PARADISE by Abdulrazak Gurnah

PARADISE by Abdulrazak Gurnah

For Salma Abdalla Basalama

"Yusuf had heard the boys say that the Germans hanged people if they did not work hard enough. If they were too young to hang, they cut their stones off." page 7

" They made up names for the places their parents came from, funny and unpleasant names which they used to abuse and mock each other. Sometimes they fought, tumbling and kicking and causing each other pain. If they could, the older boys found work as servants or errand runners, but mostly they lounged and scavenged, waiting to grow strong enough for the work of men. Yusuf sat with them when they let him, listening to their conversation and running errands for them." page 7

He was already twelve. To his amazement she did not let him go this time. Usually She released him as soon as his struggles became furious smacking his fleeing bottom as he ran. Now she held him, squeezing him to her steeping softness,  saying nothing and not laughing. The back of her bodice was still wet with sweat, and her body reeked of smoke and exhaustion. He stopped struggling after a moment and let his mother hold him to her. Page 13

You'll come and trade with us, and learn the difference between the ways of civilization and the ways of the savage. It's time you grew up and saw that the world is like ...  Instead of playing in dirty shops. A smile geew on his face as he spoke, a predatory grimace which made Yusuf think of the dogs that prowled the lanes of his nightmares. page 52

" When I think of truth, I see your face,
And every other face is nothing but a lie.
when I dream of happiness, I feel your caress.
And I see envy burning in everyone eye."  page 54

"Everwhere they went now they found the Europeans had got there before them, and had installed soldiers and officials telling the people that they had come to save them from their enemies who only sought to make slaves of them. It was as if no other trade had been heard of, to hear them speak. The traders spoke of the Europeans with amazement, awed by their ferocity and ruthlessness. They take the best land without paying a bead, force the people to work for them by one trick or another, eat anything and everything however tough or putrid. Their appetite has no limit or decency, like a plague of locusts. Taxes for this, taxes for that, otherwise prison for the offender, or the lash, or even hanging. The first thing they build is a lock-up, then a church, then a market-shed so they can keep the trade under their eyes and then tax it. And that is even before they build a house for themselves to live in." page 72

"Where is this garden? Kalasinga asked. 'In India?  have seen many garden with waterfalls in India.Is this your paradise?Is this where the Aga Khan lives?" page 80

"The east and the north are known to us, as far as the land of China in the farthest east and to the ramparts of Gog and Magog in the north. But the west is the land of darkness, the land of jinns and monsters. God sent the other Yusuf as a prophet to the land of jinns and savages.Perhaps he'll send you to them too."  page 83

"Each day the land changed on them as they descended from the high mountain ground. The settlements grew less clustered as the country dried out. Within days they were down on the plateau and their column raised clouds of dust and grit with every step. The scattered scrub took formidably gnarled and twisted forms, as if existence was a torture. The songs and spirits of the porters also dried up as they contemplated the unkind country they were entering. They came to life when they saw huge herds of animals in the distance, arguing bitterly among themselves as they debated their identities. In those first days, Yusuf's stomach turned to water and his body ached with exhaustion and fever. Thorns tore into his ankles and arms, and his flesh was covered with insect bites." page 116

"Yusuf could not bear to look on the incredible horror of the wounds, swollen now with disease. He wanted life to end at the sight of such a pain. He had never seen or imagined anything like it. They found bodies everywhere, in the burnt- out huts, near the bushes, under the trees." page 127

"look at their happiness, he said, unsmiling. "Like a mindless herd of beasts approaching water. we're all lik that, small-minded creatures misled by our ignorance. What is their excitement for? Do you know?" page 129- 130

"Never trust the Indian!" Mohammed Abdalla said angrily. " He will sell you his own mother if there's profit in it. His desire for money knows no limits. When you see him, he looks craven and feeble, but he will go anywhere and go anything for money.
Uncle  Aziz shook his head at the mnyapara, admonishing him for his impetuosity. 'The Indian knows how to deal with the European. We have no choice but to work with him." page 133

"Then one day that devil Muhammad Abdullah come and took me and my sister away, and brought us here. we were  to be rehani until our Ba could replay his dept. He died very soon after that, my poor Ba, and Ma and my brothers went back to Arabia and left us here. They just left us here." page 203

" Get on with it " Mzee Hamdani says always. 

" I know the freedom you are talking about. I had that freedom the moment I was born. When these people say you belong to me, I own you, it is like the passing of the rain, or the setting of the sun at the end of the day.  The following morning the sun will rise again whether they like it or not. The same with freedom. They can lock you up, put you in chains, abuse all your small longings, but freedom is not something they can take away. When they have finished with you, they are still as far away form owning you as they were on the day you were born." page 224.  (    It means real freedom is inside a person — no one can truly take it away, even if they imprison or control you.)

"When she was seven years old, my poor stupid Ba, may God have mercy on him, offered her to the seyyid as part of the payment. And I was to be rehani to him until she was of an age to be married, unless my Ba could redeem me before then. But he died, and my Ma and my brothers went back to Arabia and left me here with our shame. When that devil Mohammed Abdalla came to collect us, he made her undress and stroked her with his filthy hands." page 231

" He would say to her: If this is Hell, then leave. And let me come with you. They've raised us to be timid and obedient, to honour them even they misuse us. Leave and let me come with you. We're both in t middle of nowhere. Where else can be worse? There would be no wall garden there, wherever we go, with sturdy cypresses and restless bush and fruit trees and unexpectedly bright flowers. Nor the bitter scent orange sap in the day and the deep embrace of jasmine fragrance night, nor fragrance of pomegranate seeds or the sweet herbaceous grasses in the borders. Nor the music of the water in the pool and the channels. Nor the contentment of the date grove at the cruel height of the day. There would be no music to ravish the senses. It would be like banishment, but how could it be worse than this?" page 233-34

" I did her not wrong. I sat with her because she invited me in. My shirt was torn from behind, Yusuf said, his voice shaking in an unexpected and annoying way. 'That show. I\Was running away.'" page 239