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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Marriage, Moroccan style,
This review is from: Honor to the Bride Like the Pigeon that Guards Its Grain Under the Clove Tree (Hardcover)
"In Morocco", Jane Kramer tells us in the first page of this delightful book, "this would probably be called a love story." Kramer says this story really happened while she was living in Morocco and met the family of Omar, his wife Dawia, and their thirteen year old daughter Khadija. At the moment, Khadija is "the most negotiable piece of property" Omar and his wife possess, and he's arranged her marriage to a middle-aged neighbor for a good price. (He's already married off his older daughter, Fatna, so he's all set.) But unfortunately Khadija is kidnapped by a rascally vagabond and raped, and Omar is furious that his investment has sunk to zero value. A girl who is no longer a virgin is unmarriageable, and if she has no marriage value, she is worthless. So Omar has to shop around for another husband for Khadija, and this is going to take some fancy finagling. Bribes and payola have to be distributed here and there, Khadija has to be re-virginized so the family can put on a proper face, the wedding banquet must be planned, Fatna has a spat with her husband and runs home in a snit, and all this is fuel for the running commentary of some very snoopy neighbors. How all this confusion gets sorted out is somewhat mind-boggling for a Westerner accustomed to making arrangements without paying off fifty intermediaries or caring what the neighbors have to say, but as Omar sagely observes with a shrug, "Europeans -- what do they understand?"Jane Kramer may have been a Western observer, but she clearly has sympathy for her Moroccan neighbors, and a nice sense of humor besides. Omar is a likeable rogue trying to salvage his family's honor and his daughter's future, and somehow manages to do just that. Kramer is a keen observer of her environment and her description of the wedding ceremony brings us right into the middle of the festivities. It's an enjoyable read, and paints an engaging and sympathetic portrait of a very likeable, if somewhat perplexing, Moroccan family.
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