Q&A:
Timeri Murari
Fair play or
foul?
Aug 29th 2012,
21:25 by E.C | LOS ANGELES
In “The Taliban
Cricket Club” Rukhsana, an enterprising young female journalist who learnt the
sport in Delhi, returns to Kabul to teach her male cousins how to play, while
disguised as a man to avoid detection. This is a risky undertaking in a society
which disapproves of women working or practising sport, but the stakes are
high. If they are selected to be national players they will be sent to train in
Pakistan, escaping their life under tyranny.
Mr Murari spoke
to The Economist about civilian life in Afghanistan and why the Taliban
are keen on cricket.
Have you been
ruminating on the idea for this book since cricket was reintroduced in
Afghanistan a decade ago?
I read this
little squiggle of an article in 2000 saying that the Taliban was going to
support cricket, which is as strange as you can get, because they virtually
banned everything, including kite flying, chess, music, dancing, even clapping
in the country. I thought: it’s such an oxymoron. Taliban and cricket are
totally in conflict with each other. Essentially, they did it to get some
diplomatic acceptance.
I thought about
it then but I couldn’t figure out how to write it. Nobody in Afghanistan knew
how to play cricket back then. But I grew up playing cricket in our garden in
India with my sisters and cousins. And I had a niece who played cricket for
India. So, I thought, why not have a woman teach them cricket?
Why did the
Taliban allow cricket?
Cricket was ideal
for the Taliban. You’re covered completely with clothing and you wear a hat—any
other sport would expose the body. Also, there are so many unemployed youths,
and it took a long time to complete the match, which kept them occupied for
hours.
Soccer actually
was played at one point but the men had to wear long-sleeved shirts and
trousers to cover themselves. I was also told that during half-time they’d do
executions in the stadium.
Do you intend
to make a political statement with this book?
Well, I wanted to
write a story about a cricket match and I saw the possibility of making a
comment on cricket and also this political system. I didn’t set out to try to
make a political statement, but it came out in the novel because cricket is a
very democratic sport, in great contrast to the Afghan regimen and the Taliban
at the time. So, it’s about a conflict between these two.
You visited
Afghanistan when researching the novel—what was that experience like?
Yes, I went there
in 2010. The first experience I had was in Delhi airport, actually. There was
an Afghan man behind me at the check in counter who asked me where I would be staying
in Kabul. He said, “Well I have a hotel too but it was bombed two months ago.”
But quickly after, he cheered up and said, “No it’s ok. It’ll be open again in
a few months.” So, even before I went to Afghanistan, there was a sense of hope
that I saw in the people, their ability to overcome disaster.
I met many men
and women there who told me their stories. I said to the women that it must be
so difficult to wear a burqa. And they said yes, but we feel bad for the men as
well. They have to grow a beard, pray five times a day, or they would be
beaten. I was surprised that they were so compassionate for the men.
In the book,
despite the sadness, oppression and loss, there’s a sense of hope and optimism.
Did you see that there?
The Afghans were
the most courteous people I’ve ever met. Like under any tyrant, people always
have hope and will try to fight back. It’s human nature to fight against
oppression. Whether you look at Syria, Libya, the Arab Spring, it all has a
common thread. And I could see that people who live under such dictatorships
live a life of secret rebellion. You can control someone’s physical body but
the tyrant cannot control the mind.
Do you think
the media do a good job of reporting on Afghanistan?
A lot of the
reporting is about foreign troops and their dangers, with the occasional story
on the life of the Afghans. It reminded me of the Vietnam war when we didn’t
really know anything about the Vietnamese people. So I had no idea of what it
was like for these people. I wanted to write more about the civilians.
Do you feel
compelled to go back and write another book about this country?
In fact, yes, I
am working on another book that is set in Afghanistan. It’s fiction.
Non-fiction can restrict you but fiction allows you to explore your imagination,
which you can’t do when you’re reporting.
Afghanistan is in
many ways a “heart of darkness”—civilians are being killed from both sides by
NATO forces and the Taliban. It is still very important, especially to
countries in the region, like India, because whatever happens in Afghanistan
over the next few years has significant implications. I want to explore this
theme and look at how these people can fight back.
What message
do you hope this book will give to readers?
Everyone must try
and push justice in the system. The Afghan men and women were doing it through
their professions, through sport, and small acts in their daily life. Now we
can do so through blogs and the internet. Recently, there was talk of
censorship in India on the internet and people began protesting. So even in
democratic nations, young people are fighting for justice. It’s a universal
story.
The Taliban
Cricket Club. By Timeri Murari. Ecco; 336 pages; $24.99. Allen & Unwin;
£9.99. Buy from Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk
