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Mr. Mahmood
Isobel is Mr. Mahmood’s wife. She works as an orthoptist at a children’s hospital, meaning that she specializes in diagnosing and treating eye-related concerns. Isobel seems to be more emotionally mature than Mr. Mahmood: she immediately senses when her husband is upset, encourages him to speak to her about it, and validates his feelings. She also takes care of their dirty dishes despite a full day of work, and she pours out the wine that Mr. Mahmood bought so that he won’t get drunk. However, Mr. Mahmood sometimes feels that his wife treats him like a child and speaks to him in a patronizing tone, which strengthens his feelings of insecurity. Nonetheless, it is clear that Isobel cares for her husband and that they have a relationship in which he can be vulnerable with her. At the end of the story, Mr. Mahmood decides that Isobel is the one certainty in his life that he can always count on.
Isobel Mahmood Quotes in Mrs Mahmood
The Mrs Mahmood quotes below are all either spoken by Isobel Mahmood or refer to Isobel Mahmood. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Mrs Mahmood Quotes
Isobel made a few cooing noises. I didn’t know what she meant. She gathered up the dishes and walked into the kitchen…You could say that Isobel is stunning and you would not be exaggerating…When she returned, I was in the middle of pouring the last of the wine.
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Isobel once said I was abrupt with people, I cut them off, that underneath a warm exterior I harboured a cold nature.
“When?” I demanded. “When am I like this? Examples please.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” she laughed. “All the time, really. In a way.”
At the back of my mind I feared she was thinking about having children again, but she did not mention it.
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At one stage he caught me looking and I turned away. I think I lost my nerve then. I don’t remember, I just felt weak. I fled into the office and sat staring at the paperwork. Half an hour may have passed. I thought I should telephone Isobel at the hospital. “Who?” she would say. “Which Olympics?”
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Isobel Mahmood Character Timeline in Mrs Mahmood
The timeline below shows where the character Isobel Mahmood appears in Mrs Mahmood. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Mrs Mahmood
...relationship to the noisiness that comes with living in London. When he and his wife, Isobel, first moved to the city, the sound of an underground train running beneath their home...
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...business. Mr. Mahmood is “particular about order” and wonders if he learned this fastidiousness from Isobel.
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...calm down, and Mr. Mahmood thinks to himself that he is glad that he and Isobel do not have children.
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...for him. He buys fresh sea bass and white wine at a supermarket to surprise Isobel (he “need[s] something to do with [his] hands” and plans to distract himself with cooking)....
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As Isobel drives, Mr. Mahmood reflects on how his wife probably never imagined herself being with someone...
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...the athlete and feels weak. He excuses himself to his office and thinks about calling Isobel but doesn’t.
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...he has failed in life or what the future holds, but he does know that Isobel is “the one certainty in [his] life.”
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