Rating: 
Summary: Christian/Muslim; East/West
Review: Written in the 30's and out of print for many years, this novel has suddenly become very timely. It's a Romeo and Juliet story set in the midst of political turbulence far more serious than ever existed in Renaissance Italy. Ali is a Muslim from Azerbaijan and Nino a woman from Christian Georgia; both countries are in the Caucasus, a strip of land that straddles Asia and Europe, east and west, and has rarely seen peace. These childhood friends marry and then struggle to overcome differences of culture far more profound than they ever knew. When the lovers are secluded in the wilderness, all is well, but the real world intrudes forcefully. The couple are forced to flee to Persia (Iran) and Nino must adopt the extremely limited lifestyle of a Muslim woman. The descriptions of how profoundly she must change her life, and her frustration and dismay and anger, are vivid and sadly authentic. As we in the west struggle to understand the mystical power of Islam, so strong that young men cheerfully die for the promise of an afterlife, I was drawn back to the book's most powerful scene, in which Ali, a sophisticated educated man, is drawn almost against his will into a wild, fanatical religious celebration. "Suddenly I was overcome by a new and irrestible feeling--the cry gripped my soul with its warning, and I was filled with the desire for utter submission. ....the Mystery of the Unseen, the Gate of Sorrow, that leads to the Grace of the Redeemer...I had become part of the crowd. I walked with the broad-shouldered men, and my fists hammered against my naked breast...Someone put a heavy chain into my hand, and I felt the burning pain on my back..." The dream-like sequence goes on; much later Ali returns home to find that Nino has (somewhat improbably) witnessed part of the events of the night from her parents' window above the street. The story behind this novel is a mystery in itself, written up extensively in the New Yorker a couple of years ago, and for many years no one was sure who really wrote it--Baroness Elfriede Ehrenfels? Essad Bey? Lev Nussimbaum? The one sure thing is that Kurban Said is a pseudonym. Recent scholarship has clarified the issue, but cause one to reflect on why the issue was so secret for so long.
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