Tell me, my dear Shaan Azaad
Click here for Mohsin Hamid’s story “The (Former) General In His Labyrinth.”
When Mohsin was here at Vassar the other day, he was telling my students that what his novel meant–what could be concluded as happening in its final pages, for instance–would very much depend on what the reader brought to the scene. Your assumptions, your biases, your suspicions shaped the meaning of whatever was on the page.
And now comes this story whose telling also depends on the interactive reader. One of its characters says “But there are always at least two ways to tell a story.” Well, on reading “The (Former) General In His Labyrinth” you’ll find that there are many more ways of reaching the end. But is there only one end? Who knows what happened to General Zia? What is going to be the destiny of (Former) General Musharraf? And what is the fate that, thanks to you, dear reader, will befall Shaan Azaad/Sheherazade?
Also see this
