death in life

“Death in Life” is the most appropriate title “Sithy Hamid” could have decided for her short story

“Death in Life” is a short story written by “Sithy Hamid”. She is a Sri Lankan writer. This story criticizes the customs followed by Muslim community. It is noteworthy here that the writer has the courage to criticize her own culture. She depicts the sufferings faced by a widow in the Muslim community in many ways through her emotional lines in the story. She tries to generalize the idea with the use of the pronoun “She” instead of giving a name for the protagonist.

With that I would like to enter in to the topic of my research. When the reader goes through the title of this short story, he will understand that the short story is going to deal with a person who suffers a lot in his life. Certainly, the title gives the complete idea to the reader about the plot. The writer “Sithy Hamid” has chosen the most appropriate title to convey her message to the readers. The title “Death in Life” proposes the idea of how a person dies when he lives in this world. If a person dies when he lives it means he faces a lot of unbearable circumstances. In this short story also the protagonist; a Muslim woman faces a lot of problems due to some customs followed by a sector of Muslim community.

It is compulsory on Muslim woman to live in seclusion for four months and ten days with abiding by some rules and regulations for the death of her husband. There are many implications behind this act. Due to the intrusion of superstitious beliefs among Muslims, this act has become a pain taking one on Muslim women. The short story is a real portrayal of the sufferings faced by a Muslim woman in her life after her husband’s death. The protagonist of the short story; a Muslim woman suffers a lot after the death of her husband. The rituals imposed on her give her pain; the people around her give her pain; the customs followed by the people give her pain, almost all the things around her inflict pain on her, as a result of this the protagonist becomes lifeless when living in this world. This death denotes the spiritual death, she mentally exists in this world, but physically she is no more here. This thought pervades in each line of the short story. Thus we can say that the writer “Sithy Hamid” has chosen the most appropriate title for her short story.

Soon after the death of the husband she is forced to pray; the people around the corpse of “Nazeer” call him body; they accuse her for the death of the man; they take her into a strange place.  The Protagonist shows her disapproval to their activities and hammers the people around her through the following words. She says “What are they doing to me? “Did you want this done to me? You must have, or else you wouldn’t have died so young leaving me to the vultures. These heartless dogs who will now pounce on the carcass of my life”. These words propose the idea that the protagonist already knows that she is going to die after the death of the husband.

When we take the place where she lives to observe the rituals and waits for four months and ten

days also equates a coffin where dead bodies were kept and buried in the graves. She is given a very small place which affords her presence only. She has only few things around her.

On the other hand, the colour “ white” shows many ideas about the plight of the woman.  The short story says that everything around her becomes “white” even the slippers and the mug. Her room is also painted with white, the sari she wears also white with white blouses. Protagonist says “The colour of life left me with my husband’s death. White is the colour of non-existence. Almost like an attempt to erase me from the face of the world”. Through these lines the writer suggests the non-existence of the protagonist, because she is forced to wear the colour that she doesn’t like. “White” is the colour of non-existence. It is all around her now after the husband’s death. That colour is covering her. “The colour of life left me with my husband’s death” when the protagonist says like this, it shows how she feels the emptiness in her life. She leads a battered and dry life without spiritual health. All these features about “White” proclaim that the protagonist is physically alive, but she is mentally dead.

Moreover, the people around her also don’t treat her as a human being. They don’t notice her presence, because she does not exist in here. Even though she is with them, they don’t even talk to her. In the short story it is mentioned that the people come there with the cluster of two or three and speak among themselves and leave the place; they pray the prayers that wouldn’t console them; they bring trays of food which is rarely served to her. All these occurrences show that the woman is not treated properly as a human who is still alive. By this also the writer takes the advantage of painting a vivid portrait to her title about the death of a living human being.

Apart from that, the protagonist is not given the freedom to express and the freedom to lead a happy life when “Nazeer” lives and after his death as well. We feel as if the word “Freedom” is lifted from the dictionary of the protagonist. When she lives with “Nazeer” she is compelled to live with the sister in law “Umu Naima”. “Umu Naima” is a cruel lady who tries to keep the control of the family and interfere in the matters of the couple. She doesn’t allow her to go wherever she wants to go with her husband. “A Muslim woman should stay at home, she would say, and I would cry for hours alone in my bedroom he had left me behind without a second thought”. The above mentioned lines propose that she is left at her room by “Nazeer” while she cries until he returns back home.

On the contrary when “Nazeer” dies also, she is obliged to live alone without associating anyone. There are two watchdogs that scrutinize her motions. She totally lives a life of a prisoner. All these things are imposed on her in the pretext of preventing her from seeing and meeting an unknown person. She totally denies this thought by saying “Do they really think that I will think of other men with my husband buried only few hours”. This thought also nourishes the title of the short story briefly.

While considering the narrative style also, we can get some important ideas which justify the most appropriate selection of the title for the short story. The story starts with the third person point of view at the beginning. At the middle, which deals with the sufferings of the widow, it moves to the first person. With the transformation of the point of view, the writer shows the pathetic situation of the widow. When the person who suffers states about his plight and suffering, it will be more effective than others relate that. At the end of the story it moves from first person to third person.

In a nutshell, it is clear that the writer has chosen the most suitable title to convey some important ideas about the plight of the Muslim widow who suffers because of the superstitious beliefs followed by a sector of the Muslim community. As the life she leads after the death of her husband totally changes in to dark side, she faces numerous problems. Everything and everyone turns against her, subsequently, she suffers a lot and becomes lifeless. She equates to a dead body spiritually. As these are the thought pervade the whole story, the writer has chosen the most appropriate title “Death in Life” for the short story.