A'isha in a New Light

As the newspaper articles and blogs explain, it was Islamic studies professor Denise Spellberg’s comments about Sherry Jones’ novel The Jewel of Medina that led to a decision by Random House to abruptly cancel the project. Among other comments, Spellberg characterized the book as “soft core pornography.” Two questions come to mind: one, is this claim valid, and two, does it matter? 

The Jewel of Medina opens with the word “scandal.” The protagonist, A’isha, is fourteen and describes what the crowd sees upon her return to Medina: “my wrapper fallen to my shoulders, unheeded. Loose hair lashing my face. The wife of God’s Prophet entwined around another man.” This man is Safwan, whom A’isha has wanted to marry since childhood. As she approaches home, someone cries out, “Al-zaniya” (“adulteress”); others chant “A’isha - fahisha!” (“fahisha” meaning whore).

The novel then goes back in time, beginning with A’isha’s story from the time she is six and talk of her future husband begins, and ending with the death of her husband Muhammed when she is nineteen and he is in his sixties. A curious and precocious six-year-old, A’isha, along with Safwan and another friend, decide one day to spy on a bridegroom having sex; they notice his “broad, naked back as he lifted his body off the bed then slammed it down again and again.” They stare “at his behind, as big as my goat’s-bladder ball and covered with hair, as it clenched and relaxed with each thrust.” A’isha inadvertently admits her wrongdoing and is punished: she is placed in purdah, unable to step outside her parents’ home until her wedding day.  

Three years later, when the Great Day arrives and A’isha tries to cover her “budding breasts,” her (half-) sister Asma tells her she can no longer hide them. “‘Starting tonight, you’ll have to share them with your husband.’ She winked at me. ‘Just hope he doesn’t nibble too hard.’” Since A’isha has not yet begun menstruating, the marriage is not consummated immediately and A’isha continues to live at her parents’ home where Muhammed visits her, affectionately calling her “Little Red.” 

Nor is the marriage consummated even after A’isha goes to live with Muhammed and his wife Sawdah. For years to follow, the consummation, which Asma describes as “hands like scorpions scuttling across your skin… and then—the sting of his tail between your legs!” is the primary goal that consumes A’isha’s mind. She adorns her hands with henna; she tries an aphrodisiac; she learns “a dance to make a man wild.” When she is chosen to accompany Muhammed on an expedition, she attempts to seduce him once again: “I pressed my body against my husband’s… I opened my mouth to invite his tongue to dance with mine.” She tells him, “After your victory, I’ll show you more.” 

But Muhammed continues to see her as a child. A’isha’s resentment of her sister-wives grows, keenly aware of the beauty and power of each new wife Muhammed brings home. For instance, Umm Habiba, whom Muhammed considers marrying until, as A’isha discovers, she turns out to be a spy, is described as having “high cheeks like figs, eyelashes as long as a lover’s kiss, lips as full and dark as forbidden wine, skin like coffee, and a bosom like the twin hills of Mecca.” It is only after A’isha is deemed innocent for having been caught with Safwan, fives years into her marriage, that “desire burned like a fire in Muhammed’s loins” for A’isha. She eventually gets pregnant but suffers a miscarriage. 

A’isha’s focus on consummating her marriage is not the only topic covered by The Jewel of Medina. The novel also includes scenes in which men gaze at or attempt to touch women, telling them they’d “pay in gold for a feel of those glorious breasts.” It describes “the mood in al’Lah’s holy mosque” upon the arrival of Muhammed’s wife Zaynab as “lewd and leering, filled with bawdy jokes and winking speculations. See how the Prophet lusts for his bride.” The novel is also replete with platitudes about the meaning of love. When A’isha doesn’t understand Zaynab’s need to make Muhammed happy, Zaynab tells her, “It’s called love, A’isha. Perhaps someday you’ll try it.” A’isha eventually realizes that “love was more than a feeling. Love was something you did for another person.” Earlier in the novel, A’isha seems to show another sign of maturity when she helps Umm al-Masakin with her daily work of helping to feed and care for the poor; A’isha finds “an inner peace I never thought possible” and later comforts Mother of the Poor on her deathbed.  

Yet soon after her grief subsides, A’isha continues to speak her mind and compete with her sister-wives. Later in the novel, A’isha is triumphant in that she achieves her lifelong goal of becoming a warrior; she even encourages other woman to learn to protect themselves and their children with their swords—except that, as Jones admits in the author question and answer section of the novel, she has never read anything about the real A’isha wielding a sword. A’isha also achieves her objective of becoming the hatun, first wife of the harim—but this, too, as Jones admits, is a fabrication of historical events, an idea “which I picked up from reading about Turkish harems of later times.” The idea of purdah is also not consistent with Islamic teachings. 

If The Jewel of Medina is “extensively researched” as the jacket flap claims, this research does not appear to be widely incorporated into the story. A’isha’s character is shown to possess some intriguing qualities: the ability to help Muhammed strategize in war, entrepreneurial pluck. But given the intense focus on her desires and that of others, she hardly comes across as admirable. According to the dominant Islamic scholarship, A’isha is best known for being Muhammed’s favorite wife, in whose company he received the most revelations; and while the novel ultimately depicts her as such, A’isha’s historically revered charachteristics are not salient. On the other hand, Muhammed’s character is portrayed as being positive: he is shown to choose his wives for protection against enemies rather than for his own needs; he is also described as gentle and compassionate, particularly toward A’isha. But no other character, except perhaps Mother of the Poor, comes across as sympathetic or layered. The greater themes in the novel—sex, jealousy, destiny—are the stuff of romance novels. Do these themes, coupled with chapter titles like “Troublemaker,” “Ridiculous Rumors,” and “Come Away with Me,” make The Jewel of Medina “soft porn”? Hardly. But they do remind the reader that this novel is just that, a fictional account. 

In her author note, Jones asks her readers to join her on a journey to “another time and place, to a harsh, exotic world of saffron and sword fights…” She does just this, but her portrayals of the most esteemed figures of Islam are more exotic than nuanced, more entertaining than informative, more trite than thought-provoking, less historical and more fictional than readers would—or should—expect. Was Jones’s motivation to write this novel to “honor” A’isha and other women, given that her descriptions of them are more sexualized than anything else? Does she “have huge respect and regard for the Muslim faith,” considering that her presentation of this faith is so narrow in scope? Did she fictionalize a sacred history to help bring it renewed attention, or was this mission superseded by the aim of writing a novel, no matter the subject?

Jones certainly has every right to defend her intentions; and she has the right, as anyone does, to enjoy her freedom of speech: to interpret historical or any figures—regardless of religion—in any manner she chooses. And she cannot be faulted for claiming that her original publisher’s decision to pull her book—especially so far into the production process—was an act of cowardice. She is justified in praising Beaufort Books' decision to undertake the publication of this work, especially in the light of such daunting circumstances as protests and a firebombing at the office of Gibson Square, the book's UK publisher.

The bigger issue to consider is how the novel has been pitched and perceived by publishers, readers and critics alike. To view The Jewel of Medina as anything other than a romantic fiction based loosely on the life of A’isha, wife of Prophet Muhammed, is to completely undermine the humanistic significance of the novel's revered figures.  

Click HERE to read an excerpt from The Jewel of Medina 

Sangeeta Mehta has worked as a book editor at Simon & Schuster and Little, Brown. She is currently a freelance editor living in New York City.

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