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The Submission
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BetaChapters 13-14Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 13 Summary
Claire and the children take a Circle Line cruise especially designed for the families of 9/11 victims. All guests had been told that politics were off the table, so she and some other widows discuss their subsequent sex lives. Claire had a summer fling with a younger man, but she took it no further because it was beneath her dignity due to her social class, among other reasons. In playing with the other children, William insists on playing the fireman—he always does, according to Claire. But the bratty Hansen twins won’t let him because they say William’s mother likes bad guys. Claire approaches Jane Hansen to reproach her but doesn’t get very far. Nell, another of the ladies, apologizes for Hansen’s rude behavior, and Claire tries to explain to William in simple terms why some of the others don’t like the memorial design.
By chance, Asma sees the Circle Line cruise with the victims’ families on television. She thinks back to the rickety, dangerous boats on the many rivers in Bangladesh that pitched people overboard to their deaths. She also recalls when she and Inam splurged and took a Circle Line cruise. She and Abdul were not invited on this one, of course.
Asma’s father back in Bangladesh dies. She struggles with whether to go home but chooses not to. Meanwhile, she is tormented by the noises of her neighbors, particularly those of the 30-something couple, Kabir and Hasina, who have no children and fight incessantly. Hasina lives in strict purdah (a Muslim or Hindu practice of keeping women separated from men) and often asks Asma to bring her things like personal items from the store. One day Asma can take it no more when she hears Kabir hit Hasina. She knocks loudly on their door and pushes past Kabir to grab Hasina’s elbow. Asma plans to take her to a women’s shelter for Bangladeshis, but to Asma’s surprise, Hasina violently refuses to leave. Asma is left helpless. Later three men from the building arrive to inquire about Asma’s interference. The wise Nasruddin is called to comfort Asma, and he assures her that she made the right decision not to go back to Bangladesh.
The Memorial Defense Committee holds a rally in a plaza across from Ground Zero, led by Sean and Debbie Dawson, who are flanked by two pseudo-bodyguards. The rowdy crowd carries all sorts of anti-Islamic posters and signs, and drawings of Khan and others with targets on their faces, but the group is controlled by the police. A small counter-rally of Muslims opposes them, and Sean ends up in jail when he assaults a woman by pulling up her headscarf. Everyone thought it a stunt, but Sean hadn’t planned it.
Chapter 14 Summary
Numerous organizations have sprung up to support Mo’s cause: the Committee to Defend Mohammad Khan, the Mohammad Khan Defense Fund, the Mohammad Khan Protection League, and so on. Mo steers clear of them all, to preserve his independence and avoid tokenization, until Mo and Laila are invited to a party at a house in the Hamptons that Mo helped design. He is tricked into attending by Roi, who then backs out of attending himself. Mo is greeted by liberal Hollywood actors, including the likes of Robert de Niro and Sean Penn.
Alyssa, quickly becoming a celebrity at her newspaper, has the bright idea of interviewing Claire Burwell. The only way she can think to land an interview is to offer Claire some juicy bait—a promise of new information on Khan that Claire would want to know. Alyssa garners some details from her old editor Oscar—including that Khan had recently been in Kabul, Afghanistan—and sweetens the pot with a lie—that he had threatened the US embassy.
The two women meet in a grungy Albanian restaurant, and Alyssa browbeats Claire with “what ifs” concerning Mohammed Khan. Claire is visibly surprised at Alyssa’s semi-truth and, for the first time, seems beaten down. But then she revives and rejects Alyssa’s attempt to manipulate her.
A television news teaser reports that the “scarf puller” (Sean) was also physically violent toward other women. And so he had been: He once beat his ex-wife when they were married. Still, after the news breaks, men all over the country start copycatting his crime. Unlike the tabloids, the mainstream press (namely The New York Times) condemns the anti-Muslim sentiment all over the country. The FBI warns Sean that his name was found on jihadist websites, so he opts to move out of his parents’ house. He asks Debbie to help him find a room, and much to his surprise, she offers her apartment where she and her three daughters abide. Debbie uses this opportunity to blog that she is offering asylum to “a refugee from Islamist political violence.”
Paul summons Claire to have lunch. The piece Alyssa wrote about Claire has appeared in the paper. Chastised, Claire promises not to make that mistake again, but she tells Paul the lie that Spier told her. Paul informs Claire that their researchers already discovered the visit to Kabul, that Khan had been on a business trip for his company. All the jurors are suffering under the weight of the choice, Paul especially. A real estate mogul offers to hold another competition and fund a different memorial himself.
Chapters 13-14 Analysis
Social class again enters the picture. Claire, who was not born with a silver spoon in her mouth, received her fortune through her husband. Nevertheless, she allows her social standing to influence her choice not to continue her fling with the young man.
Yet another kind of social problem rears its ugly head in Asma’s neighbors, whom she hears fighting. The wife, Hasina, lives in the strictest purdah, both covering herself from men and confining herself in her apartment. When Asma tries to rescue Hasina, she refuses to leave her abusive husband. Although Asma’s attempt to help Hasina fails, this incident exemplifies her strong moral backbone. She cannot stand by when she perceives injustice, and she feels at a loss when she’s powerless to help.
In this section we also see characters beginning to break down, first Sean and then Claire. Pressure and animosity are mounting, which is represented by the protest in Chapter 13. Sean and Debbie’s more belligerent group stands across from a counter-rally, and the conflict culminates in violence, with Sean assaulting a Muslim woman. A person can only withstand so much before they snap, and this is evidenced by the fact that Sean acts on impulse, without thought.
Even Claire begins to crack. After defending the Garden so vehemently, and therefore Mohammed Khan, Alyssa’s lie causes her to falter. This fib is just the final straw laid atop a mountain of pressures—from Claire’s personal grief, from the memorial jury, from Claire’s peers, from the families of victims, from the never-ending headlines, and so on. It tips Claire down the slippery slope that she follows through the rest of the novel.
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