The World Unseen - Review

New Internationalist, Oct, 2001 by Peter Whittaker

Shamim Sarif (The Women's Press, ISBN 0704347121)

In this remarkable debut novel the reader is pitched headlong into the closed and rigorously demarcated world of 1950s South Africa, seen through the eyes of two young Indian women, Amina and Miriam. The two women are as different as can be. Miriam is a dutiful wife and mother, attempting to reconcile her hopes and dreams with the harsh realities of life and struggling to remain positive despite her loneliness in the sweltering, isolated hamlet of Delhof. Amina is a rebellious and unconventional soul: a taxi driver and cafe owner who is constantly searching for ways to defy the apartheid laws. Despite their differing personalities, the two meet and hit it off, a friendship that has unforeseen effects on Miriam, leading her to question the traditions and conventions she has been brought up with.

The writing in The World Unseen is uncluttered and assured and the author has created a strong cast of supporting characters the reader can empathise with, from Amina's partner Jacob and her scandalized grandmother, visiting from India, to Miriam's conventional and hidebound husband Omar. The themes Shamim Sarif tackles are big ones - community, conformity, freedom and responsibility - but they are handled so lightly and naturally that the reader never feels bludgeoned by 'issues'. This is an honest and deeply humane portrait of ordinary people struggling, in the depths of a merciless system, to give their own individual meaning to their lives.

Rating: * * * *

STAR RATING

EXCELLENT: *****

VERY GOOD: ****

GOOD: ***

FAIR: **

POOR: *