"When the World Breaks Open" Response
By Lila Kalick
I've been learning lately that intimacy with others is an elusive thing. It doesn't come cheaply or when you want it. It requires you to build trust, it requires patience, it requires a sense of continuing responsibility.
It is not a linear process. Instead, it comes in fits and starts. If you get it too quickly, beware. If you give it too quickly, you can be saddled with what my roommate pithily referred to as a 'vulnerability hangover.' It often goes against your instincts around love and friendship, because when you experience it, it won't fit neatly into the Disney movie in your head. Instead, it will look different for you. It does for every person. Like there's an intimacy fingerprint or something.
It's this fingerprint -- this lack of cookie cutter framework -- evident in the patchwork narrative of Seema Reza's "When the World Breaks Open," which makes me trust her as a narrator. She reliably pulls us through to her messages by giving her readers the time and space needed to let her story sink in.
On a high level, the content of this book explores what Reza gains from overcoming her struggles in an abusive relationship, in motherhood and at work running a creative-expression program for vets at a military hospital. Consistent with this, was how struck I was throughout the book by the wisdom of our narrator.
Some insights that stood out to me were when she discusses love and forgiveness on pg. 35:
"Underneath the clanging racket of anger, in the quiet beyond the threshold of forgiveness, lies a love that makes no sense, that doesn't hold up under the light of reason."
And on motherhood and raising men specifically:
"If you raise a girl poorly, she's got no self-respect, uses her body like a bargaining chip, starves herself when she should eat, eats when she should be wearing her bathing suit in the sun. But poorly raised men have been wreaking havoc with force for more generations than I can count... How much power does one wield in raising a person who is the inheritor of power?" (pg. 96).
However, the real skill in this work is how she goes about delivering these insights to us. The memoir itself seems like an experiment in earned intimacy.
Reza's structural choices in "When the World Breaks Open" are complex. Why does she choose for example to describe her husband's abuse early on in the book, but later describe his devotion during her abortion?
"One night he pushed me off the bed and my head hit the nightstand and I left a misshapen maroon pool on the carpet. When I opened my eyes in the morning, the stain had turned black... He brought me tea in bed and cleaned the blood with OxiClean and a towel while I watched. I'm sorry, head wounds bleed a lot. I'm sorry, but it's true, he told me" (pg. 21)
The above is contrasted 70 pages later with the comfort her provides her as she goes through the harrowing process of delivering a twenty-three week old aborted fetus:
"Karim stood by the bed, folding and unfolding his arms and staring at the television. When the doctor and nurse left the room, he sat next to me on the bed and I pressed my face into his neck. His warm skin smelled of home" (pg. 91).
She builds Karim's character here expertly. At first, he is seen as flat -- the villain of her story. But if that were the case, and Karim were all bad, why would the narrator struggle so hard with the decision to divorce him? This back and forth makes Reza's tale more relatable. It highlights the fact that choices like these are never easy. And it draws the reader into her head and decision making process.
Also evident in the book is an element of how contradiction and complexity breeds credibility in narrators. The questions she asks in "When the World Breaks Open" make for a more accurate reflection of Reza's life. This is evident again, when Reza ruminates or blames herself with regard to her marriage: "I believe the only reason he could possibly be in a bad mood is because I've done something. Is this a form of narcissism?" (pg. 25)
This questioning of herself mirrors a process one would use in building an argument. She presents the reader with an idea (that her husband is abusive and she should therefore leave him) and then contrasts it by building up the case of the opposing argument (she is the one to blame, it's her own actions and unworthiness that have caused her husband's behavior). She then shows why it's not credible, effectively returning us the original conclusion (she should leave).
Ultimately, this book for Reza, seems to be about the process of truth telling, which is also the basis of its reliability and intimacy with her readers. Her craft is evident in the way she gets us to reflect on the characters she presents, while in the background continuing to build her version of the story. But she also gets us to accept the inevitability that it's all a "gray area." She is a reliable narrator because she acknowledges her limitations, her subjectivity, and her unfairness.
This last insight from her final chapter seems particularly poignant: "Each of us can only truly know one particular life -- our own. The task of knowing that life -- its intricacies, its complex patterns of beauty and suffering and the ripples those experiences make upon our consciousnesses -- is relentless. We must each learn to recognize the particular pitch of the voice within our head that doggedly chips away at our own sense of self-worth... we must find our own solutions, plot our escape routes so that our bodies can continue to survive our minds."
I've been learning lately that intimacy with others is an elusive thing. It doesn't come cheaply or when you want it. It requires you to build trust, it requires patience, it requires a sense of continuing responsibility.
It is not a linear process. Instead, it comes in fits and starts. If you get it too quickly, beware. If you give it too quickly, you can be saddled with what my roommate pithily referred to as a 'vulnerability hangover.' It often goes against your instincts around love and friendship, because when you experience it, it won't fit neatly into the Disney movie in your head. Instead, it will look different for you. It does for every person. Like there's an intimacy fingerprint or something.
It's this fingerprint -- this lack of cookie cutter framework -- evident in the patchwork narrative of Seema Reza's "When the World Breaks Open," which makes me trust her as a narrator. She reliably pulls us through to her messages by giving her readers the time and space needed to let her story sink in.
On a high level, the content of this book explores what Reza gains from overcoming her struggles in an abusive relationship, in motherhood and at work running a creative-expression program for vets at a military hospital. Consistent with this, was how struck I was throughout the book by the wisdom of our narrator.
Some insights that stood out to me were when she discusses love and forgiveness on pg. 35:
"Underneath the clanging racket of anger, in the quiet beyond the threshold of forgiveness, lies a love that makes no sense, that doesn't hold up under the light of reason."
And on motherhood and raising men specifically:
"If you raise a girl poorly, she's got no self-respect, uses her body like a bargaining chip, starves herself when she should eat, eats when she should be wearing her bathing suit in the sun. But poorly raised men have been wreaking havoc with force for more generations than I can count... How much power does one wield in raising a person who is the inheritor of power?" (pg. 96).
However, the real skill in this work is how she goes about delivering these insights to us. The memoir itself seems like an experiment in earned intimacy.
Reza's structural choices in "When the World Breaks Open" are complex. Why does she choose for example to describe her husband's abuse early on in the book, but later describe his devotion during her abortion?
"One night he pushed me off the bed and my head hit the nightstand and I left a misshapen maroon pool on the carpet. When I opened my eyes in the morning, the stain had turned black... He brought me tea in bed and cleaned the blood with OxiClean and a towel while I watched. I'm sorry, head wounds bleed a lot. I'm sorry, but it's true, he told me" (pg. 21)
The above is contrasted 70 pages later with the comfort her provides her as she goes through the harrowing process of delivering a twenty-three week old aborted fetus:
"Karim stood by the bed, folding and unfolding his arms and staring at the television. When the doctor and nurse left the room, he sat next to me on the bed and I pressed my face into his neck. His warm skin smelled of home" (pg. 91).
She builds Karim's character here expertly. At first, he is seen as flat -- the villain of her story. But if that were the case, and Karim were all bad, why would the narrator struggle so hard with the decision to divorce him? This back and forth makes Reza's tale more relatable. It highlights the fact that choices like these are never easy. And it draws the reader into her head and decision making process.
Also evident in the book is an element of how contradiction and complexity breeds credibility in narrators. The questions she asks in "When the World Breaks Open" make for a more accurate reflection of Reza's life. This is evident again, when Reza ruminates or blames herself with regard to her marriage: "I believe the only reason he could possibly be in a bad mood is because I've done something. Is this a form of narcissism?" (pg. 25)
This questioning of herself mirrors a process one would use in building an argument. She presents the reader with an idea (that her husband is abusive and she should therefore leave him) and then contrasts it by building up the case of the opposing argument (she is the one to blame, it's her own actions and unworthiness that have caused her husband's behavior). She then shows why it's not credible, effectively returning us the original conclusion (she should leave).
Ultimately, this book for Reza, seems to be about the process of truth telling, which is also the basis of its reliability and intimacy with her readers. Her craft is evident in the way she gets us to reflect on the characters she presents, while in the background continuing to build her version of the story. But she also gets us to accept the inevitability that it's all a "gray area." She is a reliable narrator because she acknowledges her limitations, her subjectivity, and her unfairness.
This last insight from her final chapter seems particularly poignant: "Each of us can only truly know one particular life -- our own. The task of knowing that life -- its intricacies, its complex patterns of beauty and suffering and the ripples those experiences make upon our consciousnesses -- is relentless. We must each learn to recognize the particular pitch of the voice within our head that doggedly chips away at our own sense of self-worth... we must find our own solutions, plot our escape routes so that our bodies can continue to survive our minds."
You've convinced me -- showing Karim in a multi-dimensional light makes him more believable as a character, as well as their relationship. I hadn't really thought of her exposition of him as one of building an argument, but after your explanation, it makes perfect sense. She brings us along on her journey, as she does for the rest of the book. I also love the quotes you chose, they were ones that rang deep for me, as well, such as raising the ones who inherit power (men), and that each of us can truly know one particular life -- our own. I wonder if Reza also writes fiction.
ReplyDeleteYour analysis of her relationship with Karim made me think about how much of a memoirist's credibility is assessed based on how they've depicted a person they love(d). Maybe because each of us we empathize with the memoirist, stepping into their shoes and considering whether or not / how we would go about writing the people in our own lives. Maybe because we empathize with the person being written about. But I definitely find that when a memoirist's close relationships are treated with depth (i.e. they hold space for both the love and the hurt), it lends such authenticity and believability to their work.
ReplyDeleteLila,
ReplyDeletegood development and referencing to the text! It's admirable how she allows us to see the relationship at its best--in times of horrible pain, and at its worst--in violences. You rightly point out that "
This questioning of herself mirrors a process one would use in building an argument. She presents the reader with an idea (that her husband is abusive and she should therefore leave him) and then contrasts it by building up the case of the opposing argument (she is the one to blame, it's her own actions and unworthiness that have caused her husband's behavior). She then shows why it's not credible, effectively returning us the original conclusion (she should leave)."
yes,
elmaz