Assignment 1

Group 6
CRITIQUING THE THESIS TITLED “ THE DEFENSE MECHANISMS OF MOLL
FLANDERS” BY TINA JAKOBSSON

Course Title: Novel-1

Submitted By
 Sher Afsar (210081)
 Aiman (210050)
 Mahnoor Hussain (210016)
 Aaliya Haider (210076)
 Rooh Ullah (210068)
 Haider Ali (210058)

Submitted To: Madam Norah Arif

Dated: March 18, 2024

Department of English
Islamia College Peshawar
 Characters in the play

Raseena a twenty two years old university graduate

Jandool Raseena’s father and a business man
Waiza
Zimer friends of Raseena
Samsama
Anadil son of Jandool’s business partner
Jack human trafficker
Ishmam an immigrant from Yemen
Coast guard 1
Coast guard 2
The Adventure of Raseena
 ACTⅠ

SCENE Ⅰ
Waiza’s home : A colony in Islamabad

Enter SAMSAMA and WAIZA

Waiza: Wait a minute, coming! Who’s there?

Samsama: Wazo! It’s me.
Waiza: Come in dear! Your arrival elicits delight in my heart. Your visits are few and far
between.
Samsama: [Sits on the couch] Well dear! My ailment has confined me to bed. But Almighty
bestowed his favors and now I am well.
Waiza: O, Dear! I am so sorry to hear this.
Samsama: I came across Raseena the other day, who is thinking of going abroad.
Waiza: Would her father allow her?
Samsama: I did not inquire about it. I don’t think he would permit her.
Waiza: Although every need and most of her desires are met, still searching for more comfort;
such is the nature of mortals.
Samsama: We suffer the paucity of basic needs; our dresses are threadbare, our arms cry for
ornaments, and our stomachs crave for good food. But Raseena’s bread is buttered on both sides.
[Azaan starts]
All right Waiza. The owl starts hooting, and now I will leave.

Waiza: Adieu! Samsama

[Exeunt]

SCENE Ⅱ

Raseena’s home in Islamabad

 (ENTER Jandool and Anadil)

Anadil: Uncle! Have you informed Raseena about our forthcoming engagement?
Jandool: Not yet, son! But her consent would be necessary.
Anadil: Would she be happy about it?
Jandool: Well, son! I hope she would respond in affirmative. I do not see any reason for her
refusal; your family is well reputed, your character is impeccable, your sturdy muscular physique
is talked-about, and your business is flourishing. All these qualities make you an apt match for
my daughter.
Anadil: I am humbled uncle. No words and actions will reciprocate your favors. You deemed me
an apt match for your daughter. All right, uncle! Now I seek your permission to leave.
Jandool: All right, son!

(Exit Anadil)
All praise be to Almighty Allah. Anadil would consummate my last wish; I would feel relieved. I
distinctly remember that tragic day when her mother passed away, the innocence and grief on her
countenance was indescribable. Since that day I never made her feel the absence of her mother
and now she has come of age. Though her marriage would leave me in seclusion but would
unburden my shoulders of mammoth responsibility.

(Enter Raseena)

Jandool: Come, dear child come! I need to talk to you about an important matter. Sit dear child.
Raseena: I am all ears.
Jandool: You are well aware child that every father's dream is to wed her daughter to a good
man during his life time, with your consent I will also fulfill mine.

Raseena: What are you talking about?

Jandool: Child, you have got a marriage proposal from Anadil, the son of our business partner.
In my view he is an apt match for you and I want you to ponder over it.
Raseena: I have frequently told you that I do not have any intention of marrying. You have
constantly ignored my pleas to go abroad.
Jandool: Dear child! Marriage is obligatory…
 [interrupted by Raseena]
Raseena: I am fed of these stereotype norms. Marriage is not by compulsion but by consent, it
restrains freedom.
[Exit angrily]
Jandool: Oh! God. A father can never take the role of a mother. If her mother were alive she
would have got better of her. God knows what this girl is up to, rejecting proposal after proposal.
My days are numbered, I have suffered the blows of time. The messenger of death can knock at
my door at any instance. Though she is managing the business well she needs the support of a
male partner. My only child is adamant to go abroad, who leaves his father at this age alone? For
the life of me I will not let her. How can a girl survive alone in the West? No, no, I will never let
her.
[Exeunt]

SCENE Ⅲ
At Cafeteria
(Enter Raseena and Zimer)

Zimer: What’s up girl? Why is your visage so frowned? You should be happy about your recent
proposal.
Raseena: Shut up! Man. Who did tell you about this?
Zimer: Oh! Even walls hear nowadays. Moreover, you should not be a dissembler.
Raseena: Leave this nonsense. Lend me your ears! I have something important to tell you.
Zimer: I am all ears.
Raseena: Earlier, I went to the embassy to inquire about the modus operandi of going abroad
and the expenses to be incurred.
Zimer: What did they tell?
Raseena: All the expenses will amount to fifty million rupees; they told me.
Zimer: It is affordable for you. But will your father agree?
Raseena: Ah! I have told you about his refusals and his stubbornness to see me don a bridal
gown.
Zimer: Then how will you manage all these?
Raseena: I have to look for the ways. Father will neither grant me permission or money.
Zimer: I know of other ways but for that, you would have to put your life at the stake.
Raseena: A life without risks is like a rose without thorns, which exists only in Plato’s ideal
world.
Zimer: Ok, we will meet someone tomorrow.

[Exit Zimer]
Raseena: To live in Pakistan; in this stinking place; to marry: to serve the husband, to beget
children, to constrain one’s freedom. To manage father’s established business. They all want me
to submit to their norms. They want me to live like a harnessed horse whose freedom has been
usurped by his master. Rather I would take up arms against these norms than submitting to them.
Life is all about lavishness, liberty, and money, which, one will never procure in this country. I
detest every aspect of this society where progress is overshadowed by religious superstitions, it
lags far behind the developed society.
[Exeunt]
 ACT Ⅱ

SCENE Ⅰ
A super market in Islamabad

( Enter Raseena and Anadil)

Anadil: Hi Raseena! What have you been doing here in the mart?
Raseena: I fear it is none of your concern.
Anadil: It is, I hope your father has told you about me and I assume that you have given your
consent.
Raseena: Yeah, Father has told me about many people you are one of them.
Anadil a little embarrassed
Anadil: Alright Raseena, I am in a hurry carry on with your shopping.
Exit Anadil

( Enter Samsama and Waiza )

Raseena: What have you guys been up to? It has been ages since I last see you people.
Waiza: Finding you has become an ordeal these days.
Samsama: What about your plans of going abroad? Do you still intent to go?
Raseena: Yeah, I do
Waiza: Have you thought about your father? Who is going to look after him?
Raseena: The attendant will serve him. His decline into senility should not be a hindrance in my
way. I pity you people for submitting to the norms of the society. We all have been born equal;
why should someone else decide about what robes to put on, whom should I befriend, and when
should I marry?
Waiza: We should lead our lives according to the societal norms.
Raseena: You can, but i can’t. I have other chores to do. I am leaving.

[ Exeunt]
 SCENE Ⅱ
An underground area
(Enter Raseena, Zimer and Jack)

Jack: This beauty craves to leave the country.

Zimer: Yeah, she does.
Jack: Does she know the risks linked with illegally ferrying to Europe? Some people boards the
boat hoping to reach, but they become the food of the sea creatures, while others succumb to
hunger and diseases.
Raseena: Risks constitute life. I would have been a housewife limited to my hearth and home if I
was dreading risks.
Zimer: [giving a bag to Jack] This is what you had asked for; a sum of two million rupees.
Jack: Ah! This is a smuggler wants. Every mortal, in today’s world, is bewildered by money. In
today’s human, money flows in place of blood, relationships have become meaningless before it,
and the world has become a hot bed of materialism.
Raseena: It should be so Jack. Money is the ultimate source of everything. It buys happiness,
honour, health, joys and all other things present in this materialistic world.
Jack: Be it so. Anyhow, a coterie of fifty people including you will go to Yemen first. These
people would be locked up in a container which would be subsequently ferried to Yemen on a
ship. They would be dislodged from the container there and would join the immigrants fleeing
the war – in a boat that would be sailing to the Red Sea, through the Suez Canal, and into the
Mediterranean. Now, you can leave and reach the appointed place on time.

[Exeunt]

SCENE Ⅲ

( Enter Anadil and Zimer )

Anadil: Do your conscience not taunt you for paving the way for Raseena to leave the country?
Zimer: I didn’t do that out of my own volition, and I don’t have any implied interests in her
departure.
Anadil: You are complicit in her crime, you connived with her and arranged for a rendezvous
with the agent. I got to know about this all.
Zimer: She asked me for this. Anyhow, you should not bemoan her departure. She would not be,
in any case ready to live with you.
Anadil: I am not worried about myself. Her father could not bear the news of her departure. He
was afflicted by cardiac arrest and is now hospitalized.
Zimer: I am so sorry to hear this. May he find himself in good health.

[ Exeunt]

SCENE Ⅳ

In the immigrant boat

Enter Raseena and Ishmam

Ishmam: You told me, “You hail from Pakistan”. Didn’t you?
Raseena: I did. It’s been two weeks since I left my home.
Ishmam: What did compel you to do that? You seem to be a lady of a wealthy family. You have
not, I think, experienced the heavy blows of poverty. You have not seen the brutalities of war;
where we sleep with our child in our lap only to wake up seeing him nothing but a piece of flash.
His soul divorces his body because his teeth do not chew a morsel of flood for many days. In
Yemen, we inhale phosphorus in place of oxygen. People suffocate under the debris when the
planes unleash a volley of bombs.
Raseena: I feel your pain, sister. But you do not need to be worried. You will reach Europe soon
where you will lead a happy life.
Ishmam: No, no, it is nothing more than apocryphal stories. There is nothing like one’s own
motherland; where one is born, where the air and streets are lovely: they have developed an
acquaintance with us. I would have never left my country if I was not forced to do so. Heaven
knows what has made you take such a perilous step. May god help you.
Raseena: May we all find peace and happiness.
Ishmam: The last time we ate something was a loaf of bread that they gave us two days before
since then, nothing, no water, no food. Two children have died due to hunger and thirst. Instead
of Europe, we might end up being meals for the sea creatures at the depths of the Mediterranean.
Raseena: Do not talk like that sister. I do not want to die with so much enjoyment left in the
world.
Ishmam: Do not worry about death. It will come sooner or later. Worry about life. Take charge
of it for as long as it lasts.
Raseena: This boat is too heavy. It may sink at any time. Go and look after yourself.

[ with herself ]
What compelled me to leave? God O! God, the appetite for liberty and money? O Thou
bewitching wealth and liberty, it was thy temptation that has robbed me of my happiness. Be a
meal for the sea creatures at the depths of the Mediterranean oh! I deserve it. Fools who love
money must for money die. My bedridden father, what will happen to him? I descended so low
that I did not think about my father for a moment, for a moment.

SCENE Ⅴ
shores of Mediterranean

(Enter two coast guards)

Coast Guard 1: These immigrants are swarming like flies into our country.
Coast Guard 2: It is not so far when our own culture will be on the verge of extinction.
Coast Guard 1: These odious vermins have unbalanced our society. They should be confined to
the concentration camps and then should be immediately sent back.
Coast Guard 2: [beckoning to a boat ] Look! Look! sergent the boat is dwindling. It is about to
capsize.
Coast Guard 1: the boat capsizes. Send this message forward that a boat of immigrants has
capsized in the Mediterranean. All onboard have died.

[ Exeunt ]