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The Dancing Girls of Lahore: Selling Love and Saving Dreams in Pakistan's Pleasure District (P.S.) |
Author: Louise Brown
Published: 2006-07-01 |
List price: $13.95
Our price: $11.16
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As of: November 20th, 2008 10:00:22 PM
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Customer comments on this selection.
 Brilliant
Very real, funny ..thoroughly enjoyable. Author takes you into the steets of Heera Mandi along with her. But there are certain facts she misses to point out such as the name "Heera Mandi" is not because it ever was a diamond (heera) market but was named after Maharaja Ranjeet Singh's general Heera Singh, and Roshnai Gate is called thus not because it was well lit at night during Mughal period. Also she brings in unrelated subject of devadasis from South India. Almost all actors, singers, musicians and prostitutes(earlier singing courtisans stayed with one man/patron later on started taking more patrons to suppliment income)in Pakistan are Shia who were converted to Islam from hindu lower class tribes such as "mirasis" and "kanjars", and had nothing to do with devadasi's from South India.
Painful book
This book is about the harsh realities of life. It's one of the best non-fiction books Iv'e come across. Louise completed it in a span of 7 years by visiting Lahore every few months to see the city's red ligh district change with changing time. She has done a daring job by writing about this subject in a country like Pakistan. It's a well researched, non-judgemental book with only facts and no bias. It can be read as her journal. She wrote whatever she observed with very few personal opinions in it.
 Good idea, but not enough here to sustain the reader
The Dancing Girls of Lahore has a fascinating premise: looking at the lives of dancing girls (prostitutes) in Pakistan. Technically forbidden under Sharia law to engage in sex, these women lead what can best be described as shadow lives -- physically, metaphorically and spiritually in the murky margins of a society in which women have strictly (read: narrowly) proscribed roles. There are some very interesting (and also heartbreaking) bits here -- anecdotes, throwaway lines, etc. But that's the problem, really. We never come to understand what it is exactly that drew the author, British writer Louise Brown, to spend four years (off and on) living amongst the prostitutes of Lahore. As a result, what could have been a really fascinating study of lives not lived becomes a bit of a rag-tag collection of daily anecdotes.
I had the strong feeling that this would have made a wonderful magazine piece for, say, The New Yorker. Something with heft and something that would have allowed for 5,000 or even 10,000 words. As a book, however, one begins to feel the lure of skimming as a way through because it all starts to sound the same. We are not engaged enough in the lives of the women profiled; there isn't enough real detail about them, nor is there any sense of genuine dialogue. Descriptions of urine-filled streets, rats in the house, cough syrup overdoses, etc., are not engaging enough over 250+ pages to keep at least this reader emotionally connected and committed.
 Amazing!
WOW! An amazing well-written documentary on life in Pakistan's prostitution business. Not only does Louise Brown clearly describe what life is like for these women and girls, but she makes a great effort to be non-judgemental and give you enough background information about why they continue this existence. From a Western perspective it is hard to comprehend. Reads like a great novel - you want to know what's going to happen next. Even if the subject is not something you would normally read, this book is definetely worth your time.
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