Brick Lane: Chapter 11 Summary & Analysis

It is January 2001, and Hasina is writing from the Dahnmondi district of Dhaka. She tells Nazneen that she has much to thank God for, the first of which is her position in the household of James, whose real name is Jamshed Rashid, and Lovely, whose real name is Anwara Begum. They brought her from the home for fallen women to work in their house as a maid. Their house is richly furnished with expensive wooden furniture and a television and video-playing machine. James and Lovely sleep in the master bedroom. The children, Jimmy and Daisy, have their own rooms as well. There is a guest room whose bed Hasina airs out every day at the request of Lovely. Hasina sleeps in a room next to the kitchen. She has an electric light.

The street in front of the house is wide, but plastic bags blow everywhere. Where the street narrows is a rickshaw workshop. The men paint different designs on the sides, usually the Taj Mahal or a mosque, but sometimes peacocks and film stars. Hasina stops to ask about a particularly beautiful face a man is painting. He tells her it is of a beautiful American singer named “Britainy Spear.” She hurries along on an errand she is running for Lovely. Hasina’s duties include caring for the children, cleaning the house, and washing the dishes. A man does the cooking and gardening.

Hasina mentions that she has been waiting a long time for a letter from Nazneen. She hopes very much that her words are reaching her.

Hasina’s next letter is dated February. She mentions that she has finally gotten Nazneen’s letter. All her others are gone, destroyed in the dark time after her marriage to Ahmed ended. She is glad to hear the girls are doing well and that Nazneen is still having Dr. Azad to her home for dinner. She knows that Nazneen is bored with her routine, but it is Hasina’s opinion that routine and sameness are the biggest blessings in life.

Lovely, a former beauty queen, loves to “entertain.” She often finds her children too much for her. Jimmy loves to play with guns and swords, and Daisy follows Hasina around like a duckling. At first Daisy missed the old maid, who was fired for stealing grocery money, but now she is very attached to Hasina. Since Zaid the cook has taken to stacking food in Hasina’s bedroom, she now sleeps on a bedroll on her floor. Zaid sleeps on the kitchen table if he sleeps in the house at all. Lovely worries one of the neighboring families will poach him—he makes the best kitchari in Buriganga. Hasina worries that Lovely is stretching herself thin. Running a household is hard work.

When Jimmy and Daisy are occupying each other, Lovely finds time to tell Hasina her problems, and they are many. She worries that her best friend, Betty, is more beautiful than she is, but Hasina assures her this isn’t true. Betty also has a larger house than Lovely and a car and driver at her disposal at all times. Lovely, on the other hand, must wait for her husband to lend her his car and driver, and she doesn’t have an ayah, or nanny, to watch over the children.

Lovely also worries that James’s company, Bangla National Plastic, could be in hot water over its production of plastic bags. She thinks people won’t be happy until they’ve all been turned out on the street. Hasina tells her not to be so down. God has provided for her and he will provide for Lovely as well. Lovely says she is sweet. She still fears Zaid will leave then, but Hasina doesn’t think so—he has it too good with Lovely and James. Oftentimes he doesn’t even make dinner. He is too busy attending political meetings. A small, hard man, he practices Kung-Fu while he cooks and watches Kung-Fu movies when Lovely and James go out. Jimmy watches the movies with him. It is the only time he stays still.

Jimmy has grown as affectionate with Hasina as Daisy, and Hasina closes her letter by observing to Nazneen that all she ever wanted in life was love, and now it has finally found her.

Nazneen finishes reading Hasina’s letter and puts it away. Razia, dressed in a Union Jack sweatshirt despite the hot weather, has come to visit. Neighbors in the estates are gossiping about Razia and her British habits, but she doesn’t care. She’s much more concerned with the fact that the factory where she’d been sewing has been closed down by immigration authorities. Tariq needs books or he’ll fail his exams. She needs money fast. She is considering borrowing money from Mrs. Islam. Razia does some of Nazneen’s sewing and Nazneen thinks about Hasina and about Hamid’s second wife who came and went without a trace. What happens to such women? She does not tell Razia about Chanu borrowing 50 pounds from Mrs. Islam to buy the sewing machine and computer.

Karim comes to pick up the vests from Nazneen. While he is there his phone rings—a call from his father, he says. His father was once a bus conductor, but he is now too anxious to work or even leave his apartment. Nazneen makes tea in the kitchen. Karim follows her, and they drink in the kitchen standing up. Nazneen has again forgotten to cover her hair. Karim gets a notification on his phone, alerting him to prayer time. Nazneen invites him to pray in her apartment and he accepts. Watching him move through his prayers makes Nazneen dizzy. It is all she can do not to pray along with him, but that is strictly forbidden. When he is finished, he invites her to a meeting. It is for all Muslims, he says, and they don’t have many older women in the group.

Nazneen tells herself not to go to the meeting, but then she goes anyway. It is in an ugly building at the edge of the estate. She is nervous going in and even more so when she sees that the group gathering is almost all men. An intense man in immense pajamas and a skull cap welcomes her, and Karim tells her to sit down. The meeting starts with Karim announcing that the matters of business are to settle on a name and a mission and elect a board. There is much cross talk about the name before they settle on the Bengal Tigers. The mission is simple: to support the local Muslim community and Islam around the world, although the audience also seems to want to fight the Lion Hearts gang if given a chance.

A wiry man continues to challenge Karim. Nazneen thinks of him as the Questioner. Karim and the Questioner vie for the position of chairman of the board. Nazneen casts the deciding vote in favor of Karim. She sees that Karim and the Questioner hate each other. As the meeting breaks up, the man in the skull cap points out the group’s spiritual leader, an old imam in women’s shoes who just got to London and who has no idea what’s going on.

Karim comes to Nazneen’s apartment with jeans and unlined dresses. They talk. He tells her about the persecution of Muslims in Chechnya and Palestine. Nazneen is ashamed of her ignorance. She reads the pamphlets he gives her and puts them out on the table to show Chanu, but then hides them at the last minute. Karim prays in her house several more times. At one point, when she hands him her prayer mat, their fingers touch, and she smells the soap coming off his clean shirt. It is the smell of her ice skating daydreams, of her faceless fantasy dancing partner: limes.

Dr. Azad is once again having dinner with Chanu and Nazneen. Age has not been kind to his face. It has collapsed completely, although he still has a full head of flat, black hair. Chanu asks after Mrs. Azad and their daughter. Dr. Azad replies that they are healthy and asks Chanu about his petition to start the mobile lending library. Nazneen watches the men trade barbs, and then the girls come in. Chanu quizzes them for a moment. Shahana fails the test and Bibi passes, but Chanu does not acknowledge her. He continues to quiz Shahana, so Nazneen intervenes and sends the girls to bed.

Now that the men are alone, they take up their own separate topics. Dr. Azad is preoccupied with heroin abuse among the Muslim community. Chanu worries about the tragedy of the immigrant. The men talk around each other, never directly addressing what the other is saying. Nazneen is amazed they can keep it up so long. At one point, though, Chanu strays from the script, bringing up abuse of the Bengalis at the hands of the British, and Dr. Azad asks Chanu about his job. Chanu retaliates by asking Dr. Azad about his son-in-law, whom he and Nazneen have never met. She sees clearly that her husband has won the verbal battle.

Days later, a leaflet falls through the letterbox and Shahana grabs it and begins reading. Chanu demands that she give it to him. Then he hands it back to her and tells her to read it aloud to him, Nazneen, and Bibi. It is an anti-Muslim screed. The writer claims that, at school, Christian children are being taught to follow Islam and that soon they will be worshipping Muhammed. Chanu announces that, from now on, all money made in the household will go to the Home Fund. That night, for the first time since their marriage, Nazneen sees Chanu take the Qur’an off the shelf. He keeps the book with him the rest of the evening.

Nazneen is walking a respectable distance behind Chanu through Brick Lane. Chanu comments on the exorbitant price of the merchandise in the shops. Nazneen notices the high-end restaurants and fancy homes nearby and thinks of Karim. He often talks of his father, of his father’s former life as a bus conductor and how proud he was of him then. Chanu changes the subject to the bankrupt nature of British culture. While they walk, an English woman with cropped hair snaps of photo of Nazneen, making her self-conscious.

Nazneen thinks about the events of her life and how it has always been her perception that they were being recorded, written down by angels who were tallying up her transgressions for the day of judgment. She then grows convinced that the street is filled with angels. They flap their wings around her head until she has to sit down. She remembers the last time Karim came to their apartment. Their shoulders nearly touched. She wonders if he is fated to be her future, knowing it is not that simple.

Chanu assumes that Nazneen is over-tired and says they will be home soon. Tears come to her eyes. She feels like a fool, thinking a young man like Karim would want an older woman like her. She and Chanu begin walking again, and he tells her of his hopes of obtaining a professorship in English literature at Dhaka University when they return to Bangladesh. Nazneen realizes that when they go home, it is not just Shahana she will have to worry about. They see Mrs. Islam walking toward them and duck away onto a side street.

The Bengal Tigers and Lion Hearts are conducting a war of leaflets in and around the estate. Every day seems to bring a new flyer. The Lion Hearts want to protect the Englishness of their estate against the encroachment of what they see as extreme Muslim values. The Bengal Tigers want the freedom to practice their faith in peace. Chanu finds the leaflet war amusing. He thinks the Bengal Tigers have grown fed up with the quiet timidity of his generation, and the Lion Hearts are trying desperately to save a culture not worth saving. Nazneen has begun walking both Shahana and Bibi home from school.

Karim often composes leaflets while Nazneen sews. He is unhappy with what he sees as apathy among the members of the Bengal Tigers. They do not know what it was like when Karim was a kid. White boys beat up Muslims on the way home from school. They had to fight and gang together to protect themselves. The youth, Karim says, have lost their focus. Often Karim comes when Chanu is in the house, and Nazneen feels good about this because it means her interactions with Karim cannot be considered sinful.

Karim’s main aggravation is not the Lion Hearts and their anti-Muslim leaflets: it is the Questioner who, in Karim’s opinion, just does not understand the struggle. Karim tells Nazneen that he will decide what is radical or not, and Nazneen comes to understand that “radical” means “right.” Karim says he wishes Nazneen weren’t always working. She tells him to talk; she will listen. He tells her about the current political unrest in Egypt. Then he goes through her glass showcase. When Chanu cannot be still, it is because he is uneasy. Karim, on the other hand, is full of energy. And Nazneen is full of longing and desire. Karim talks more about how difficult it was to grow up Bangladeshi in London. It was as if he had no identity to claim. Nazneen wishes only that he would claim her.

In the bath, Nazneen thinks about her children, about Shahana’s habit of finishing her homework too quickly and Bibi’s way of chewing on her nails. After a time, she lets herself think of Karim, about his well-shaped forearms and the mole on his chin and the certainty with which he holds himself at all times. He seems to have found what Nazneen and Chanu cannot: his place in the world. She grabs the soap and razor and shaves her legs.

The next day, when Nazneen goes to pick up the girls from school, the police are in the courtyard, separating the Questioner from a group of Lion Hearts, both sides obviously spoiling for a fight. Shahana walks ahead of her mother, drawing stares. Nazneen wishes she were wearing pants today. Chanu has been waffling on the issue of the girls’ attire. If he has a Lion Hearts flyer in hand, he insists the girls wear pants under their uniform skirts. If he sees a woman in a hijab, he insists the girls defy such peasantry and show their legs. If he is in the mood to see both sides of the question, it is up to Nazneen to decide what the girls wear.

Back in the apartment, Nazneen begins a letter to Hasina, attempting to explain to her what is happening on the estate. What she writes makes her laugh. It’s all about leaflets. It’s ridiculous. She goes to her room to put more money in an envelope for her sister.

There is another letter from Hasina, dated April 2001. She tells Nazneen that everything is the same. She is fine, working for Lovely and James. She is making friends with Syeeda, the maid next door, who is completely untroubled and happy with her lot. She is not pretty like Lovely, but she is more content and that gives her a certain attractiveness. James is anxious about an upcoming election. Depending on who wins, it could be bad for business. Zaid is behaving oddly, chopping the air even more than normal and declaring that his time is coming. Lovely departs for a charity function benefitting female and child victims of AIDS. She leaves the house wearing more jewelry than a bride. She calls it “the Bombay look.”

It is May, and Hasina writes of witnessing something horrible on the city streets. Robbers shot two men in front of the bank and, having grabbed the victims’ money and valuables, attempted to make a get-away on a moped, but a crowd pulled them off the bike and started beating them. Then someone set their bike on fire, and the robbers were burned alive. Hasina cannot stop seeing the image of the men in agony, and she wonders if in London there is justice by the court or by the people. Hasina finds justice by the people cruel.

James and Lovely have dinner together and, while Hasina cleans around them, James grumbles about the country needing more stability and the opposition party being a bunch of criminals and thugs who want nothing more than to break into houses and rape wives. And students aren’t students anymore, he says; they’re thugs. Lovely isn’t really listening. She makes a comment about James’ company being medium-sized under her breath. Zaid hears everything and tells Hasina in the kitchen that all sides are hiring muscle for a political fight, only sometimes the muscle is a brain that can think for himself. He taps his head as he says it. Hasina is starting to think that Zaid is actually pretty smart.

In Hasina’s next letter, also dated May, she writes to Nazneen about finding out through the grapevine that her friend, Monju, is near death. She goes to see Monju in the hospital and finds her in a terrible state. Pushed into a corner of a hospital hallway, her face is melted and she smells awful. She can hardly talk, but she tells Hasina that her husband, his brother, and his sister poured acid on her. Back home, Hasina visits with Syeeda, drawing strength from the woman’s calm demeanor and from the love she gets from little Daisy.

Nazneen turns back to her letter to Hasina. She can’t remember what she found so funny. Her head is full of household cares and worries. She turns the paper over, thinking she’ll start a shopping list, but writes that she has fallen in love instead. She tears the paper up and begins again, thinking she hears someone outside the door. She wonders if it is Mrs. Islam or one of her sons. Chanu did not only borrow that first fifty pounds. In fact, she has no idea how much he borrowed from Mrs. Islam. She only knows that all of the money is going toward repaying the loans.

Bibi comes over, and wonders what she’s doing. Nazneen checks her throat, as she’d been ill with tonsillitis. Dr. Azad diagnosed her. In his office, Bibi had been transfixed by his snow globes. He showed her how they worked and told her they were like life. Snow and confusion might swirl around you, he said, but as long as you had a strong foundation, the sky would clear eventually. In the lobby, Nazneen sees Tariq. All the bones seem to have been removed from his body and his head lolls.

Nazneen wakes to a feeling of anticipation. Then she sees the hated wardrobe and Chanu’s pimply arm and she realizes it is a day like any other. She is filled with dread and worry. Karim seems to appear before her, the wind blowing his hair. She banishes him and gets up.

The leaflets keep coming, but they come in the morning now. Chanu picks up the latest one from the Bengal Tigers. It is a reminder that all Muslims should be grateful for the death of martyrs in the name of Allah. It mentions a specific fighter in Chechnya whose dead body smelled fragrant upon its return to the man’s home country even though it had lain three months unburied. Chanu is furious. He calls the Tigers peasants and says that putting such flyers through the doors of white people will end with the death of them all. Nazneen has begun secretly giving money to Karim for the cause. On television, the news is reporting of a riot in a city called Oldham. The rioting men wear black masks over their brown faces.