How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #1
Behind our craft's bow sit my two granddaughters, Gulbadan and Rurayya. No longer girls, each is a wondrous incarnation of my daughter. Looking at them, I think that time has moved too swiftly, that just yesterday I was stroking the soles of their diminutive, untested feet. My love for my granddaughters is even stronger now than it was then. When I see them I feel as if I'm moving forward into places harboring no regrets, no memories to remind me of my scars, those thick welts upon my mind and body. (Part I.4)
This is such a sweet way to describe getting old, and it gives all of us optimism for the days when we're old and yelling at kids to get off our lawn.
Quote #2
The next few years were peaceful, quiet in the way Allah intended. Infants learned to crawl while our elderly journeyed to Paradise. Crops were sown and reaped, then sown again. Certainly battles were fought, but battles had always been a constant in our lives. At least we suffered through no famine, plague, or shaking of the ground. Our homes rarely caught fire, and our prayers mostly seemed answered. (7.1)
It can be a tricky business to jump forward in time when you're writing a novel. Just saying "ten years later" is pretty blah, and you want to create a smooth transition so the readers don't just mentally check out. Shors has mastered the art of the time passage by describing it this way. Isn't it pretty?
Quote #3
I held her, feeling the heavy toll of years, years short in number but becoming long with demands. I was tired of being strong, so weary of duty and scheming that at that moment I'd have traded my station with any serving girl in Agra. (7.93)
Jahanara's right: happy years tend to fly by, but difficult years drag on and on and on. The poor girl has had a couple of really tough years, so this period of must have felt like an eternity.
Quote #4
I hadn't been within its enshrouding walls for many days, but I suddenly felt an urge to relax, now that my plans were in place. Time's passage had changed little in the harem, even if the women who had always surrounded me looked older and fatter. (10.119)
Hey, now, Jahanara, not everyone has access to a gym, okay? There's hardly even room to run laps in the harem. She says the same thing about an older Ladli, too…
Quote #5
My child let out a whimper. She raised a miniature fist in the air, as if to protest this harsh induction to our world. She's already strong, I thought, bending down to kiss her fingers. They were impossibly small, and again I found myself in awe of her. Does every mother, I wondered, stumble upon this moment in time and discover that her life, however arduous, has import? (11.165)
Is such a moment in time a universal experience? And would you say that Arjumand's birth is really the first time Jahanara's life has had import? Why do you think Jahanara says this?
Quote #6
Time spent caged ceases to feel like time. It's more akin to a long bout of illness, debilitating and wretched. (18.1)
Yeah, we can't exactly relate, so we'll take Jahanara's word for it.
Quote #7
It gave me scant surprise to see that since my escape from the Red Fort I'd shed what little fat I carried. Yet I disliked how my skin was starting to age. It didn't appear as ripe as before and seemed loser on my bones. I had seen thirty-six years, after all, and I knew that a woman's beauty was considered a fleeting thing. Perhaps mine was already gone. (19.91)
Man, Jahanara is really tough on herself. She's not the first woman to consider time an enemy that must be fought (just take a look at any of the Real Housewives to see what that looks like), but thirty-six is hardly ancient. (Okay, it was more ancient way back then, but these days, it's nothing.)
This self-consciousness doesn't come out of nowhere, though: the idea that a woman's beauty is fleeting and seated in youth has been a cultural constant for hundreds of years.
Quote #8
A part of me rejoiced at finding them alive and bartering for their freedom, whereas another part lamented our inevitable separation. How could I endure another five years in their absence? "What do you think?" I asked Nizam, knowing that he had missed nothing.
"I think that time is fleeting. Far better to have them in a few years than not at all." (20.79)
The whole "time flies" thing must be a conspiracy constructed by the olds, because um, hello, high school can feel like it lasts forever…and that was only four years. Five years must be an eternity.
Quote #9
I'd last seen my friend and my brother many years previous and my eyes widened in shock. Ladli appeared little different: even if her hips and belly had thickened, age hadn't tempered her beauty.
[…]
Aurangzeb, meanwhile, looked as if time had sucked the vigor from him. He was much thinner than I remembered. His face was deeply lined, though not with wrinkles of laughter but of vexation. His beard was gray and his hair had receded. (23.21)
Some people think that over time you start to look like your inner nature. Like, compare Mrs. Claus with the Wicked Witch. They're both old women, but one is inherently good-natured and kind, so she gets little laugh wrinkles by her eyes and a furrowed brow from worrying about loved ones—and the result is adorable.
The Wicked Witch is, well, wicked…and she looks like it, too. Her wrinkles come from scowling too much—and possibly from avoiding water.
Moving on, we think this is the case with Ladli and Aurangzeb. He looks terrible because he feels terrible. Age is just allowing that terribleness to physically manifest.
Quote #10
After her departure I felt, as any mother might, that time was moving swifter. Still, I had Isa. And our love didn't dwindle with age. It flourished, even if growing old together wasn't always easy. A time came when Isa couldn't lift the heavy stones that he built with. He often hurt himself, and I spent long nights tending to his crushed fingers and toes. He also began to forget things. I slept more, walked less and rarely went swimming. But despite our aches and pains, we were happy. We had each other, and almost every day that blessing was more than good enough. (25.31)
Time can be both a blessing and a curse, eh?