I can hardly recall anything that made me fall more in love with the Anarkali side of Mall Road than Mohsin Hamid’s The Reluctant Fundamentalist. I read it for the first time in my master’s course in South Asian Literature and quickly took a liking to it, predominantly for its lively and jocund depiction of Lahore’s food street and its environs. Two years later, I spent many an evening sitting and sipping tea near the location of the fictional café mentioned in the novel.
Hamid spent his childhood and teenage years in the euphoric city of Lahore and then went to the US to pursue higher studies. He worked in New York and London before eventually becoming a full-time writer. The Reluctant Fundamentalist is his second world-acclaimed novel, the first being Moth Smoke, which is entirely set in Lahore.
For this novel, Hamid employs the story-within-a-story technique where, in the outer narrative, the protagonist Changez strikes up a conversation with an American stranger and strives his best to make him feel at home. Bearded Changez approaches the stranger as follows: “Excuse me, sir, but may I be of assistance? Ah, I see I have alarmed you. Do not be frightened by my beard: I am a lover of America.”
The text also carries strong shades of autobiographical resemblance, for the author and the protagonist share similar early and adolescent lives, with similar achievements to their credit. As part of the inner story, Changez recounts to the stranger the years he spent at Princeton University, different stages of his rapport with his American girlfriend Erica, and the privileged job he secures at Underwood Samson.
As the story moves on, readers come across many themes that echo with them. One such theme is based on Changez’s reaction to the 9/11 attacks and the morass in which most immigrants find themselves
During his interview with Jim, the Executive Vice President at Underwood Samson, Changez provides an imposing description of the megalopolis Lahore. Hamid writes, “I said I was from Lahore, the second largest city of Pakistan, ancient capital of the Punjab, home to nearly as many people as New York, layered like a sedimentary plain with the accreted history of invaders from the Aryans to the Mongols to the British.”
Changez’s family back in Pakistan has a large home in a posh locality of Lahore. But with the passage of time, and since most of his immediate relations rely on salaries, the ever-changing devaluation of money makes it difficult for his family to effectively manage the household and maintain the social status that they once enjoyed. The narrator observes, “But status, as in any traditional, class-conscious society, declines more slowly than wealth.”
As the story moves on, readers come across many themes that echo with them. One such theme is based on Changez’s reaction to the 9/11 attacks and the morass in which most immigrants find themselves. When he gets to know that something untoward of massive scale has transpired in New York City, devastating countless lives, he smiles. This reaction shocks even him. Afterwards, he struggles to keep thoughts of the safety and well-being of his family at bay, especially owing to the rising escalations between Pakistan and India following the terrorist attack on the Indian Parliament in 2001.
The other theme is of being ‘hungry', as Jim terms Changez, in a foreign land to achieve something substantial in life and not feel deprived. Many young South Asians feel deeply connected to the aims, aspirations, and ambitions portrayed through Changez. His character mirrors the raw feelings experienced by students enrolled in foreign universities and sheds light on their crisis as well.
The lingering quest in Changez’s life for love and an emotional anchor during turbulent times adds another humane and natural colour to the story. Changez reflects, “I remained emotionally entwined with Erica, and I brought something of her with me to Lahore—or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that I lost something of myself to her that I was unable to relocate in the city of my birth.”
His relationship with Erica is marked by her relentless struggle to move on after her first boyfriend’s untimely demise. They try different ways to cope: picnicking, getting physically close, and listening to each other's pasts and stories about cultures. But nothing helps. Erica does appreciate the presence of Changez in her life, but it is not strong enough to pull her out of the depression and void created by the absence of her first boyfriend and past life.
The Reluctant Fundamentalist is by all means a contemporary classic novel. There are few books that one does not tire of reading, re-reading and, of course, holding them as part of cherished experiences. You may gauge the novel’s charm from the fact that I held it in my hands for the sixth time and enjoyed it more than ever before. It contains many elements that any South Asian reader might want to explore, especially the predominant themes of identity crisis, love and fundamentalism.