I am a Bengali. That is my greatest identity. I speak Bangla, and that is my greatest source of pride. In the history of the world, Bangla is the only language for which people have fought a war to secure the right to speak it. How can one not love a language earned through such struggle and bloodshed!
Whenever I get a break from class or work, I read books. Although I read both Bangla and English books, my soul is more drawn to Bangla literature. One of the most beloved and well-respected individuals among people in Bangladesh and many countries around the world is Humayun Ahmed . Since this is my first post in this community, I am going to start by writing about my favorite book by Humayun Ahmed, titled "Opekkha" that meansWaiting.
On the cover of the book, there is a short paragraph, from which one can get a brief idea of the essence of the story. Since the book is in Bangla, I’m translating that paragraph: "Is human life like a cycle? A cycle has no beginning, no end. Is human life like that too? Does life keep circling within a mysterious cycle? No beginning, no end. The cycle keeps spinning. While spinning inside this cycle, some people wait. Or maybe everyone does. Waiting for what?"
The book "Opekkha" primarily portrays a deeply emotional picture of love, separation, and the anticipation of life. >>Writing a book review is a new thing for me; this will be my first time writing a review of a book, so I hope you’ll kindly overlook any mistakes. Honestly, I don’t have the knowledge to review a legendary writer like Humayun Ahmed. I am just a simple person, so instead of calling this a review, I will share the parts of the book that touched me or caught my attention.
Summary:
Hasanuzzaman had a small family with his wife Suraiya and their 5-year-old son Iman. In their household also lived Hasanuzzaman’s younger brother Firoz. Sometimes, their mother would come to visit for a few days. One day, Hasanuzzaman left for work and never returned. Despite extensive searching, he was never found. But Suraiya believed that her husband would return one day. And in that wait, she spent years of her life. Her behavior changed over time. She gradually withdrew into herself. Often, for the smallest reasons, she would inflict inhuman treatment on her children. Later, Suraiya went to live with her brother along with her children. Iman gradually grew up. At one point, a spiritual man (Pir) told Suraiya that the day Iman gets married, his father will return. One day, Iman gets married. And thus, their lives moved forward.
One line from the conversation between Suraiya and her brother-in-law Firoz first caught my attention. Firoz told Suraiya: "It’s not a drop-out case. I’ve completed my studies. It sounds worse to say an MA graduate is unemployed. Saying a BA pass is unemployed doesn’t sound as bad." In society, it truly sounds better to say someone with less education is unemployed than someone who is highly educated.
Another thought of Suraiya’s caught my eye: " An object that used to be part of your body is no longer there. There’s a great sense of drama in that." All people lose their baby teeth and grow new ones between the ages of six and ten. Only Humayun Ahmed Sir could express such a thought about losing teeth so beautifully.
"Any pain seems bearable during the day, but night is a different matter. Some nights are therefore called dark nights. There is no such thing as a dark day ." This is another realistic sentence from the story, almost everyone in the world can relate to this through their own experience.
When Firoz searches for his missing brother, he gains a realization: "Human life has very little value. If someone loses ten thousand taka, even after twenty years they mourn that loss. But if a person goes missing, after twenty days we more or less try to forget them." In this mechanical world, the value of objects is truly surpassing that of human beings!
After Suraiya’s husband went missing, she had a daughter named Suprabha. As Suprabha grew up, she became irritated by her mother’s behavior. Sometimes she would voice her irritation silently in her mind. Once, by mistake, she said something out loud about her mother which her mother overheard. Then she thought to herself: "If you don’t like a pencil drawing, you can erase it with a rubber. But there’s no way to erase disliked words, if there were, it would’ve been wonderful for her."
"People age, many things from childhood leave them, but fear doesn’t." While reading the story, this line appears subtly. Children’s minds are like clay. They take the shape they are molded into.
One of my favorite lines in the story is about Suprabha, after her death: "Little Suprabha. You will not appear again in the novel Opekkha. Because no one waits for you. We do not wait for the dead. All our waiting is for the living. That is all." Another line from the story is: "For a person to live, the act of waiting is very important. Waiting is the tonic for survival." What a beautiful thought, isn’t it? People live in hope for the living. No one wastes time thinking about the dead!
Although at the end of the story, Iman marries his cousin Mitu, there was hope at the beginning of the story that his missing father would return on the day of his wedding. But in reality, he didn’t return. Then again, maybe he did! because someone rang the doorbell continuously on the night of the wedding. Suraiya, weak from age and anxiety, still managed to ask upon hearing the sound of the bell: "Who’s there?" But the story ends without revealing who had come, and people like me who immerse themselves in the story are left with the regret of not knowing who it was…