Description
Winner of France's most prestigious literary honor, the Prix Goncourt, in 2008, Sang-e-Saboor is a haunting novella by Afghan-French writer Atiq Rahimi. Set in a war-torn Afghan village, it tells the story of a woman keeping vigil beside her comatose husband, a soldier left brain-dead by a bullet. In Persian folklore, a "syngué sabour" is a magical black patience stone that absorbs the confessions and suffering of those who speak to it — until it finally shatters. As gunfire echoes outside, the woman begins to speak to her husband as she never could before, unraveling a lifetime of suppressed anger, desire, and pain in an extraordinary act of confession. Praised by Khaled Hosseini as giving "face and voice" to Afghan women too long silenced, the novel was later adapted into an acclaimed film starring Golshifteh Farahani. A powerful, award-winning work now available in Urdu.