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The Women’s Swimming Pool

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As i was reading the short story “The Women’s Swimming Pool” by Hanan Al-Shaykh, I found it very interesting how Al-Shaykh used this “swimming pool” in a very symbolic matter. In the islamic religion women aren’t seen or treated equally to men. This led me to wonder has the islamic religion led this society to become blind to the reality of it all? This swimming pool is sort of like the light at the end of the tunnel, it meant more than just a plain old swimming pool. The freedom that women have always wanted and deserved, the equality that should have been dealt to them, the pride of being able to say we are as equal as men was waiting for them at this swimming pool. They ended up going through everything and everyone in order to locate this swimming pool that Sumayya had told her about. This reminded me of all the hard work and fighting that women had to do in our countries history in order to gain equality. Same way she had to go through a long journey to find the swimming pool so did women in the United States.

“And now here were the two of us standing at the door of the swimming pool, and she, having heard the call to prayers, had prostrated herself in prayer. She was destroying what lay in my bag, blocking the road between me and the sea.” These sentences from the text made me think about religion and rights. The Islamic religion has 5 calls to prayer a day, which meant you would have to pray that much times a day at necessary times. She didn’t know whether to join the grandmother in prayer or to go keep chasing after this swimming pool. In this situation i could tell that religion has played a big role in the fight of equality for women. Society has portrayed this concept of inequality through religion, the grandma stopped this journey to achieve the equality of women in order to pray and follow her religion. This made me wonder if maybe religion is what was pushing women back from achieving their rights. If women wouldn’t let religion or other obstacles stop them from achieving their equality, it would be achieved in all parts of the world, in all cultures and in all religions.

Some say plants don’t speak- Rosalia De Castro

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“There goes that mad woman, dreaming of the eternal spring of life and the fields, though soon enough, all too soon, she will comb grey hair, and shivering, numb, see the hoarfrost shroud the meadow.” De Castro portrays her thoughts in a deeply visual manner, even though everything has an end to it or an “expiration date” De Castro sees things differently. There is a bright side to everything especially nature, and she only looks forward to the positive perspective of it, which is the long lasting beauty of it. I found it very interesting how she called herself an incurable sleepwalker, how everything she thinks and sees is just part of a dream which she continues to dwell on and can’t seem to live without that perspective, she’s trapped in her dream. “Stars and fountains and flowers, don’t murmur against my dreams; could I delight in you without them, could i live? Its almost as if she knows the truth but doesn’t want her surroundings to advise her of these truths, she’s sort of blinded by reality similar to Orgon in the play “Tartuffe” how he sees tartuffe as the most perfect and holy person even though everyone around him tells him otherwise, no matter what is being told to De Castro or what she sees she still can’t seem to handle or take in the truth.

Although keeping a positive outlook is the right thing to do it also makes sense to face reality. De Castro uses her poetic ways to illustrate how nature (Plants, Fountains, Stars, Birds) all seem to mock her and try to bring out the ugly truth about everything, such as death. Whether its a human or an object everything has its expiration date. De Castros writings are very poetic and portray a lot of imagery, which helps the reader visualize what is going on and get a better understanding.