the beast within

ah, the vicarious pleasure to be had from dredging the mind of a terrorist. it’s a tempting trip more than a few writers have attempted to take in our pleasant post 9/11 world. mohsin hamid did it rather well with the reluctant fundamentalist, as did h.m. naqvi in his own manner with home boy. now, omair ahmad takes his shot. the result is quite possibly the most poignant of the lot.

set in the fictional town of moazzamabad, ahmad’s terrorist is an 18-year-old with a knife. what he does with it is of far lesser significance than the story of what drives him to pick it up. the novella (longer than a short story, with a modest timeline and no ‘grand scope’ to speak of) opens with the lives of rafiq ansari and shaista shabbir, and closes with their son jamaal’s almost hesitant transformation into jimmy the terrorist. in the process ahmad, like hamid before him, manages to shine a light on what compels one to negate everything from instinct to an innate sense of morality. like all good fiction, the journey from point 'a' to 'b' cannot be paraphrased.

the writing is mature; ahmad’s control over his story, complete. his work as a reporter comes to his aid when he describes the innocent spark that ignites a riot. his familiarity with india’s political history helps him create powerful caricatures, like the one of l.k. advani. there are a few minor annoyances — the omniscient narrator doesn’t quite find his voice at the opening, shaista’s presence (or, rather, her absence) doesn’t affect much, and rafiq’s switch from amateur poet to prophet isn’t entirely plausible. also, can the hindu-muslim story ever find a language that doesn’t occasionally stumble into cliché?

ahmad is clearly a gifted storyteller. better still, he has stories worth telling. that he does this using finely-polished prose, even while focusing on proselytizing, is what makes jimmy the terrorist an achievement.

— jimmy the terrorist, omair ahmad, penguin india