How to Fight Islamist Terror from the Missionary Position by Tabish Khair
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
A book review is never objective but when I know the person who has written it, it becomes less so. Not that I would be untruthful, exaggerate or overpraise on account of a friendship. It’s just impossible to separate the experience of reading from the friendship or the knowledge of the writer.
This felt particularly true while reading Tabish Khair’s fabulously titled How to fight Islamist terror from the missionary position. Tabish and I met at a Danish folk high school, me on a year abroad from university, and Tabish, as a journalist and writer… my memory fails me of how he also ended up in that small quirky international gathering of young people, Danes who wanted to practice their English and the stranger group, a ragtag assortment of foreigners all with some tie to or interest in Denmark or Scandinavia.
We bonded over writing, and I remember his gentle wit and intelligence and some shared bottles of red wine. Tabish fell in love and ended up staying in Denmark. I saw him a number of years after the college, and then a long break until seeing him in October of last year. It was great to reconnect, which lead to him sending me the American version of this novel. But the visit was also somewhat unsatisfying. How do you catch up over so many years, share the twists and turns of one’s life? There wasn’t enough time.
Reading this novel gave me what I’d missed. His story is of three South Asian men living in Arhus in Denmark: the narrator, a measured and thoughtful English literature professor of Pakistani origin, his good friend Ravi, with movie star looks and wealth, and their housemate Karim, also Indian, a devout Muslim and taxi driver.
Their interactions and stories tell me about South Asian men living in Denmark, about Danish society, about dating, and about understandings or misunderstandings across cultures, language and religion, wrapped expertly with marvellous storytelling and playful commentary on gender roles, politics and society.
I often read books to enter into new worlds, and the university setting of a not universally known Danish city with characters I was unfamiliar with, engaged me. Rather than the common trope of an immigrant family in the West, the men in this story are simply living their adult lives, in a culture they were not born to.
Depicting three characters extremely different from each other in culture, philosophy and belief, but who could all be stereotyped with the same brushstroke in certain circumstances, is not done heavy-handedly but makes its point. The narrative effortlessly switches between themes: a jab at ‘Eng List types’, defining tolerance, the negotiations of dating a single mother, questions of Islam, many observations of Danish culture, and the ebbs and flows of both romances and friendships.
It told me a unique story of what my old friend Tabish has been thinking and observing over years living in Denmark and teaching at the university, with parts that felt like an in-joke for friends such as the characters’ visit to Elsinore, the location of our college, or the chapter called ‘Great Claus and Little Claus’ which is how we differentiated between the two Clauses at our college.
Reading back these paragraphs above, they don’t seem to capture how much I enjoyed the book. It really is funny and engaging but also matched with a depth and breadth of thought.
I’m curious how it will be received by others. I’d love it to be a blockbuster! But I’d guess that the setting is neither familiar enough nor exotic enough for some readers, and the big event of the book, hinted at compellingly through the novel, is not as explosive as I thought it might be. There’s a subtlety to the storytelling that may not be appreciated by readers looking for bigger bangs and cheaper thrills. Still, it’s been now published in the USA and the UK with rumours of a film version. I recommend reading the book not only to get ahead of the curve, but for the enjoyment of a wonderful novel.
Now, I think this is an appropriate time to sign off and websurf to find out what other readers think of the book. It’s a pleasure to sometimes come to a book completely fresh and then explore what chatter is out there. Excuse me.
[Postscript: very pleased to read rave reviews of the book in the Huffington Post, Slate, the New Republic and reader reviews on Goodreads.]