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What is This?
Pakistan
compiled and introduced by Muneeza Shamsie
Karachi, Pakistan
Introduction
2010 marked the birth centenary of Ahmed Ali (1910-1994), one of the
great pioneers of South Asian English fiction and, for a long while, the only
internationally known writer of Pakistani English fiction. The immense
changes that have taken place since and the increasing interest in Pakistani
English Literature were reflected by the publication of special issues on
Pakistan of Granta and other international journals. There were also important
critical works by Cara Cilano and Masood Raja, a debut poetry volume by
Shadab Zeest Hashmi, new fiction by established writers Hanif Kureishi,
Tariq Ali and Roopa Farooki and notable debuts by Anis Shivani, Maha
Khan Philips and Haider Warraich. There were incisive political analyses
by Khaled Ahmed and Zahid Hussain, a topical autobiography by Fatima
Bhutto and English translations of early women’s memoirs – respectively,
by a Princess of Pataudi and by Atiya Fyzee Rahamin. There were also
accomplished translations by Musharraf Farooqi and Yasmeen Hameed.
Pakistani English fiction continued to gather awards. Daniyal
Mueenuddin’s story collection In Other Rooms, Other Wonders won
the regional (Eurasia) Commonwealth Writers Prize for the Best First
Book, the O. Henry Award, The Story Prize and The Rosenthal Family
Foundation Award and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, The
National Book Award and the Los Angeles Times First Fiction Award.
Aamer Hussein’s novella Another Gulmohar Tree was shortlisted for the
regional (Eurasia) Commonwealth Writers Prize for Best Book. Kamila
Shamsie’s fifth novel Burnt Shadows received the Anisfield Wolf Award,
the AOLA award and the Nord-Sud Award; Uzma Aslam Khan’s third
novel Geometry of God received the IPPY Bronze Award; Musharraf Ali
Farooqi’s Story of A Widow and H.M. Naqvi’s Home Boy were shortlisted
for the inaugural DSC award which Naqvi won in 2011; Bina Shah’s fourth
novel A Season For Martyrs, published first in an Italian edition, received
Niilofar’s sleepy village. Amid the media attention, Mumtaz evolves into
a terrifying political and media opportunist, while Amynah is forced to
consider her own integrity and confront a few home truths.
In an accomplished first collection consisting of spare, evocative poems,
Pakistani American Shadab Zeest Hashmi commemorates Andalusia’s
inspiring Euro-Arab culture in The Baker of Tarifa. The book, divided into
three, includes prose poems and performance poetry and uses bread as
the central metaphor for an enduring multicultural legacy. The first part
celebrates Europe’s introduction to sugar cane, palm fronds and stringed
musical instruments, among others. A sequence revolves around Yusuf
(Joseph), “His name means/the interpreter of dreams”. The poem “Yusuf
Sees the Ghost of the Last Queen of Andalus” conjures up images of empty
cradles and war. The second part revolves around the 1492 expulsion of
the Moors from Spain and includes references to historical figures such as
Boabdil and Queen Isabella. The final section “Lambent” gathers up words,
crafts and cultures which reflect to this day the Andalusian inheritance
in Europe and far beyond.
The year also saw important translations of Urdu, Sindhi and Punjabi
poetry including Songs of Freedom, translations of the great Sindhi poet
Shaikh Ayaz, by Anwer Pirzado, J.M. Girglani, Saleem Noorhusain and
others. This compilation of Ayaz’s volumes includes a valuable introduction
to each collection and leads up to a tribute to Ayaz. Muzaffar A. Ghaffar
continues his “Within Reach” series of Punjabi mystic poetry with his
translation of Damodar Das Aurora’s great classic Heer Damodar based
on the romantic folk legend of Heer Ranjha. The novelist, children’s writer
and translator Musharraf Ali Farooqi brings his considerable linguistic and
literary skills to Rococo and Other Worlds consisting of his translations
of selected poems from Afzal Ahmed Syed’s three Urdu collections. The
quality of translation is truly remarkable: each poem stands on its own
in English. Afzal’s poems, merging the classical and the modern, range
from the witty and ironic to the metaphorical and symbolic. He mingles a
myriad of images, such as Goya and Napoleon in the title poem, references
to chocolate chip cookies and Egyptian amulets in “It Could Never Be”
and images of blind cheetahs, coloured fish and flying clouds in “If I Do
Not Return”. In “Spring Shall Return to the City”, he writes:
By virtue of the prime minister’s
photogenic smile
Adonis-like
the murdered youth shall return from Hades
And other victims too.
The president shall clear his throat
And the terrorists will surrender arms
And get jobs at the Mehran Bank.
and who learn Hindi, are endowed with creativity, inventiveness and the
ability to mediate between cultures – skills lacking in Britons newly arrived
in India. She provides a fascinating reading of Kim, locating Kim’s power
in language and demonstrating the symbolic role of the amulet he wears
on his chest and of his white skin as embodiments of text. She says that
through the conflicts of Kim, the narrative makes an assertion of self-
disguise and the difficulties/ambiguities of writing. In her discussion of
Forster’s sexual politics and his awareness of the links between different
forms of oppression – racial, gendered and sexual – Hai looks at the author’s
prolonged struggle to write A Passage to India. She examines Forster’s
concerns with language and the double meanings which run through the
text, with particular attention to the mysterious cave scene and its echoes
in the courtroom. In Dr. Aziz’s inability to write a poem for the future
that transcends creed and culture, Hai reads Forster’s inability to imagine
a postcolonial language – of the kind Salman Rushdie set out to invent
in Midnight’s Children through this narrator Saleem Sinai – and argues
that Midnight Children’s constant references to the body, its processes,
ingestions, secretions and excretions present “the genesis of [the] human
body as the genesis of the text” (205).
Constructing Pakistan: Foundational Texts and the Rise of Muslim
National Identity (1857–1947) by Masood Ashraf Raja studies the ways
in which pre-Partition literary texts in Urdu created transgeographic
narratives of Muslim unity which contributed to the idea of Pakistan. He
asserts that the growth of Muslim nationalism and concepts of Muslim
exceptionalism were political and “a question of survival” (xvi) amid major
political changes in the post-Mutiny era. He re-interprets the writings of
Ghalib and Sir Syed Ahmed Khan as a means of negotiating an equitable
relationship between the British Raj and the Indian Muslims (not one
of patronage). He discusses the new movement in Urdu literary criticism
pioneered by Azad and Hali and the reformist message in the fiction of
Nazir Ahmed, who advocated Anglicization while neo-traditionals such
as Shibli Nomani and Akbar Allahbadi searched for answers in Muslim
history and pan-Islamism instead. Raja goes on to compare Iqbal and his
modern, egalitarian universalist interpretation of Islam with Maulana
Mawdudi’s concepts of an Islamic state governed by shariah.
Cara Cilano’s pioneering book National Identities in Pakistan: The 1971
War in Contemporary Pakistani Fiction explores the loss of East Pakistan
which gained independence as Bangladesh. As the events of that traumatic
year have passed into a virtual public amnesia in Pakistan, Cilano points
out the many contradictions in the 1972 Hamoodur Rahman Commission
Report and looks for answers in Pakistani fiction in English as well as in
translated Urdu texts. She provides an excellent reading of Sorayya Y.
Khan’s Noor, which excavates the 1971 genocide in East Pakistan, through
Bibliography
bibliographies published serially
“Bibliographic News” Annual of Urdu Studies ed MU Memon pp298 [see
Journals, Internet Sites].
MLA International Bibliography 2010 [see Pakistan-related items in the
relevant sections].
“List of Recent Pakistan Related Texts” David Waterman Pakistaniaat 2(1)
pp152–53; 2(2) pp94–96; 2(3) pp117–121 [see Journals, Internet Sites].
Downloaded from jcl.sagepub.com at UNIVERSITY OF SASKATCHEWAN LIBRARY on May 27, 2014
Pakistan 701
RESEARCH AIDS
Poetry
Akhtar, Rizwan “A Half Rhymed Tale of a Punjabi Girl” Pakistaniaat 2(1)
pp118–121; “Kitchen Cabinet” Pakistaniaat 2(2) pp85–86; “Betrayal”
Pakistaniaat 2(3) pp114.
––– “Alphabets in Our Time”, “Chapatti” Wasafiri 25 (3) Sept pp28–29.
Hashmi, Shadab Zeest Baker of Tarifa: Poems 68pp Poetic Matrix Press
(Madera, CA) US$15.
––– “Diary of a Wartime Chief”, “Ghazal” Pakistaniaat 2(2) pp83–84;
“A Scribe Is Visited by a Jinn in a Sugarcane Field”, “Notes for My
Husband” Pakistaniaat 2(3) pp115–116.
Pasha, Kyla High Noon and the Body 99pp Yoda Books (New Delhi) Rs150.
Sahir, Mashal Love the Unspoken Language self-pub.
Turner, Mehnaz “Punjabi” Pakistaniaat 2(2) pp87.
Drama
Sheikh, Farhana Mincemeat 96pp Oberon Books (London) £8.99 [2009].
Fiction
Ali, Tariq The Night of the Golden Butterfly 288pp Verso (London) £14.99.
Bukhari, Shaista The Untamed Affair 120pp self-pub Rs650.
Farooki, Roopa Half Life 260pp Macmillan (London) £11.99.
Gandhi, Nighat M. Ghalib at Dusk and Other Stories 175pp Tranquebar
(Chennai) Rs200.
Gardezi, Saadia Zehra “Escape on Ferozepur Road” Pakistaniaat 2(1)
Spring pp115–117.
Khan, Khadija The Mind of Q self-pub.
Khan Phillips, Maha Beautiful from This Angle 232pp Penguin India Rs250
Khar, Shahnawaz The End of Islamabad 134pp self-pub.
Kureishi, Hanif Collected Stories 688pp Faber & Faber (London) £14.99.
Mueenuddin, Danyal “A Spoiled Man” PEN/O’Henry Prize Stories 2010
ed Laura Furman Anchor Books (New York).
Shah, Bina Slum Child 288pp Tranquebar (Chennai) India Rs295.
Shivani, Anis Anatolia and Other Stories 268pp Black Lawrence Press
(New York) US$16 16 [2009].
Tanweer, Bilal “After That, We Are Ignorant” Granta Online-Only: New
Voices <www.granta.com/Online-Only/New-Voices-announcing-
Bilal-Tanweer>.
Warraich, Haider Auras of the Jinn: A Pakistani Story 288pp India Ink
(New Delhi) Rs295.
Translations
Arora, Damodar Das Heer Damodar: Within Reach trans from Punjabi
by Muzaffar A. Ghaffar Ferozesons (Lahore) Rs4995 [boxed set of
4 vols].
Ayaz, Shaikh Songs of Freedom ed Saleem Noorhusain trans from Sindhi
by Anwer Pirzado, J.M. Girglani, Saleem Noorhusain et al. 476pp
Culture Department Government of Sind (Karachi) Rs500.
Fyzee Rahamin, Atiya “A Time for Education” trans from Urdu by Siobhan
Lambert Hurley and Sunil Sharma in Atiya’s Journeys: A Muslim
Woman from Colonial Bombay to Edwardian Britain eds Siobhan
Lambert-Hurley and Sunil Sharma Oxford Univ Press.
Ghalib, Mirza Asadullah Khan Wine of Passion: The Urdu Ghazals of
Ghalib trans from Urdu by Sarfaraz Khan Niazi 301pp Ferozesons
(Lahore) Rs295 [2009].
Hameed, Yasmeen Pakistani Urdu Verse [see Anthologies]
Haider, Khwaja Razi Ruttie Jinnah: The Story Told and Untold trans from
Urdu by Haider Khwaja Razi 165pp Oxford Univ Press (Karachi)
Rs595 (English ed first pub Pakistan Study Centre 2004).
Anthologies
Happy Birthday to Me: A Collection of Contemporary Asian Writing ed
Farhana Shaikh fwd Claire Chambers 224pp Dahlia (Leicester) £8.99.
Ibn Taymiyya and His Times eds Shahab Ahmed and Yossef Rapoport gen
ed Syed Nomanul Haq 400pp Oxford Univ Press (Karachi) Rs750.
Karachi: Megacity of Our Times: Second Edition eds Hamida Khuhro and Anwer
Mooraj 410pp Oxford Univ Press (Karachi) Rs1950 [updated+colour
photographs first-pub Oxford Univ Press (Karachi) 1997].
Karachiwala: A Subcontinent within a City ed Rumana Husain
330pp+photographs The Jaal Trust (Karachi) Rs2990.
Look at the City from Here: Karachi Writings ed Asif Farrukhi 295pp
Oxford Univ Press (Karachi) Rs625.
New Anthem, The Subcontinent in Its Own Words, The ed Ahmede Hussain
335pp Tranquebar (Chenai) £13.99 [includes Pakistani authors] [2009].
Pakistani Urdu Verse: An Anthology ed Yasmeen Hameed 538pp Oxford
Univ Press Rs995.
Pakistani Women: Multiple Locations and Competing Narratives ed Sadaf
Ahmed gen ed Ali Khan 324pp Oxford Univ Press (Karachi) Rs695.
South Asian Voices: Writing Feminism eds Selina Hossain and Radha
Chakravarty 177pp The University Press (Dhaka) Rs460 [includes
Pakistani writers].
South Asian Voices: Writing Freedom eds Selina Hossain and Radha
Chakravarty 207pp The University Press (Dhaka) Rs540 [includes
Pakistani writers].
Criticism
general studies
Ali, Tariq “Interview: Tariq Ali on Writing Novels” Maniza Naqvi Three
Quarks Daily 1 Feb <www.3quarksdaily.com/3quarksdaily/2010/02/
interview-tariq-ali-on-writing-novels.html>.
Alvi, Moniza “Review: Europa by Moniza Alvi” Joseph Coelho Wasafiri
25(3) Sept pp83–84
Aslam, Nadeem “Memory and Cultural Identity: Negotiating Modernity in
Nadeem Aslam’s Maps for Lost Lovers” David Waterman Pakistaniaat:
A Journal of Pakistan Studies 2(2) pp18–35.
Farooki, Roopa “My Brother Enemy” Muneeza Shamsie Dawn B&A
(Karachi) 31 Oct pp1–2 [review of The Way Things Look to Me and
Half Life].
Farooqi, Musharraf “The Revival of the Qissa” Riaz Aamir The News:
Literati (Karachi) 27 Jun p30 [review of Hoshruba].
––– “Musharraf Ali Farooqi’s The Adventures of Amir Hamza” Colleen
Thorndike Pakistaniaat: A Journal of Pakistan Studies: 2 (2) pp51–53
[review of Amir Hamza].
Haji, Nafisa “All in the Family” Saman Shamsie Newsline (Karachi) Jun
p102.
Hussein, Aamer “Flame in the Forest” Padraig Belton Dawn B&A (Karachi)
9 May p1 [review of Another Gulmohar Tree].
Jamal, Mahmood “Labour of Love” Humair Ishtiaq Dawn B&A (Karachi)
2 May p3 [review of Islamic Mystical Poetry].
Khan, Sorayya Y. “Memories of Another Day” Semeen Khan Newsline
(Karachi) Apr p102 [review of 5 Queens Road].
Mueenuddin, Daniyal “Daniyal Mueenuddin’s In Other Rooms, Other
Wonders” Sohomjit Roy Pakistaniaat 2(1) pp90–94.
Naqvi, H.M. “Interview: Hussein Naqvi” Mahvesh Murad Dawn (B&A)
31 Jan, 1–2; “I’d Like to Think That All the Characters Are Facets of
My Persona” Huma Imtiaz The News: Literati (Karachi) 4 Apr p30
[interviews].
––– Imtiaz, Huma “Brash, Refreshing” The News: Literati (Karachi) 28 Feb
p30; “Bright Lights, Big City” Mohsin Siddiqi Dawn B&A (Karachi)
21 Mar p3 [reviews of Home Boy].
Pasha, Kyla “A Primer for the Small Weird Loves” Aasim Akhter The News:
Literati (Karachi) 22 Aug p30 [review of High Noon and the Body].
Phillips, Maha Khan “Well, Dirt and More” Dawn B&A (Karachi) 7 Nov
p1; “Couture Served with a Side of Scandal” Afrah Jamal Daily Times
(Lahore) 25 Dec ppA7 [reviews of Beautiful from this Angle].
Sahir, Mashal “The Language of Love” Intizar Hussain Dawn B&A
(Karachi) 10 Jan p8 [review of The Language of Love].
Sethi, Ali “A Renaissance Man” Huma Yusuf Dawn (B&A), (Karachi) 6
Jun pp1–2 [interview].
Shamsie, Kamila “Eyeless in Guantanamo: Vanishing Horizons in Kamila
Shamsie’s Burnt Shadows” Pascal Zinck Commonwealth Essays and
Studies 33(1) pp45–54.
Shivani, Anis “Of Other Worlds” Mohsin Siddiqui Dawn B&A (Karachi)
5 Sept p1 [review of Anatolia and Other Stories]
Tanweer, Bilal “An Interview with Bilal Tanweer” Ollie Brocker 26 Jan
http://www.granta.com/Online-Only/New-Voices-announcing-Bilal-
Tanweer [short story+interview see Fiction].
Warraich, Haider “A Novel Experience” Dawn (B&A) (Karachi) 14 Nov
http://www.dawn.com/2010/11/14/non-fiction-a-novel-experience.html
[on writing a novel].
Non-fiction
Acharaya, Keya and Frederick Noronha eds The Green Pen: Environmental
Journalism in India and South Asia 303pp Sage (New Delhi) Rs395
[essays, see this section Noronha, Frederick].
Kothari Smitu, and Zia Mian eds Bridging Partition 360pp Orient Black
Swan (Hyderabad, India) Rs995 [includes essays by Pakistani writers].
Malik, Iftikhar Pakistan: Democracy, Terror and the Building of a Nation
208pp New Holland Publishers London £9.99
Marsden, Magnus and Ali Khan eds [see this section Khan, Ali].
Masood, Ehsan Science & Islam: A History 240pp Icon Books (London)
£14.99.
Mir, Nadir Gwadar on the Global Chessboard: Pakistan’s Identity History
Culture 200pp Ferozesons (Lahore).
Naqshbandi, Mohammed Al-Haq Black Water 250pp Fikr Publications
(Lahore) Rs250.
Niaz, Ihlan The Culture of Power and Governance of Pakistan: 1947–2008
320pp Oxford Univ Press (Karachi) Rs795.
Niazi, Zamir The Press in Chains: Second Revised and Updated Edition
ed Zubeida Mustafa introd Zohra Yusuf xviii+237pp Oxford Univ
Press (Karachi) Rs895 [first pub Karachi Press Club 1986].
Noorani, Asif ed Mehdi Hassan: The Man and His Music 80pp Liberty
Books (Karachi) Rs695 (includes 2 CD’s).
Noorani, A. G. Jinnah and Tilak: Comrades in the Freedom Struggle 484pp
Oxford Univ Press (Karachi) Rs795.
Noronha Frederick and Acharaya, Keya eds The Green Pen [see this
section Acharaya, Keya].
Patel, Rashida Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment in Pakistan
308pp Oxford Univ Press (Karachi) Rs695 [first pub as Women versus
Man: Sociological Gender Inequality in Pakistan Oxford Univ Press
(Karachi) 2003].
Quraeshi, Samina, and Carl W. Ernst with Ali S. Asani, Kamil Khan Mumtaz
Sacred Spaces: A Journey with the Sufis 296pp+250 colour illustrations
Peabody Museum Press (Cambridge, Mass) US$65.
Qureshi, S.M. Moin Wandering and Wondering 308pp Qureshi Enterprise
(Karachi) Rs500 [travelogue].
Raschid, M.S. Iqbal’s Concept of God Oxford Univ Press (Karachi) Rs395
[first pub under name of MS Raschid by Kegan and Paul (London) 1981].
Rashid, Ahmed Taliban: The Power of Militant Islam in Afghanistan and
Beyond, 2nd ed 344pp IB Taurus (London) £9.99 [first pub as Taliban:
Militant Islam, Oil and Fundamentalism in Central Asia, 2000].
Saif, Lubna Authoritarianism and Underdevelopment in Pakistan 1947–1958:
The Role of the Punjab 262pp Oxford Univ Press (Karachi) Rs595.
Sandford, Christopher Imran Khan: The Cricketer, the Celebrity, the
Politician xiii+402 HarperCollins (London) Rs1295.
Siddiqui, Wajih-uddin Renaissance and Reformation of Islamic Society: Need
for Revival and Development of Confidence, Creativity & Pluralism
fwd Khalid Zaheer xviii+516pp Royal Book Company (Karachi).
Miscellaneous
Basharat Peer “Life in Kashmir” Kamila Shamsie Dawn (Op-Ed) 8 Jun
p7 [review of Curfewed Nights first pub The Guardian 5 Jun].
Journals
Annual of Urdu Studies 25 ed M.U. Memon University of Wisconsin
Madison, Department of Languages and Cultures 1220 Linden Drive,
Madison, WI 53706, USA Subs Individual (US): US$25; (Rest of
World) US$35; Institutional (US): US$45.00; (Rest of World) US$50
(incl postage) <subscriptions@urdustudies.com> (South Asia edition,
forthcoming) [see Internet sites].
The Life’s Too Short Literary Review 01: The Magazine of New Writing from
Pakistan, eds Faiza S. Khan and Aysha Raja 114pp Siren Publications,
Lahore Rs395.
Pakistani Literature ed Fakar Zaman Pakistan Academy of Letters Sector
H-8/1, Islamabad, Pakistan [see Special Issues].
Pakistaniaat: Journal of Pakistan Studies ed Masood Ashraf Raja Department
of English, University of North Texas, Denton, TX 76203, USA
subs print (single) US$29 (print+online–1year) individual US$80
institutional US$150 <pakistaniaat@gmail.com> [see Special Issues,
Internet Sites].
Pakistan Perspectives: Biannual Research Journal ed Sabiha Hasan Pakistan
Study Centre Univ of Karachi P.O.Box 8450 Karachi 725270 subs
individual Rs250 US$30; Annual Rs500 US$60 airmail charges (for
two issues) US$15 <pscuok@yahoo.com>
Special Issues
Granta 112: Pakistan ed John Freeman Sept 288p £12.99 [see Internet Sites].
Muslims in the Frame: Interventions: International Journal of Postcolonial
Studies 12(2) guest eds Peter Morey Amina Yaqin gen ed Robert J.C.
Young 330pp £15.
Internet Sites
<www.chowk.com> [news, creative work, reviews, chat].
<http://framingmuslims.org> [research network].
<www.tandf.co.uk/journals/spissue/riij-si1.asp> [Interventions, “Framing
Muslims”, see Special Issue].
<www.granta.com/magazine/112> [Granta, see Special Issues].
<www.PakUSonline.com> [includes author interviews].
<www.pakistaniaat.org> [Pakistaniaat, see Journals, Special Issues].
<www.urdustudies.com> [Annual of Urdu Studies, see Journals].
<www.wordswithoutborders.com> [see Special Issues].