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The Bookseller of Kabul

Åsne seierstad ingrid christophersen

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In spring 2002, following the fall of the Taliban, Åsne Seierstad spent four months living with a bookseller and his family in Kabul.

For more than twenty years Sultan Khan defied the authorities—be they communist or Taliban—to supply books to the people of Kabul. He was arrested, interrogated and imprisoned by the communists, and watched illiterate Taliban soldiers burn piles of his books in the street. He even resorted to hiding most of his stock—almost ten thousand books—in attics all over Kabul.

But while Khan is passionate in his love of books and his hatred of censorship, he also has strict views on family life and the role of women. As an outsider, Åsne Seierstad found herself in a unique position, able to move freely between the private, restricted sphere of the women—including Khan’s two wives—and the freer, more public lives of the men.

It is an experience that Seierstad finds both fascinating and frustrating. As she steps back from the page and allows the Khans to speak for themselves, we learn of proposals and marriages, hope and fear, crime and punishment. The result is a genuinely gripping and moving portrait of a family, and a clear-eyed assessment of a country struggling to free itself from history.' to 'This mesmerizing portrait of a proud man who, through three decades and successive repressive regimes, heroically braved persecution to bring books to the people of Kabul has elicited extraordinary praise throughout the world and become a phenomenal international bestseller. The Bookseller of Kabul is startling in its intimacy and its details—a revelation of the plight of Afghan women and a window into the surprising realities of daily life in today’s Afghanistan.'

288 pages, Paperback

First published September 2,2002
Literary awards
bokhandlerprisen, 
Places
kabul, 

This edition

Format
288 pages, Paperback
Published
October 26, 2004 by Little, Brown and Company
ISBN
9780316159418
ASIN
0316159417
Language
English
Characters More characters

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About the author

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Åsne seierstad

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Community Reviews

Rating(3.8 / 5.0, 99 votes)
5 stars
27(27%)
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28(28%)
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44(44%)
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99 reviews All reviews
Profile Image for Kimberly .
xwinax
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 26,2025
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Asne Seierstad, a journalist, met bookseller Sultan Khan in Kabul after the fall of the Taliban in 2002.She was impressed with a man, who, despite seeing his books burned by the Taliban numerous times still believed in the free exchange of ideas. Khan went to great lengths to hide books in the houses of friends so that he could continue to keep his store open. Seierstad asked Khan's permission to live with his family for several months so that she could write about what she believed was a very progressive thinking man.... a man who she hoped represented a change in the country of Afghanistan.

Unfortunately, the truth turned out to be much more complicated. Yes, Khan DID believe in the rights of people to freely express ideas but he was also caught up in the ancient customs of his country concerning women... more specifically, the invisibility of women in Afghan society. Sultan decided to take a very young second wife despite the fact that his first wife was angry and heartbroken and refused to even attend the ceremony.

This book exemplifies the very complicated society due to age old Muslim customs in the Middle East and is very interesting and frustrating to read.I had the feeling that for every step forward these societies take, the deep seated ancient customs force them two steps back. In light of the United States involvement in these middle eastern countries, I feel this book is required reading for anyone who wants to really understand what we are facing.
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Lord_Arcana
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 26,2025
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Another non-fiction from the gothic Afghanistan which will pierce your heart. What makes this book different though, is the profound potrayal of the day-to-day life in an Afghan household post-Taliban era.
A country which is war torn by more than 30 years of war and is finally trying to rebuild itself but is constantly threatened by the dogma of internal dissidents and the ambiguities of its own citizens- who are thrown in between the complex fabric of a phase where they are happy to be free, still decide to cling to the age old traditions.
The story revolves around a bookseller who is actually a liberal in his thoughts, but an authoritarian at his home, and the various male and female members of his family.
The Norwegian author had actually lived among the family in their house, and hence her account of it, comes to be more lively than surreal.

An easy and quick read, but is mentally invigorating enough to linger in your mind for a while.
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cronna257
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 26,2025
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„Mladé ženy sú v prvom rade tovarom na výmenu či predaj. Manželstvo je zmluva, ktorú uzavrú rodičia alebo rodiny. Dôležité je, aký bude mať manželstvo prínos pre klan – city sa nezohľadňujú. Afganské ženy sa s nespravodlivosťou, ktorá sa na nich páchala, museli zmierovať storočia. Vznikli o tom svedectvá v piesňach a básňach. Tieto piesne však nie sú určené verejnosti, ich ozvena ostáva v horách a v púšti.“

Kniha nórskej spisovateľky nesie síce názov Kníhkupec z Kábulu, ale je hlavne o ženách v Afganistane. Åsne Seierstad opisuje ich trápenie v hrubých burkách, pod ktorými sa ťažko dýcha, ale aj v rodinách, kde sa ešte ťažšie žije.

Afganky sa vydávajú ako deti za mužov, ktorí sú od nich bežne starší o 20 rokov. Keď sa im neskôr zunujú, musia sa naučiť akceptovať ďalšie ich ženy, ktoré sú často vo veku ich spoločných detí.

Kniha Kníhkupec z Kábulu nie je taká výborná ako Dve sestry alebo Jeden z nás, ale je výnimočným svedectvom o afganskej spoločnosti, v ktorej ženy nie sú zvyknuté za niečo bojovať, ale naopak, celý život sa vzdávajú.
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01RuneMishe
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 26,2025
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Åsne Seierstad har en magisk evne til å få selv de mest dagligdagse betraktninger av ting til å høres nedlatende ut
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Oriotiar
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 26,2025
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خلال قراءتي وجدت أنَي أكتشف عادات وتقاليد أفغانستان وتفاصيل عائلة سلطان"بائع الكتب" بطريقة جذبتني وأنا متشوقة لقراءة المزيد.
أطلعت على الكثير حول حياة النساء في كابول وكيف أنهن يخضعن تحت سلطة الرجال لدرجة أنهن يفقدن غالبًا أبسط حقوقهن, كالموافقة على زوج تقدم أو استكمال تعليمها وأخيرًا رغبتها في الوظيفة.
الحياة في كابول قاسية جدًا على النساء, تهضم حقوقهن بشكل مريع, في كثير من المواضع حزنت على آمالهن وهي تتحطم أمامهن لسبب لا يقنع أحد.
قسوة سلطان على أبنائه وأخوانه وفرضه لعملهم معه في فروع مكتباته مؤلم.


,,

الكاتبة أخذتني لأفغانستان وبالتحديد لكابول لأعيش مع أفراد عائلة سلطان, مرورًا بتفاصيل حياتهم البسيطة واليومية وانتهاءًا بطقوس الأعراس والخطبة.

,,
لم تخطر على بالي هذه النهاية لعائلة سلطان .. توقعت "آنسي" حدوث كارثة لهم إذ كان آخر ما كتبت:
"ستحدث كارثة أخرى في عائلة آل خان"


,,
أجمل مما توقعت,ستكون هذه الرواية ضمن قائمة الاقتراحات للصديقات :)
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Sstainew
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 26,2025
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"My tale from Kabul is the tale of a most unusual Afghan family. A bookseller's family is unusual in a country where three quarters of the population can neither read nor write."

After Taliban's rule in the country, Afghanistan tried to set up their country back to how a democracy should be. Tried to rule out all the old laws made by Taliban. The story is both a nation which was determined and believed in rising up after loosing its freedom to gunmen.

n  "This is how first-year schoolchildren learn the alphabet: 'J is for Jihad, our aim in life, I is for Israel, our enemy, K is for Kalashnikov, we will overcome...."n

Sultan Khan is a bookseller in Afghanistan. He has many book stores and he believes that everyone should have access to books but never sent his kids to school. He wants women to be independent but doesn't let his sister work and earn. This book shows the lives of different members in his family and how they are dependent on him. His decision is something no one would ever oppose and will obey even when they see that he is wrong because he is the one who wants people to be free but wants he family be dependent on him.

n  " I laugh with my mouth, not my heart."n

My favorite character was Leila as she was only one who actually want to be truly free and out of the cage. The book closely shows the culture and tradition of the country and how it slowly changed for women and children after years of trying. I really loved the epilogue where the author questions about other families' freedom and gives something to ponder over.

Really love this book. Four stars, overall :D


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MoonSpider
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 26,2025
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my issues with this book are basically ideological/political -- in spite of an introduction justifying her decision to erase herself from the story, the author also says that she spent a significant period of her time in the household arguing with its male members (presumably about gender politics and the subordinate status of the family's women). i think including these disagreements would have made for a far stronger and more compelling story (not to mention more honest) -- as it is, this is just another piece of quasi-anthropological boo-hoo over the oppression of afghan women from an admitted cultural and linguistic outsider. hey, how about letting said women speak for themselves for once?
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T3hSource
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 26,2025
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The Bookseller of Kabul is a book written by a norwegian journalist and it talks about an afghan family. Not a conventional afghan family though since this family had some money and most families are really poor and barely got something to eat. Besides that, this is a very typical afghan family where men work and women can't, men are in charge of the whole family and women can't even leave their houses without a boy or a man by their side, men can choose a woman and ask her family to marry her (by paying her family) and women don't even have a say in the marriage, it's her family that accepts it or not. And don't get me started with all the war that's going on there.
There's so many differences between my culture and afghan culture and most of them aren't so great for women. It is indeed very interesting to read this book and learn a bit more about other cultures, I think it's really important for everyone to know that there are countries with realities completely different than the ones we are familiar with. I really recommend it!
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