Dreamcatcher (2016)

Introduction

The novella is divided into four parts. The first part introduces the reader to Zoya’s character, her thought processes, along with a mental state which hints at departure from normalcy. One of the significant markers of clinical depression is extreme sleepiness as a result of mental exhaustion. Therefore, Part one ends on a note when Zoya makes an assertion very unlike her usual self and ends up feeling “unusually drained” at the end of it. Part two brings with it tragedy in Zoya’s life in the form of the death of her younger sibling, Mehak, in an accident. This leads to the protagonist’s first full-fledged confrontation with clinical depression, something that would continue to influence her character for the entirety of the remaining novel. The two friends who help her deal with it, along with Devika, are Reza and Priyanka. While dealing with a nervous breakdown, Zoya not only realises their importance in her life, but also that she is in love with Reza, and that her feelings are not one-sided. This part ends with their marriage.

Plot

The theme of this 33,000 word long story is madness and repression. The opening of the novella, “Baba said…” sets the horizon of expectation as the narrative takes the reader into the consciousness of the protagonist, Zoya. Despite the first person narration of the story, it is always the consciousness of others that become more significant for the choices and decisions Zoya makes, as opposed to her own understanding. Zoya hails from Lucknow and now finds herself a student of one of the all-girls’ colleges of the University of Delhi. She is not a very social person, and makes few, but true friends during her graduation years. One of them is Devika, her bibliophilic roommate, who becomes pivotal in drawing the reader’s attention to Zoya’s denial and repression.

The next part gives a glance into Zoya’s marriage and her strained relations with her mother-in-law, who is overly-protective of her son, thereby ensuing a conflict between Zoya and her. Zoya continues to live in a state of complete denial and repression of the resultant anxiety. However, along with this, she also gives birth to a son. The narrative mentions that she wants to name him Arsh, but her mother-in-law has another name in mind. In the subsequent chapters, there is no mention of the name Arsh, and even Zoya is found addressing her child with the name the mother-in-law had chosen. Zoya’s mother has passed away by this point in the story.

Part four reveals the name of this character as Arsh, once again a hint at a desire which not only Zoya had denied herself, but also refused to fight for when the circumstances demanded it. She has an affair with Arsh, the nature of which is not sexual. Her relationship with Arsh is more like an emotional involvement of sorts which she keeps a secret from everyone. However once the affair begins to move towards a sexual involvement, Zoya decides to end it for her subconscious allows her only so much transgression. While she is making her desires to end it clear to Arsh, Reza walks in on them and finds Zoya talking to herself. Her schizophrenia is revealed as well as the truth about Zoya’s relationship with Arsh. Since both Reza and Zoya see this as an act of cheating, and the biggest blow to their marriage, Zoya decides to leave and comes back to Lucknow to live with her father. It is after a year that Reza visits Zoya and asks her to come back in his life.

Zoya, already longing for Reza, returns with him. Her father dies after a while, but this time she allows herself to be helped by Reza. She goes ahead to have twins and a happy married life for a couple of decades. Reza dies in their sixty-third year of life, by when all three of their children have moved out, comfortably settled in their lives, and this is where the story ends.

The epilogue gives us a Zoya who is schizophrenic again, and this time sees both Arsh and Reza. However she accepts this madness now, she doesn’t desire to fight it for she knows if reality is a nightmare, she would let this madness be her dreamcatcher.

Praise for Dreamcatcher

An uneasy story, a story rife and ripe with so many shades and colours—and yet told in the simplest of terms—a tale of today, but also a tale of forever—as long as people, young and old, are forced into emotional and practical corners and pigeon-holes, as long as lives are dictated by tradition and mediocrity, fashion and fad—as long as the courage to think for yourself, to think in an original way, is viewed as 'wrong' -- there will be dreamcatchers—this is a book to be both read and then deeply understood—a work of powerful truth, wrapped in the dark light of the mind -- -Tom Alter, Actor

Dreamcatcher ‘catches’ a world where sanity and insanity collapse, where nightmare and reality converge, and where resilience competes with loss. A sensitive and poignant portrayal of a young woman whose life comes a full circle after the vagaries of life. — Javed M. Ansari, India Today

Zoya, the protagonist, is not looking for things logical, like money or a measure of happiness. She skirts the edge of sanity, and yet it is still not possible for her to be clubbed as insane. In fact, the story makes it clear that the mad aren’t – after all – so mad, but it is the circumstances and the consciousness of others that drive them towards this blind alley. Zoya’s denial and repression have been brilliantly depicted by Rosheena in her debut novel. - Udaya Narayana Singh, Writer

‘Madness is a country just around the corner’ ---with this poem of Kamala Das begins Rosheena Zehra’s debut novella Dreamcatcher. In a note at the beginning, the young author alerts her readers saying, ‘I hope this story disturbs you…’, and disturb it does to the core of your being. The first person narrative of the protagonist of the novel, Zoya, drives the plot through her interaction with friends like Devika, Priyanka and Reza. She has a streak of clinical depression which over the time develops into full-blown schizophrenia that makes her reject reality as an illusion of normalcy. She realizes that the reality is a big bad nightmare and her insanity becomes her cherished dreamcatcher.

The novel is apparently a little dark and morbid, but it raises important questions about the binary between imagination and reality which continue to haunt the reader long after the reading is over. -Nirmal Kanti Bhattacharjee, Director Niyogi Books and Former Editor Indian Literature