35 pages • 1 hour read
The Waiter’s Wife
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Themes
Modernity Versus Tradition
The Iqbals’ immigration to Britain forces them to grapple with their differing views on modernity and tradition. They meet in a traditional way: through an arranged marriage. Neena—arguably the most modern character in the story—questions how Alsana “could […] bear to marry someone [she] didn’t know from Adam” (Paragraph 94). To Alsana, arranged marriage was “by far the easier option” (Paragraph 95). While Neena believes that a marriage should be a partnership of equals and that husbands and wives should share their most intimate thoughts, Alsana dismisses this philosophy as faddish nonsense. She liked her husband best when she met him, hours before the wedding. Now, she says, the more she learns about him, the less she likes him.
Immigrating to Britain forces the Iqbals to confront the tensions between modernity and tradition—opposing forces that must work together to make cultural assimilation possible. This tension works in both directions: While the prevailing values of late-20th-century London sometimes strike Alsana as distressingly modern, her very presence in England strikes the members of the racist National Front gang as a modern affront to their idea of traditional British identity.
Alsana supports the family (a modern thing for a woman to do) by sewing (a traditional thing for a woman to do). However, she sews “together pieces of black plastic for a shop called Domination in Soho” (Paragraph 6). It is implied that this is a BDSM shop, something that is very modern, but Alsana doesn’t seem to know this because “many were the nights Alsana would hold up a piece of clothing she had just made—following the plans she was given—and wonder what on earth it was” (Paragraph 6). It is her ignorance of what she’s creating that allows her to continue supporting the family.
Neena serves as Alsana’s foil throughout the story, primarily because of her explicitly modern viewpoint. She struggles with Alsana’s arranged marriage, viewing it as backward: “It’s 1975, Alsi. You can’t conduct relationships like that any more. It’s not like back home. There has to be communication between men and women in the West” (Paragraph 87). Neena draws a clear line here: Britain is modern; Bangladesh is traditional. However, she is not immune from the juxtaposition of modernity and tradition. Even her job mixes elements of the old and the new, as she works in “an old-fashioned cobbler’s” where she “fixes heels back on to stilettos” (Paragraph 55). Stilettos are in no way old-fashioned shoes; however, Neena is able to marry the two worlds—modernity and tradition—which allows her to find some peace. In fact, by accepting the juxtaposition, she is able to assimilate and take on aspects of British culture. She embraces “the talking cure” (Paragraph 121), which is implied to be therapy. She also embraces feminist literature, such as The Female Eunuch by Germaine Greer, Sex, Race and Class by Selma James, and Erica Jong’s novel, Fear of Flying. However, Neena spends most of her time angry or frustrated with Alsana, suggesting that her forceful support for modernity actually causes her more stress.
Clara seems to be the character who best marries modernity and tradition. She listens and learns from Neena while still holding onto her traditional values. She views naming her child as “a fearful responsibility, a godlike task for a mere mortal” (Paragraph 81). She chooses what parts of her new culture she wants to take on, and what parts she wants to ignore, making her one of the happier characters in the story.
The Search for Identity
Identity is how people make sense of their place in the world. When characters in this story feel lost or uncertain, it is often because a superficial identity is being forced on them by the outside world, obscuring their intrinsic sense of self.
Most notably, Samad feels stripped of his multifaceted personality by being solely labeled a waiter. In fact, the short story's title—not “Samad’s Wife” but “The Waiter’s Wife”—reiterates this loss of identity. The “heartbreaking disappointment” for Samad is his realization that, in his economic life, none of those other identities matter—instead, “the inclining of one’s head, poising of one’s pen, these were important, so important" (Paragraph 26). In the atomized environment of the city, the only identity that matters is the one that makes money, something his wife, his coworkers, and his boss continually remind him of.
Though Alsana chafes against the prejudices directed at her as an immigrant, she is not without prejudices of her own. While fighting with her husband, she lashes out against Clara and Archie: “Who are they? […] I don’t know them! You fight in an old, forgotten war with some Englishman […] married to a black! Whose friends are they? These are the people my child will grow up around? Their children—half blacky-white?” (Paragraph 48). Archie is Samad’s best friend, and Clara is the woman Alsana spends the most time with. Yet, Alsana reduces both to their skin color and nationality, stripping them of their individual identities. Additionally, she describes Clara and Archie’s children as “half blacky-white” (Paragraph 48), implying a racist attitude toward biracial people. This attitude betrays her own discomfort with the cultural hybridity that characterizes modern London.
Both Clara and Alsana are pregnant in the short story, and both have given a lot of thought to what they will name their future children. These names will serve as the foundation of their children’s identity. Alsana is clear in what she wants for her children: “Magid and Millat. Ems are good. Ems are strong. Mahatma, Mohammed, that funny Mr Morecambe, from Morecambe and Wise—letter you can trust” (Paragraph 80). Alsana believes that by giving her children certain names, she can ensure that her children will be good and strong—values that she does not assign to her husband. Clara feels the opposite way: “I tink I like Irie. It patois. Means everyting OK, cool, peaceful, you know” (Paragraph 81). Both women have different hopes for their children’s identities, evident through their different approaches to naming them.
The Inescapability of the Past
The story starts in the present, but almost immediately flashes back to the difficult conditions in which Archie and Samad began their friendship--piloting a tank together in the Second World War, sharing the close quarters, physical discomfort, and danger that job entailed. That shared experience—one that their wives have no access to—remains at the foundation of their friendship. Many of the characters struggle to live in the present, choosing either to be nostalgic about the past or optimistic about the future. Samad is unhappy with his present life, so he prefers to retreat into the past. This is what Shiva mocks him for:
I hear you trying to talk to the customer about biology this, politics that—just serve the food, you idiot—you’re a waiter, for fuck’s sake, you’re not Michael Parkinson. Did I hear you say Delhi […] I was there myself, you know, Delhi University, it was most fascinating, yes—and I fought in the war, for England, yes—yes, yes, charming, charming (Paragraph 17).
Samad felt seen and validated in his past life, but now he is mocked in his present life for this nostalgia, with the implication that his longing for the past hinders his ability to succeed in the present.
The past exerts a quiet influence in both Alsana’s and Clara’s marriages, as both women are married to significantly older men whose intense and complicated memories of the war create conflict and distance between themselves and their wives. For Alsana, World War II is “an old, forgotten war” (Paragraph 48), but it’s one that continues to shape her life, as her husband insists on moving to the neighborhood where his war comrade, Archie, lives. In some ways, the two women bond over their older husbands and participate in almost childish activities together: “Picnics, the movies, museums, swimming pools” (Paragraph 5). While their husbands reminisce about their soldier days, Clara and Alsana play up their youth and indulge in childish activities.
Both women are pregnant, causing Alsana to reflect on the past and future: “‘But the past is made of more than words, dearie. We married old men, you see? These bumps,’ Alsana pats them both, ‘they will always have Daddy-long-legs for fathers. One leg in the present, one in the past. No talking will change this. Their roots will always be tangled’” (Paragraph 121). Alsana implies that not being fully in one era is a bad thing that can cloud a person’s identity. However, she seems to be quite hopeless about the situation, accepting that her children will never fully feel rooted in life or in Britain.
Gender Roles and Expectations
Neena and Alsana are constantly at odds over their differing views on gender roles. Alsana wants takes refuge in a traditional vision of marriage—one in which she doesn’t expect to have a rapport with her husband and doesn’t seek to learn much about him. Meanwhile, Neena questions these traditional female roles. She speaks crudely to men, replying, “Keep your tits on” (Paragraph 68) when a male coworker asks for her help at work. She gives Clara iconic feminist literature to “rid Clara of her ‘false consciousness’” (Paragraph 104). The main conflict between the women comes from their differing views on what it means to be a good woman.
Alsana goes so far as to nickname Neena in a way that constantly reminds Neena of her failings as a woman. She calls her Niece-Of-Shame “as in Niece, you have brought nothing but shame” (Paragraph 58). Alsana is only a couple of years older than Neena, but she insists on calling her niece, putting herself in a position of authority over Neena. However, Alsana bristles when Neena calls her aunt: “And don’t call me Aunty, I am only two years older than you” (Paragraph 61). Alsana wants the power that comes along with an aunt's position; however, she does not want the lack of power or assumed beauty that comes with being older than Neena.
Alsana switches between non-traditional and traditional gender roles whenever it suits her. She refuses to let Samad into her ultrasound appointment because “a husband needn’t be involved in body-business, in a lady’s […] parts” (Paragraph 75). She plays up her meekness to counter Neena’s vulgarity and to stress that she is a proper woman, unlike Neena. However, when Alsana fights with Samad, she “ripped to shreds every stitch she had on and […] stood naked before him” (Paragraph 53). This act seems to be much more intimate than her ultrasound appointment, and she is willing to act non-traditional to achieve what she wants: bullying Samad into giving her the freedom to buy whatever she wants.
Ironically, Alsana’s failure to conform to traditional gender roles causes discord in her relationship with Samad. Samad “assumed a woman so young would be […] easy” (Paragraph 42). Alsana shatters these expectations, particularly because she is unlike Samad’s mother, who “worked through the night preparing meals for her family [instead of buying] prepared meals, yogurts and tinned spaghetti” (Paragraph 51). Samad’s ideal woman is someone who works tirelessly on the domestic front to make his life easy. He views Alsana’s decision to take shortcuts in the form of prepared meals as a fundamental failing that makes her difficult to live with. Alsana only bolsters his feelings by punching “him full square in the stomach” (Paragraph 51), something a well-behaved woman would never do.
Ultimately, Alsana realizes she is unable to escape these traditional gender roles. Toward the end of the short story, she explains that she might not understand anything: “what do I know, a barefoot country girl who never went to the universities” (Paragraph 119). This is the most unflattering portrayal of womanhood throughout the short story. The seemingly strong and difficult woman is gone and left in her place is a girl who has no education and little independence or agency.
While female gender roles are the main focus of “The Waiter’s Wife,” male gender roles are also explored. Samad is constantly portrayed as a weak man. He works as a waiter, an occupation that is in the domestic sphere typically reserved for women. He wants to be seen occupying the more masculine roles he occupied before immigrating to England: “A STUDENT, A SCIENTIST, A SOLDIER” (Paragraph 25). He is clinging to his past, where he was respected and seen as a multi-faceted man. Additionally, the fact that Samad constantly brings up his past as a soldier indicates that he is fantasizing about a past in which he got to play the role of hero to others, instead of his current role of Alsana’s weak husband.
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