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Aadam Aziz
Saleem Sinai’s grandmother, Amina Sinai’s mother, and Aadam Aziz’s wife. Naseem is first introduced when her father, Mr. Ghani, tricks Aadam into falling in love with her. Using the “magical and sacred” allure of a perforated sheet, Ghani summons Aadam, a doctor, to examine his daughter from behind a purdah, and after many years and several fake illnesses, Aadam and Naseem fall in love. Their love, however, is doomed from the beginning, and their union is an unhappy one. After their marriage, Naseem morphs into Reverend Mother, a particularly unpleasant and unattractive version of herself who rules over her family like a tyrant, imposing punishments and leveling insults. Reverend Mother is resentful of Aadam’s support of her exit from purdah, and she serves to personify the pre-independence concept of womanhood and femininity in India. She is dedicated to her domestic responsibilities and her religion, which she equates with morality, and she cares very little about politics or the oppression of others. Reverend Mother is killed in the Indo-Pakistani War, when a bomb is dropped on her during an air raid.
Naseem Ghani / Reverend Mother Quotes in Midnight’s Children
The Midnight’s Children quotes below are all either spoken by Naseem Ghani / Reverend Mother or refer to Naseem Ghani / Reverend Mother. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Book 3: A Wedding
Quotes
“Women have made me; and also unmade. Form Reverend Mother to the Widow, and even beyond, I have been at the mercy of the so-called (erroneously, in my opinion!) gentler sex. It is, perhaps, a matter of connection: is not Mother India, Bharat-Mata, commonly thought of as female? And, as you know, there’s no escape from her.”
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Naseem Ghani / Reverend Mother Quotes in Midnight’s Children
The Midnight’s Children quotes below are all either spoken by Naseem Ghani / Reverend Mother or refer to Naseem Ghani / Reverend Mother. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Book 3: A Wedding
Quotes
“Women have made me; and also unmade. Form Reverend Mother to the Widow, and even beyond, I have been at the mercy of the so-called (erroneously, in my opinion!) gentler sex. It is, perhaps, a matter of connection: is not Mother India, Bharat-Mata, commonly thought of as female? And, as you know, there’s no escape from her.”
Related Characters:
Related Themes:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
