even one of the protestor’s pointed that out and demasulated Mr. Thorton

4. When her mother died, she didn’t cry because she had to be strong for her father and brother. By today’s standards one would her a young boy as the one that would have to be strong in that event. However, I understand that this is a different time period and the woman was really the domestic “Angel in the House”, so I would like to talk about that moment for a bit, if possible.

In general, I feel like Margret’s father trusted his daughter with a lot more “masculine” responsibilities, in terms of the authority that she had, even over her own mother.

In what I like to call the chaotic climax in Ali’s Brick Lane, Nazneen visits her friend Razia to talk about her expected departure back to Bangladesh. 

“There were three more days to go. Three more days to take action, if any action was to be taken. Chanu had bought more suitcases. The girls and Nazneen gathered around them as at a graveside. The knocking grew louder. It became a pounding. Razia got up. She rubbed her arthritic knees. Approaching the door, she walked against an unseen drag, as if wading in chest-high water. Nazneen felt the bubble expand. Her collarbone would snap. She breathed carefully”(356).

This quotation stands out to me, because both characters are experiencing two completely different situations, but they are experiencing it together. Nazneen is having anxiety about finally having to tell Chanu she will not be leaving London. In comparison, Razia is dealing with her issue head on by locking her heroin addict son in his bedroom to kick the habit. To me, Razia is a role model and sort of foreshadow to Nazneen because she deals with  the struggles that come in her life with courage.

This dramatic part in the book is important because it parallels the two characters’ situations and ties it together to make a climax in the next chapter. I believe after Nazneen sees Razia struggle with her son, and then experiences  her own with Shahanna, she finally builds the courage to tell Chanu the trip to Bangladesh will never happen.

In Brick Lane, there were two really large themes that stuck out to me more then any other–I was very interested in the theme of First Wave Feminism (in terms of women’s education) and a culture of assimilation.

First Wave Feminism- One of my favorite quotes is  “Knowledge is a mirror and for the first time in my life I was allowed to see who I was and who I might become.” (Cloud Atlas David Mitchell). Knowledge in many regrades is a form of power. Because for Nazneen, for the greater half of the first novel, she could not speak English, but her husband could. Even in Chanu’s first dead end job, he still had the power as someone who spoke English and knew about English text to even get a job. Nazneen was stuck in the house, and she was desperate for knowledge, she wanted to go to school to learn, but there was always an “excuse” for her to stay at home and fulfill some other “womanly duty”. Chanu at first would say that she wouldn’t have to go out because he would just get her whatever, or when she had her first child, she was suppose to be taking care of him. etc. etc. etc. There is a power in being educated, a power that she didn’t have, and that severely crippled her. She wasn’t really allowed to see “who see might become” because of her position.

As the reader, I could tell that she wanted more then anything to learn English. she held onto the word “ice skating” for the longest time, and she wanted to know more. I’m going to briefly talk about the tattooed woman and her role, because Nazneen really wanted to talk to her so badly. For me the tattooed woman represented an idea of freedom or at least the allure of something different. She was a mysterious woman who would sit at her apartment and smoke. She was different from Nazneen in every which way, but Nazneen had an almost obsession-like attitude of wanting to talk to the tattooed women. I saw that as another desire for education to have the ability to talk to that very “different Western woman”

Now again, I have Professor Mcleod for another class and we talked about the position of privilege of Feminism in the West. I don’t to sound ethnocentric, but because of my sociological environment I feel that a woman shouldn’t have to ask her husband/brother/male-person where she can and can’t go. However, those are ideals from a Western Culture and a Western Feminism.

Brick Lane Theme/Issue Response:

In class today we discussed the Chanu and Karim, and one thing I noticed about both characters is that they have a kind of nostalgia for something that never really existed in the way they think about it. Chanu has a deep longing to return to Bangladesh, yet the country he wants to return to and that he “remembers” is starkly contrasted with the country Hasina experiences and writes about in her letters. One of the reasons Chanu says he wants to return to Bangladesh is to get Shahana and Bibi there so they can have a better life, but given the horrible experiences Hasina has, it seems unlikely that they would have had a better life there. Similarly, Karim has a sort of nostalgia for Bangladesh, even though he has never been there, and does not know what it is really like. His reasons for this are probably different that Chanu’s, and it would make sense to me that it had to do with wanting to learn his history and culture, like we discussed in class today. It also seems likely that his response was so strong because of the othering and discrimination he likely felt. Nazneen, on the other hand, has nostalgia for certain real places and times. It was interesting to note the differences!

Welcome to British Woman Writers, a special study abroad class with Dr. Melissa McLeod and Ms. Katy Huie Harrison.  We will use this space to keep students up to date on important information for both the class and for the logistics of our trip, and all enrolled students will blog daily on this site while we’re in London.  Feel free to share the address with your family and friends before we leave so they can keep up with our exciting literary adventures!