Book Review: The Diary of Malala

WORLDWIDE FAME:A man walks past a mural depicting Malala Yousafzai in the Bushwick section of Brooklyn, New York

As I write this, the news channels are full of reports that the Pakistani government and the Taleban are in the midst of heated peace talks — that might even qualify as an oxymoron — even as nine anti-Taleban are gunned down, and 13 people killed in a grenade attack on a cinema, around the same time.

It would seem nothing much has changed since Malala Yousafzai’s near 
fatal shooting in October 2012.

When Malala burst into public imagination, post her tryst with a Taleban gunman in her school bus, the world couldn’t have fathomed the heights of fame to which this young girl would be, literally, shot into.

Co-written with seasoned British journalist and war correspondent Christina Lamb, I am Malala is a simply written, clear-cut and revealing memoir of what made Malala what she is today. Right after her shooting, many like me had assumed that here was a child of instant fame caused by nothing but being in the wrong place at the wrong time, and maybe a few outspoken views she had about rabid fundamentalists who overrun her part of the country. Surely, someone nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize had to have a body of work showing their commitment to the cause, rather than being a timely victim of circuitous circumstance?

But through the book, Malala, at just 16, proves herself to be such a woman of substance and a true patriot, fighting for everything she believes in that the forces surrounding her want to destruct.

I am Malala’s narrative is linear enough, except that it starts with the time of her shooting, goes into a detailed memoir starting with her family before 
her birth, and up until October 9, 2012, and her near-death days in hospitals, long recovery and life post-assassination attempt.

She hails from a clan of Pashtuns, with forefathers who have/had a strong sense of altruism, social zeal and working for the larger good. In a way, the book is as much about Ziaudddin, Malala’s father — who relentlessly works for girls’ education, environmental concerns, and women’s rights — while still being a devout Muslim, and who shapes Malala’s views and political ethos. Coupled with his unending struggles to build schools — including the one Malala studies at — and championing other local causes, the book is also a look into his daughter’s initially idyllic days in the town of Mingora in the beautiful Swat valley in northern Pakistan, and also a brief on the local Pashto culture. Offset by the Hindu Kush mountains and beauteous nature, Swat is soon gradually overtaken by the Taleban , who impose their hard line views on living and women, upon the locals. The reader can only vaguely begin to grasp the incredulous reality of a girl not being able to go to school because she is over 10 or 11 years of age. Aided and goaded by her father, Malala begins a career of political and social activism, giving interviews in local publications and broadcast media, and then famously blogging under a pseudonym — Gul Makai — for the BBC, about life as a young girl under the Taleban . A telling statement — “Sometimes I think it’s easier to be a Twilight vampire than a girl in Swat.” She gets nominated for the she was nominated for the International Children’s Peace Prize in 2011. These experiences are punctuated with touching snippets of an ordinary teenager, such as trivial fights with best friends and preening over new hairstyles for hours in the bathroom, her obsession with Ugly Betty and Twilight.

The account is not without its flaws. Some laudatory views on Pakistan’s political leaders — Benazir Bhutto is presented as a symbol of simplicity and women’s emancipation — are off the mark, but also telling of the high status we subcontinentals accord our leaders. It also takes a light view of 
US foreign policy, their cultivation of the Frankenstein that is the Taleban, and their own virulent incursions into Pakistan.

Yet, Malala will come off as the one who spoke out, and survived. For her, life as a true fighter is just beginning.

marypaulose@khaleejtimes.com