The following paper revisits Mirat-ul-Urus, translated as The Bride’s Mirror to uncover the ethnographic basis of the work. It argues, borrowing concepts from New Historicism, the text’s susceptibility to absorb ethnographic details of an Indian Muslim, middle class household living in colonial Delhi. By focusing on the constituent parts of the text, namely the translator’s note, the preface and the introduction, the paper establishes how native fiction from 19th century colonial India fraternizes with colonial ethnographic accounts, and records events, cultures, and minor histories of Muslim women. The text’s metatextuality, namely the text’s self-referential quality whereby the text comments on itself and offers a critical analysis, lends it a status of a historical/cultural document that sheds light on the emergence of middle class in the Muslim community. 

([1])      James Clifford, Writing Culture: The Poetics and Politics of Writing Ethnography (London: University of California Press, 1986), p.9

([1])      Simon Malpas and Paul Wake, The Routledge Companion to Critical and Cultural Theory (Canada: Taylor and Francis, 2013), p.62

([1])      ibid

([1])      ibid

([1])      Catherine Gallagher and Stephen Greenblatt, Practicing New Historicism (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2000), p.9

([1])      Pramod K. Nayar, Contemporary Literary and Cultural Theory: From Structuralism to Ecocriticism, (Delhi: Longman, 2010), p.30

([1])      ibid

([1])      Nazir Ahmad, The Bride’s Mirror, Translated by G.E Ward (New Delhi: Aleph Book Company, 2018) vii

([1])      Simon, Sherry, and Paul St-Pierre, eds. Changing the Terms: Translating in the Postcolonial Era. University of Ottawa Press, 2000

https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctt1ckpcz7.

([1])      Nazir Ahmad, The Bride’s Mirror, (Trans.) G.E Ward (New Delhi: Aleph Book Company, 2018) xvii

([1])      Nazir Ahmad, The Bride’s Mirror, (Trans.) G.E Ward (New Delhi: Aleph Book Company, 2018), p.1

([1])      Elizabeth Langland, “Nobody’s Angels: Domestic Ideology and Middle-Class Women in the Victorian Novel”, PMLA 107 issue # 2 (1992), p.291

([1])      Nazir Ahmad, The Bride’s Mirror, Translated by G.E Ward (New Delhi: Aleph Book Company, 2018), p.13

([1])      ibid

([1])      Elizabeth Langland, “Nobody’s Angels: Domestic Ideology and Middle-Class Women in the Victorian Novel”, PMLA 107 issue # 2 (1992), p. 290-91

([1])      Nazir Ahmad, The Bride’s Mirror, Translated by G.E Ward (New Delhi: Aleph Book Company, 2018) x

([1])      ibid

([1])      Nazir Ahmad, The Bride’s Mirror, Translated by G.E Ward (New Delhi: Aleph Book Company, 2018) xvii

([1])      ibid, p.109

([1])      ibid

([1])      ibid, p.51

([1]) Leonore Davidoff and Catherine Hall, FAMILY FORTUNES: Men and Women of the English Middle Class 1780–1850, (London: Routledge, 2019), p.76-77

([1])      Elizabeth Langland, “Nobody’s Angels: Domestic Ideology and Middle-Class Women in the Victorian Novel”, PMLA 107 issue # 2 (1992) 290-91

([1])      Nazir Ahmad, The Bride’s Mirror, Translated by G.E Ward (New Delhi: Aleph Book Company, 2018) 105-6

([1])      Leonore Davidoff and Catherine Hall, FAMILY FORTUNES: Men and Women of the English Middle Class 1780–1850, (London: Routledge, 2019), p.195

([1])      Nazir Ahmad, The Bride’s Mirror, Translated by G.E Ward (New Delhi: Aleph Book Company, 2018), p.135

([1])      Leonore Davidoff and Catherine Hall, FAMILY FORTUNES: Men and Women of the English Middle Class 1780–1850, (London: Routledge, 2019), p.279-81

Bibliography

-          Ahmed, Nazir. The Bride’s Mirror: A Tale of Domestic Life in Delhi Forty Years Ago. Translated by G.E Ward. New Delhi: Aleph Book Company, 2018.

-          Clifford, James. Writing Culture: The Poetics and Politics of Writing Ethnography. London: University of California Press, 1986.

-          Davidoff, Leonore and Catherine Hall. Family Fortunes: Men and Women of the English Middle Class 1780-1850.  London: Routledge, 2019.

-          Gallagher, Catherine and Stephen Greenblatt.  Practicing New Historicism. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 2000.

-          Langland, Elizabeth. “Nobody’s Angels: Domestic Ideology and Middle-Class Women in the Victorian Novel.” PMLA, vol. 107, no. 2, Modern Language Association, 1992, pp. 290–304, https://doi.org/10.2307/462641

-          Malpas, Simon and Paul Wake.  The Routledge Companion to Critical and Cultural Theory Canada: Taylor and Francis, 2013.

-          Nayar, Pramod K. Contemporary Literary and Cultural Theory: From Structuralism to Ecocriticism. Delhi: Longman, 2010.

-          Pernau, Margrit. Ashraf Into Middle Classes: Muslims in Nineteenth-century Delhi. New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2013.

-          Sherry, Simon and Paul St-Pierre, eds. Changing the Terms: Translating in the Postcolonial Era. University of Ottawa Press, 2000.

https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctt1ckpcz7

vvv