Book Review: “Moth Smoke” Lahore’s Life amid Nuclear Tests

It's the summer of 1998 in Lahore, metropolitan capital of Punjab. Atmosphere is damp and hot; people are waiting for Monsoon winds to come by city’s rescue. The story revolves around DaraShikoh, alumni of Government College Lahore, and drop out student of economics in Punjab University; who has lost his job as a banker and finds his life stuck and going nowhere. Amidst Pakistan’s Nuclear Tests, the economy is crashing, and so his Darashikoh’s life. With no money at hand, he struggles to maintain his former life style. To make his place in Lahore’s late night parties once again, but at a grave cost. 

As his life spirals down into nothingness, a series of unintentional happenings take place, he falls in an affair with his best friend’s wife. The extramarital affair grows tense and ultimately meets its destitute fate. To make his life even worse, the protagonist slowly moves from his usual hash to the unforgiving Heroin. To make his life even worse, the protagonist slowly moves from his usual hash to the unforgiving Heroin. The story unravels, events take place and circumstances get worse.

At the end of the novel, the reader (you) finds himself in a courtroom presiding over the case. The gavel weighs heavily in your hand. The actors in the incident sit upright in the final moments, waiting for you to pass the judgment. The accused would accuse those who accuse him. The accused would have you believe that a crime is in progress in this very courtroom, you are chairing. “The fish is reeling in the fisherman”, your conscience whispers slightly. “Enough of this nonsense, Mi Lord. Do Justice!”, the prosecutor demands looking at you (the reader). You find yourself in a Dilemma! The crisis that has long lingered within mankind. The dilemma of pardoning a sinner amongst sinners.

Who would you (the reader) pardon?

The novel is pretty good and exciting. Mohsin draws a beautiful correlation between the mystic prince Dara-Shikoh of Mughal Empire, and the protagonist also struggling with his kin in 1998. The plot and how it changes seamlessly, is definitely amusing. It sheds light on the lifestyle of Lahore’s young elite and upper middle class. You will find wit, poise, profundity and strangeness in it, all at once. For anyone who has lived in Lahore for 2-3 yrs, the references of Barkat Market, LUMS, DHA, Pak-Tea house, Jallo park and old Lahore etc are sure fun and witty.

Mohsin has eloquently exemplified the sophisticated period in every young graduate, who feels his life stuck and going nowhere while his mates soar into the skies of success. The period when you know that your life is getting nowhere. It spirals down day by day, month by month, year after year. However, the author cautions the reader to contemplate and beware in this tragic period of life, to keep hold of his/her senses in such bleak yet brief times of unemployment. He probes through the life of Lahore’s everyday working class and their conscience regarding Pakistan’s Nuclear Tests and the economic crisis that follows it.

As it is Mohsin Hamid’s first novel, his writing style is less mature as compared to his later work, ”The Reluctant Fundamentalist”. One finds unnecessary details and flattered exaggeration in the novel. It further contains explicit sexual content that might discomfort some readers. I won’t recommend you to give it a read, but I also won’t stop you from reading Moth Smoke, because it’s enigmatic.

Following is the best excerpt from novel, leading the reader across the analogy of Moths, mysticism and uncertainty:

“She circles, forced to keep her distance, afraid of abandoning her husband and even more, her son for too long. But she keeps coming, like a moth to my candle, staying longer than she should, leaving late for dinners and birthday parties, singing (burning) her wings…..

….And I, the moth circling her candle, realize that she’s not just a candle. She’s a moth as well, circling me. I look at her and see myself reflected, my feelings, my desires. And she, looking at me, must see herself. And which of us is moth and which is candle hardly seems to matter. We’re both the same.

That’s the secret.

What moths never tell us as they whirl in their dances.

What Manucci (Daru’s servant) learned at Pak-Tea House.

What sufis veli in verse.

I turn her around and look into her eyes and see the wonder in them that must be in mine as well…..”