Becoming Woman and Gender Typologies 211
unaffected. Thinking it her fault and that she deserves correction, her bad-
conscience overwhelms her and she murmurs to Camruddin: “My dear, you
should have beaten me and locked me up!”66
On the opposite end of the spectrum, one of the most dominant heroines
in Pickthall’s oriental fiction is Reshideh. In Istanbul, Turkish men and women
of the early twentieth century imitated everything French and “went mad with
Frankish customs”.67 A specifically French type of nationalism, class distinc-
tions, high party feelings and snobbishness were oddities newly imported from
Europe. The members of this new aristocracy were gradually defying their cul-
tural heritage and oriental rules of decency.68 Reshideh, being a member of
this new aristocracy, is brought up and educated by French governesses and
foreign tutors. She becomes an indiscriminate admirer of things European and
is married to Shukri Bey who belongs to the same pro-European coterie as her-
self. But as she matures quickly and becomes the mother of two children soon,
she shakes off the European illusion. One day, when Shukri Bey attends a ball
as a steward of dance organised by the Committee for European residents in
Istanbul, Reshideh, in a fit of jealousy, decides to do justice on his gallantry
and transgression of the unwritten marriage contract. She goes to the loca-
tion of the ball and sends for her husband. When he comes outside, she whips
him terribly without fear of being divorced. Reshideh’s whipping of Shukri Bey
is also motivated by the primitive and presignifying instinct of afflicting pain
on the betrayer and his breach of the contract: “To take half-naked, shame-
less women in his arms, and clasp them tight and jump about with them – in
public, too – is that a pastime for the father of my children?”69 Reshideh is not
like Barakah in Veiled Women and the other women who follow their husbands
to France and spend the nights alone in the prison-like hotel while the men
are enjoying themselves with some French women. She does not make the
crow her messenger and decides to be the judge herself though she regrets this
very much later as she confesses to her confidante Gul-raaneh with whom she
spends that night sleepless: “‘Last night I was a lioness, but to-day I feel more
like a little mouse”.70 Reshideh’s beating of Shukri Bey in the novel is based on
a real incident which took place in Istanbul as narrated to Pickthall by Misket
Hanum and her circle of friends. But Reshideh’s courage and determination to
66 Ibid.
67 Ibid., 203.
68 Ibid., 199.
69 Ibid., 201.
70 Ibid., 203.