My Forbidden Face: Growing Up Under the Taliban: A Young Woman's Story

I looked forward to reading Latifa's account of growing up female under Taliban rule (as the subtitle revealed). However, I felt a little disappointed when most of her recollections dealt with her life in Kabul *before* Taliban rule. Her observations of how her life has changed since she was banned from education and work were excellent but short. Rather, she delves into her past and recounts how she lived under Soviet rule and subsequent tribal leaders. To read about the earlier sections of her life was good but I feel that the title of this book is misleading. In addition, chapters toward the conclusion of the book were confusing and convoluted as she jumped from one time period to another without any context or explanation. It appeared that she was hurrying to finish the remaining chapters in a mad dash.

Regardless, MY FORBIDDEN FACE is a worthwhile read and suggested to all those who are interested. Latifa succeeds in putting a [human] perspective to this horrifying phenomenon. Hopefully history will not repeat.


Absolutely gripping: NEVER FORGET what women endured   August 23, 2002
Joel L. Gandelman (San Diego, CA USA)
12 out of 13 found this review helpful

Latifa's nonfictional My Forbidden Face is absolutely DEVASTATING -- to defenders of the Taliban's rule and those who somehow still insist that women weren't systematically mentally and physically brutalized under their thankfully vanished rule. This is a TRUE motivational book: thoughtful -- and compassionate -- people of ALL religions will want to ensure that human beings are never EVER treated like this again. Are there REALLY people who consider human life as cheap as a crow's feather (or considerably cheaper)? The events of the past year aside, just Read My Forbidden Face. Your answer (y-e-s) is HERE.

This book is written by Latifa (a pen name), a 22-year-old woman who details how her life was "confiscated" from her by the Taliban in Kabul when she was 16. This compelling and super fast-read (and no, the fact it's a translation does not diminish its impact one iota) raises several issues: the way women were treated under Taliban rule, the low value placed on human life, how countries become pawns of other countries -- and how books are so much more effective than film. t.v. or cable in communicating a real life horror story through the eyes...and thoughts...of a young dismayed woman.

Bit by bit she recounts how, as a teen indeed influenced by Western culture's music and cultural figures (she had a poster of Brook Shields on her wall.) her world was turned upside down when the Taliban, taking advantage of warring factions and supported by Pakistani intelligence and the United States, hijacked her country.

Banks closed. Radios and t.v.s were literally shattered to smithereens by the new fundamentalist rulers. Tangles of once-innocent cassette tape became bittersweet symbols, she writes, "hanging in the trees, swaying in the autumn breeze like sinister wreaths." Spies were everywhere. A Taliban-supporting mother went crazy after her son was brutally was beaten to death by the new regime's thugs for his heinous crime -- playing a VCR. Teenage boys were forced to slap other teen boys as punishment or face their own, even more brutal punishment.

Talifa recounts this systematically and you get a sinking feeling as she goes on about women being beaten for wearing white. Women being executed in the soccer stadium for going out without a man or not dressing in "chandra" (covering her arms and face) clothing, the wearing of which she likens to a mobile "jail cell." Official mutilations of the disobedient, for even tiny infractions, were routine.

A highly poignant scene recounts how she released her beloved canary, figuring it would be outlawed -- as it indeed was, along with tea kettles and any form of whistling. Even kids playthings were taboo:"Poor little boys, and poor Afghanistan!" she writes. " Those kites once looks so lovely in our skies.''

A key triumph is how she describes her sense of loss and grief over the fact that under the Taliban the only future she faced was being a virtual house prisoner. As a girl, she
dreamed of being journalist, but the regime banned careers or education for women. A highly effective passage recounts precisely what it was like for a young woman to stay
home, supremely bored, looking at every nook and cranny, and having to "wander around my home like a convict taking a tour of her cell...This time they're really killing us, killing
all girls and women. They're killing us stealthily, in silence..''

In the end, the gang rapes of women, the executions, the daily horrors manifested by the draconian Taliban decrees did not terrorize her as much as spark courageous defiance, so she got involved in an underground school to give youngster a chance at a non-Taliban education. When this book was published she was living in exile in France. More gripping than any cable or television special, more dramatic than any movie, this quick-but-vital read is a MUST. Read it, gift it, pass it along...and never forget it as more daily events unfold.


Good but lacks Depth & Detail   March 25, 2002
11 out of 12 found this review helpful

As a supporter of women's rights all over the world, when I saw an ad about this book I bought the book straight away. It is a heart-wrenching account in so many ways--letting the reader witness a monstrous environment through the tiny slit of the burqa. I read the book in one sitting (very brief book) and while I do not regret buying the book, and recommend that the world support these women in whatever they can do to further their fight for basic freedom, I was slightly disappointed. Why? The book was very obviously hastily written and without the detail I felt I needed. Compelling accounts ARE revealed about other women but the author only devotes a couple of pages to stories that absolutely require a chapter. The book ended without details of life in that country after the Taliban were defeated. Although the young author could not return to the country (for fear of personal safety) surely she could have gotten information from inside the country to answer the many questions that are in all our minds. I felt the book was choppy and that the publisher and the editor had not guided this young writer to write a full account. I felt as though I left a potential banquet without being fulfilled! Still, as said above, I recommend the book, and think that everyone should support this endeavor. I believe that it will be necessary to go to other books to get the detail necessary to fully understand what life is like for women behind the veil or burqa. I STRONGLY recommend: Price Of Honor; Nine Parts of Desire, and Princess: A True Story of Life Behind the veil in Saudi Arabia. These books are much more detailed and mind-expanding. The richness and narrowness of women's lives in that part of the world are fully revealed in these books, and in particular the book about Princess Sultana in Princess. But read all three along with My Forbidden Face,and you will have detailed, yet haunting information that I believe will certainly propel many people to action.


The horrors of the Taliban from a young woman's perspective   March 14, 2002
lucy costigan (Wexford, Ireland)
9 out of 9 found this review helpful

This is an excellent read. It's the story of Latifa, a 15-year old Afghan who has always dreamed of becoming a journalist. She's intelligent, perceptive and so full of life. But she has already witnessed so many coups and invasions. Yet the worst is yet to come with the arrival of the Taliban. Latifa finds herself and her family virtually imprisioned in their own home. Women cannot go outside unaccompanied by a male and they are obliged by decree to wear a huge heavy black garb that covers the body entirely. There are slits in the material where women can just barely see through. Education for women is banned. Women can't work outside the home. Professional women who have worked at top levels in the old Afghanistan are now treated as little better than animals. Atrocities occur on a daily basis - public executions and amputations, torture, rape, beatings and whippings in the streets.
Latifa and her family are finally forced to flee their homeland. It's only then that she gets the chance to put her experiences onto paper and to let the world know what the Taliban is doing to a people who are left broken, friendless and desperately alone.
For anyone interested in history, war, politics or simply in true life stories this is a wonderful piece of work which should be read and highly publicised.