Abdulla Qahhor and “Bemor”

In the story “Bemor” (The Sick Woman, 1936) Sotiboldi’s wife is gravely ill. Instead of treating her, various village “healers” use superstitious methods: one takes blood, a baxshi chants with a drum, another woman beats her with a willow switch, a “chilyosin” rite is held. None helps. The little four-year-old daughter prays in the morning for her mother. The wife dies at dawn while the little girl, unaware, keeps praying. The rich man Abdug‘aniboy does not help either: finding the twenty-five so‘m for a doctor was impossible for Sotiboldi. In the story it is not only the woman who is sick but the whole society — with the disease of ignorance, superstition and poverty. That is exactly why the Jadids fought for enlightenment. The writer tells the heavy event calmly without exaggeration, and this strongly affects the reader.