Module10

THE MIDDLE EAST ASIAN LITERATURE

Objectives:
At the end of the lesson, the students should be able to:
1. Identify literature in Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Iran, Mongolia, Palestine and
Pakistan.
2. Differentiate literature in Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Iran, Mongolia, Palestine and
Pakistan.
3. Explain the literature of Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Iran, Mongolia, Palestine and
Pakistan.

Introduction
Twenty-first-century Middle Eastern (primarily Arabic, Persian, and Turkish)
literature encompasses a rich variety of genres, whose maturation has profited from
internal and external influences upon this literature over the past fourteen centuries.
Modern Arabic literature addresses the full range of human experience, often through a
realist approach that employs the Arabic language in ways ranging from the most
formal to the most colloquial. While Turkish and Persian literatures have both followed
individual trajectories since the modern period, they too evince a similar range with
respect to genre and employment of language.
Although today these three literatures appear as discrete entities, they share a
long early religious, cultural, and political history. While pre-Islamic Persian and Turkish
literatures would prove influential when taken up by writers in the first few centuries
after Islam, pre-Islamic Arabic literature provided the first literary model. Pre-Islamic
Arabic literature is characterized by the mua'allaqat (ca. mid 500s–early 600s ce), a
collection of poems from the Arabian Peninsula renowned for their beauty. These
poems are odes to the sorrows of lost love, using such tropes as abandoned campsites
to evoke memories of a beloved. That of Imru al-Qays (c. mid-500s), perhaps the best
known, begins: "Come, let us cry from the remembrance of a love and a home."
Although poetic themes have changed over the centuries, the ode (qasida) has
enjoyed continuing popularity through the twentieth century.

Literature in Saudi Arabia

The tradition of Arabic literature stretches back some 16 centuries to unrecorded
beginnings in the Arabian Peninsula. At certain points in the development of European
civilization, the literary culture of Islam and its Arabic medium of expression came to be
regarded not only as models for emulation but also, through vital conduits such as
Moorish Spain and Norman Sicily, as direct sources of inspiration for the intellectual
communities of Europe. The rapid spread of the Islamic faith brought the original literary
tradition of the Arabian Peninsula into contact with many other cultural traditions—
Byzantine, Persian, Indian, Amazigh (Berber), and Andalusian, to name just a few—
transforming and being transformed by all of them. At the turn of the 21st century, the
powerful influence of the West tended to give such contacts a more one-sided
directionality, but Arab litterateurs were constantly striving to find ways of combining the
generic models and critical approaches of the West with more indigenous sources of
inspiration drawn from their own literary heritage.
The Arabic literary tradition began within the context of a tribal, nomadic culture.
With the advent and spread of Islam, that tradition was carried far and wide during the
course of the 7th to the 10th century. It initially sought to preserve the values of chivalry
and hospitality while expressing a love of animals and describing the stark realities of
nature, but it proceeded to absorb cultural influences from every region brought within
the fold of “Dār al-Islām” (“Abode of Islam”). Early contacts with the Sasanian empire of
Persia (present-day Iran) led to a noisy but fruitful exchange of cultural values. The
foundation in 762 of Baghdad, built expressly as a caliphal capital, brought about
further expansion to the east and contacts with the cultures of India and beyond; one of
the results of such contact was the appearance in the Middle East of the world’s
greatest collection of narrative, Alf laylah wa laylah (The Thousand and One Nights). In
that same capital city was founded the great library Bayt al-Ḥikmah (“House of
Wisdom”), which, until the sack of the city by the Mongols in 1258, served as a huge
repository for the series of works from the Hellenistic tradition that were translated into
Arabic. AlAndalus became to the rest of Europe a model of a society in which the
religions and cultures of Islam, Christianity, and Judaism could work together and
create a system of scholarship and teaching that could transmit the heritage of older
civilizations and the rich cultural admixture of Andalusian society. Western science,
mathematics, philosophy, music, and literature were all beneficiaries of this fascinating
era, of whose final stages the fabulous Alhambra palace complex in Granada, Spain,
remains the most visible token.
By the 10th century, the political fragmentation of the larger Islamic community
was evident in the existence of three separate caliphates: that of the Abbasids in
Baghdad, that of the Shiʿi Fāṭimids in Cairo, and that of the Umayyads, in Spain at this
time after having been earlier removed from power in the eastern regions by the advent
of the Abbasids. Ironically, this fragmentation worked to the advantage of literature and
its practitioners; the existence of a continuing series of petty dynasties provided ample
opportunity for patronage at court, which was the primary means of support for poets
and scholars. However, literary production and creativity were inevitably marked by the
ongoing series of Crusades, carried out by Christians from western Europe, the Mongol
invasions and later those of the Turkic conqueror Timur (Tamerlane), the fall of
Constantinople to the Ottomans in 1453, the fall of Granada in the Reconquista in 1492,
and the fall of Cairo to the Ottomans in 1517. It has been customary in surveys of the
Arabic literary tradition to write off the era between 1258 and 1800 by declaring it a
“period of decadence.” However, a more nuanced analysis of the situation would
acknowledge the political turmoil that characterized many regions and periods and
would also suggest that a degree of caution is needed in applying Western criteria for
literary evaluation to a period in which the aesthetic yardsticks were clearly different.
The nature of “the modern” in the context of Arabic literary history involves twin
processes: first, renewed contacts with the Western world, something that was
considerably accelerated by European imperial incursions during the 19th century, and,
second, a renewed interest in the classical heritage of the Arabic language and Islam.
Particularly in analyzing the earlier stages in the process known as al-nahḍah
(“renaissance”), Western historians have for a long time placed much more emphasis
on the first of these factors. It is certainly true that the 19th century witnessed a
vigorous translation movement that introduced to the readership of Arabic literature
examples of genres such as the novel, the short story, and the drama. All these genres
were subsequently produced within the literary milieu of Arabic, although the
chronology and pace of that process varied widely in different regions. However, as
Arab literary historians endeavoured to trace the development of a modern literary
tradition in different regions and as creative writers themselves strove to find indigenous
sources of inspiration and modes of expression, a perceived need to incorporate the
second category mentioned above—that of the linkage between the classical heritage
of the Arab past and the creativity of the present—became more pressing and led in
many regions to a reexamination of the balance between these two forces.
At the turn of the 21st century, the Arab creative writer operated at a local level
within a social environment that, more often than not, constrained freedom of
expression and indeed subjected literature to strict forms of censorship. Many
prominent Arab authors spent large segments of their life in exile from their homelands
for political reasons. More broadly, the confrontation between secularism and popular
religious movements, which might in the best of circumstances provide for a fruitful
interaction of opinions, instead—because of local, regional, and global factors—created
an atmosphere of tension and repression that was often not conducive to creative
thought. This confrontation also prompted Arab litterateurs to view the global
environment with considerable circumspection.

Saudi Arabian Writers

1. May Ziadeh. As one of the Arab world’s earliest feminists, it’s surprising
May Ziadeh is a name rarely discussed, despite the significant role she played in
transforming Arabic literature in the early 1900s. Born to Lebanese-Palestinian
 parents, Ziadeh grew to make her mark in the Egyptian scene, where her family
had migrated. There, Ziadeh made a name for herself as a journalist, and was
equally known for her poetry and fiction works. But the feminist’s biggest impact
were the weekly literary salons she held, where Egypt’s most prolific (and mostly
male) writers met.

2. Mikhail Na’ima. If you’re familiar with Khalil Gibran, Mikhail Na’ima is a

name you probably recognise. The Lebanese writer is particularly known for his
mystical works that varied from poetry to short stories. Naimy wrote a total of 99
books in his life time, with the Book of Mirdad being his best-known piece of
work. But above all, Na’ima is known for the lasting mark he and Gibran left
through their New York based literary movement that revolutionised Arabic
poetry.

3. Ahlam Mosteghanemi. Algeria is home to a host of distinguished writers,

but Ahlam Mosteghanemi stands amongst its brightest—having been the first
Algerian woman to publish a book in Arabic. Mosteghanemi, who was born in
Tunisia after her family was exiled during the Algerian Liberation War, returned
to her native country to become among the first generation of Algerians to
undertake the Arabic language following the nation’s independence. She went
on to become known for her feminist positions, reaching literary success with her
first novel, entitled, Zakirat el Jassad – then going on to write two sequels—
solidifying her as one of North Africa’s most prolific writers.

4. Ghassan Kanafani. When it comes to Ghassan Kanafani, writing and

politics came hand in hand. The Palestinian writer spent his twenties as a
journalist for various publications in the Arab world, with his political affiliations
being front and centre. And his political views continued to shape his work,
including his fiction novels, through which he pioneered what is known today as
Palestinian Resistance Literature. His novel, entitled Men in the Sun, is still
revered today as one of the most reputable Arabic works of fiction.

Literature in Iraq
Iraqi literature has long reflected the tumultuous nature of Iraq’s political realities,
and is now emerging from decades of suppression to flex its artistic muscle again.
In addition, the literature of a country and people is a window onto the soul of
their language. The way language is used is a key clue to the culture behind it – and I
need as many clues as I can get! A great example is the modern Iraqi literary scene.
Iraq is a country that has been through the ringer, and if you seek to translate their
work, you’d better have an idea of how the population sees things. Plus, because of
Iraq’s eventful century you can actually see their literature changing as the political
reality changes.
Iraq has been engaged in violent and constant change for almost a hundred
years now, though often with lengthy periods of ‘calm’. In the early-to-mid 20th century
Iraq was a kingdom, In the late 1950s a revolution formed a republic, which lasted until
the military coup of 1968 that put the Ba’th party and Hussein into power. From 1991 to
2003 the country was largely cut off from the rest of the world as international powers
sought to pressure Hussein economically, and then, of course, the invasion and the
occupation that has existed ever since.
One result of this tumultuous history is the division of Iraqi literature between
“outsiders,” made up of intellectuals and artists who fled or were forced to leave under
the Ba’th dictatorship and the “insiders” who remained. Their perspectives are
understandably different, and the “Insiders” often reject the exiles’ point of view as no
longer truly representing Iraqi life and attitudes.
One good result of the Iraq War is the new freedom afforded to writers. Under
the Ba’th party, a great deal of artistic expression was suppressed as being unpatriotic
or dangerous. Much of the literature created in the last decade or so of Hussein’s rule
was blandly nationalistic and militaristic, clearly demonstrating nothing more than the
government’s wish to control the conversation.
Since the fall of the Ba’th party, literature has managed to regain some of its
footing and there has been an attempt to return to the “social realism” movement that
prevailed in Iraq in the 1960s and 1970s, before the government cracked down.
Even more interesting is the departures from these older movements as war and
endless chaos has inspired newer writers to be less formal and more avant-garde.
Today, Iraqi literature is among some of the most innovative and interesting in the
world.

Contemporary Iraqi Writers

Despite numerous conflicts, Iraq’s writers display incredible literary virtuosity and
versatility, moving between genres and atmospheres to capture the swiftly changing
nation. It is naturally almost impossible to streamline such a wealth of talent into a small
selection of authors, but here are ten contemporary Iraqi writers carving a place for
themselves not only in Arabic speaking countries but, with the help of sensitive
translation, across the globe.
1. Najem Wali was born in al-Amara and studied German at Baghdad
University. Following the completion of his university degree in 1978, Wali was
drafted for military service, during which time he was reputedly arrested and
tortured as a dissenter. Given the problems arising in the duration of his training,
the outbreak of the Iraq/Iran war in the 1980s led to Wali fleeing the country for
fear of similar treatment, arriving in Hamburg in November 1980 where he
remained in exile. Wali’s Journey To Tell Al-Lahm is arguably his best known
work, having becoming something of a cult classic following its initial publication
in 2004. The tale is a ‘no holds barred’ description of Iraq under Saddam
Hussein’s dictatorship, stylised in the manner of a Kerouac-esque ‘road’
narrative. The two protagonists, Najem and Ma’ali, travel in a stolen Mercedes
towards Tell Al-Lahm, entertaining each other with fragmented memories and
stories. These snippets are pieced together by the reader to result in a
beautifully crafted novel acerbically commenting upon the bitter personal
resentment and fractious violence underlying the Saddam regime.

2. Luay Hamzah Abbas has achieved international acclaim for his

intriguing, songlike collections of fiction. Born in Basra and educated to doctorate
level at Basra University (2002), Hamzah Abbas currently lectures in Literary
Criticism and has had his creative writing published not only throughout Iraq but
throughout the English speaking world. His short stories were translated into
English by the literary magazine Banipal and his Closing his Eyes (2008)
collection was translated into English by Yasmeen Hanoosh, following a grant
awarded by the National Endowment of the Arts. His four short story collections
and four novels have been recognized with various esteemed accolades,
including the Creative Short Story Award from the Iraqi Ministry of Culture (2009)
and the Kikah Best Short Story Award from London (2006).

3. Muhammad Khdhayyir was born and raised in Basra and continues to

devote himself to the area and Iraq as a whole. Whilst little is written on
Khdhayyir in the English language, some of his fiction is accessible via Banipal,
where the keen reader can glean a sense of his ambitious style and delicate
prose. Khdhayyir’s Basrayatha is perhaps his best known publication: ostensibly
a travel memoir, it manages to resist becoming a coldly accurate and detailed
orientation around Iraq. Rather, in its elusive and faded recollections of a city
ravaged by war, the reader gains a mystical sense that memory and history
serve as the true intrinsic methods of orientation through the paths of life.

4. Dubbed ‘perhaps the greatest writer of Arabic fiction alive’ by The

Guardian, Hassan Blasim did not actually begin his career as an author.
Studying film at the Academy of Cinematic Arts, Blasim quickly attracted
attention by winning the Academy Festival Award for Best Work for both his
‘Gardenia’ (screenplay) and ‘White Clay’ (screenplay and director). Blasim’s
 impressively comprehensive essays on cinema can be found in Cinema
Booklets (Emirates Cultural Foundation) and a smattering of his fiction at the
blog Iraq Story. His most esteemed collections of stories, The Madmen of
Freedom Square, longlisted for the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize in 2010
and since translated into five languages, was heavily edited and released into
the Arab market in 2012 – immediately banned in many Arab countries.
Regardless of his controversial status as a writer, his method of successfully
employing unique narrative stylistics cannot be denied. His commitment to
spreading his work far and wide has also won him notable acclaim, winning the
PEN Writers in Translation award twice.

5. Betool Khedairi has a fascinating half Iraqi, half Scottish heritage and
was born in Baghdad in 1965. An accomplished French speaker with a BA in
French Literature from the University of Mustansirya, she currently lives in
Amman after a period of splitting time between Jordan, Iraq and the UK.
Khedairi’s first novel, A Sky So Close, was translated from Arabic into English,
French and Dutch and currently takes pride of place as the subject and centre of
literary critique studies in international universities.

Literature in Iran (Persia)

Persian literature, body of writings in New Persian (also called Modern Persian),
the form of the Persian language written since the 9th century with a slightly extended
form of the Arabic alphabet and with many Arabic loanwords. The literary form of New
Persian is known as Farsī in Iran, where it is the country’s official language, and as Darī
in Afghanistan (where it and Pashto are official languages); it is written with a Cyrillic
alphabet by Tajiks in Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. For centuries New Persian has also
been a prestigious cultural language in western Central Asia, on the Indian
subcontinent, and in Turkey.
Persian was the first language in Muslim civilization to break through Arabic’s
monopoly on writing. Already under the Sāsānians a standard form of Persian had
come into being that was called Fārsī-yi Darī (“Persian of the Court”). From the centre
of the empire it had spread to the provinces and had even marginalized other Iranian
languages with a tradition of writing, such as Sogdian in Central Asia. In the course of
the 9th century this prestigious variant of Persian emerged again as a written language
in the Iranian lands that were farthest from Baghdad, the centre of ʿAbbāsid power. This
New Persian (as it is called by linguists) did not differ very much from the Middle
Persian of the Sāsānian period except in its vocabulary. Three centuries of Arabic
hegemony had caused an influx of Arabic loanwords, which amounted to about half of
the total word material of Persian. The Persian alphabet was also borrowed from the
Arabs with the addition of only a few signs for Persian sounds unknown to Arabic. All
Arabic loanwords retained their original orthography whatever their pronunciation in
Persian might be.
The emergence of written Persian was facilitated by the political fragmentation of
the Caliphate. From the 9th century onward, a number of semi-independent rulers
came to power who only in name accepted the suzerainty of the ʿAbbāsids. The most
successful were the Sāmānid emirs of Bukhara in western Central Asia. In the 10th
century they controlled most of eastern Iran and present-day Afghanistan. The
Sāmānids belonged to the local Iranian aristocracy and even claimed a pedigree going
back to the Sāsānian kings. Though they remained faithful to Islam, they did much to
promote the literary use of Persian and the survival of Iranian traditions. Balʿamī, one of
their officials, adapted in Persian two important works by al-Ṭabarī, a native Persian
writing in the early 10th century exclusively in Arabic: a commentary on the Qurʾān and
a huge chronicle of Islamic history that included an account of the ancient kings of Iran.
At the same time, the writing of poetry in Persian was established as a court tradition.
The works of the Sāmānids have been preserved only as fragments, but they show
clearly that already in the 10th century most of the formal and generic characteristics of
classical Persian poetry were in use.

Iranian Writers
Iranian people have a deep love of poetry and literature, so it’s fitting that some
of the most famous writers come from Iran. Whether they are more classical or
contemporary authors, each brings a unique perspective to shed light on the country
and its culture.
1. To understand Iran and its culture, there’s no better place to start than
with Abolqasem Ferdowsi. Sultan Mahmud of Ghazni sought Ferdowsi to write
the glory of Persian history and the Shahmameh (Book of Kings), was born.
Much like ancient Greek literature, this epic poem tells the mythical tales of
Iran’s history and creation through tragic love stories, wars, villains and heroes.
It has been credited with preserving Iranian culture and the Persian language.
Reading this fast-paced tome will not only give your trip to Iran a whole new
meaning, but it will earn you the instant and eternal respect of every Iranian you
meet.

2. Born in Rasht, Marjane Satrapi grew up in Tehran and moved to Vienna

as a teenager before settling in Paris in 1997. Her life in Iran amid the political
turbulence of the Revolution of 1979 and subsequent immigration to Europe
became the subject matter of her beloved black and white graphic novels,
 Persepolis. These funny and moving novels have received a lot of global
recognition and were also adapted into a full-length animated film.

3. Born in 1921, Simin Daneshvar is credited with many firsts as a female

writer in
Iran: the first novelist, the first to publish short stories and the first to translate her
work. Her husband was the famous writer, Jalal al-Ahmad, who she is said to
have influenced greatly. Her collection of short stories, Atash-e Khamoosh,
gained her some recognition, but her greatest work was above all Savushun, the
story of a family in Shiraz and their struggles during the Second World War.

4. Historian and author Nina Ansary is perhaps most widely known for her
work on gender equality in Iran. Her collection of essays, which analyze using
modern interpretations of the Koran to support women’s freedom, was published
in the Daily Beast. She has received a lot of recognition, including being selected
as one of the ‘Five Iranian Women Visionaries You Need to Know’ and the ‘6
Women Who Build Bridges – Not Walls’ by Women in the World. Her book,
Jewels of Allah, examines the role of women’s rights in pre- and post-revolution
Iran and profiles over 100 awe-inspiring women.

5. Iraj Pezeshkzad was born in Tehran and educated in both Iran and
France. His law degree allowed him to serve as a judge and diplomat before he
took a different path. His writing career began in the 1950s by translating French
literature and writing short stories of his own. His 1973 novel, My Uncle
Napoleon, a satire about three families living under a patriarchic figure during the
Second World War, earned him wide acclaim and was later adapted into a TV
series.

Literature in Mongolia
Mongolian literature, the written works produced in any of the Mongolian
languages of present-day Mongolia; the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region of China;
the Uygur Autonomous Region of Xinjiang, China; and the Russian republics of
Buryatiya and Kalmykiya.
Written Mongolian literature emerged in the 13th century from oral traditions, and
it developed under Indo-Tibetan, Turkic, and Chinese influence. The most significant
work of pre-Buddhist Mongolian literature is the anonymous Mongqolun niuča tobča’an
(Secret History of the Mongols), a chronicle of the deeds of the Mongol ruler Chinggis
Khan (Genghis Khan) and of Ögödei, his son and successor. Written in prose, it
features alliterative verse, myths, legends, epic fragments, songs, eulogies, dialogues,
army regulations, and proverbs. Internal evidence indicates that it was composed no
earlier than 1228, the year before Ögödei’s enthronement; it may have been completed
in 1252, the year after the election of Möngke, grandson of Chinggis Khan, as khagan
(“great khan”). Its original Mongol script version was transcribed in Chinese characters
in the late 13th century, but large portions were copied in Lubsangdandzin’s
17thcentury Altan tobchi (“Golden Summary”). Likewise, the Mongol original of the
history of Chinggis Khan’s campaigns was lost, but its Chinese translation survived. His
sayings, which were preserved in Rashīd al-Dīn’s 14th-century universal history and, by
oral transmission, in Mongol chronicles of the 17th century, also gave rise to a strong
stream of moralistic literature, which soon became enriched with Indo-Tibetan
elements. An example of this literature is a Mongol version, translated from Tibetan by
Sonom Gara perhaps in the late 13th century, of Sa-skya Pandita’s Legs-bshad
(“Aphorisms”).
Buddhist works translated mostly from Tibetan and certainly with the aid of
extant Turkic versions brought new forms and subjects to Mongolian literature. The
monk Chosgi Odsir added a commentary to his prose translation of a long Buddhist
poem, which was printed with his benediction (in alliterative quatrains) in 1312. To his
disciple Shirab Sengge belong a life of Buddha and the Altan gerel (“Golden Beam”), a
sermon of Buddha. Turks transmitted to the Mongols a version of the Alexander
romance, a legendary account of the life of the Macedonian king Alexander the Great.
Other medieval Mongol writing includes letters sent to popes and European monarchs,
imperial and Buddhist inscriptions (including one on a gate of the Great Wall of China),
and fragments of the secular poetry of the Golden Horde. An inscription (1340) by a
Mongol prince of Yunnan province in China is both an intimate confession about himself
and a document about his donation to a Buddhist shrine. The Chinese Confucian
canonical work Xiaojing (“Classic of Filial Piety”), which includes quotations from the
Shijing (“Classic of Poetry”), was also translated into and printed in Mongol.
In the 16th and 17th centuries a struggle for unity among the Mongols and efforts
to renew their Buddhism revived literature. Chronicles such as Erdeni-yin tobchi (1662;
“Jeweled Summary”) by Saghang Sechen, a prince, and Lubsangdandzin’s Altan tobchi
united Buddhist and Chinggisid traditions. To the cult of Chinggis Khan, which kept
alive his sayings as well as legends about him, also belongs Ere koyar jagal (“The Two
Dappled Steeds”), an anonymous allegory about freedom and loyalty that is thought to
date from the 17th century. Over the course of some 400 alliterative quatrains, Erdeni
tunumal sudur (c. 1607; “Jewel Translucent Sutra”), an anonymous biography of Altan
Khan, relates the story of his wars with the Ming dynasty and his alliance with the Dalai
Lama. A rock inscription (1624) preserved a uniquely personal poem by the Chinggisid
prince Tsogtu about his aunt, whom, the poem recounts, he misses because he is
separated from her. The poem contrasts their spatial separation and their differences
with their unity in compassion and suffering.
 The Mongols also embraced and adapted the Tibetan epic of Gesar Khan,
probably in the late 16th century. One of the orally transmitted Mongol versions of the
story of Gesar Khan’s victories over various monsters (mangguses) and other enemies
was the first form of the epic to be printed in Mongol, in 1716. It became a source of
inspiration for several heroic epics, including the Abai Geser Khübüün of the Buryat
people. (This epic, of some 20,000 verses, and other heroic Buryat songs were first
recorded in the early 20th century by the scholar Tsyben Zhamtsarano.) Jangar, the
national epic of the Kalmyk people, is a loose chain of heroic songs that reflect the
belligerent past of the western Mongols. It dates from perhaps the 16th century; a
version of it was recorded and published for the first time in 1910.
The monk Zaya Pandita Namkhaijamts (Oktorguin Dalai), an Oirat man of letters,
created a new literary language rendered in a new alphabet, known today as Clear
Script, which dates to 1648. The alphabet narrowed the gap between writing and
speech. A long afterword in verse to his translation (1644) of the Tibetan apocryphal
work Maṇi bka’-’bum shows his poetic verve. His disciple Ratnabhadra wrote a
biography of him that is also an invaluable source of western Mongol history.
The full translation of the Tibetan Buddhist canon was completed in the 17th
century and printed by order of the Qing (Manchu) dynasty in more than 330 volumes in
the early 18th century. These and other translations refined the literary language and
conveyed many elements of Indian lore. Such 18th-century writers as Mergen Gegen
Lubsangdambijalsan and Chahar Gebshi Lubsangtsültim combined Tibetan and
Mongolian mores in verse and prose. Rashipungsug’s Bolor erike (1774; “Crystal
Garland”) and several other histories were produced under the Qing dynasty, which had
begun to take control of Mongolia in the 17th century.
The Buddhist priest and poet Rabjai (Dandzinrabjai) wrote religious and worldly
songs and moralistic poems. He skillfully used folk songs as well as literary forms
derived from the Mongol written tradition. He also composed a musical drama, Saran
Kököge (“Moon Cuckoo”), based on the Tibetan story of a prince confined to live as a
bird preaching the Buddha’s truths. A 19th-century Tumet nobleman, Wangchingbala,
started Köke sudur (“The Blue Chronicle”), a historical novel that depicts the rise and
fall of the Yuan (or Mongol) dynasty during the 13th and 14th centuries. Injannashi, his
son, finished his father’s novel and wrote two others, all in the style of contemporary
Chinese popular novels. To Köke sudur he added Tobchitu tolta (“Brief Summary”), a
long essay that outlines his views on history. He also wrote numerous poems.
Gularansa and Gungnechuke, his siblings, were also poets. Ishidandzinwangjil’s Altan
surgal (“Golden Teaching”), an extensive guide to ethics composed in alliterative
stanzas, is a late example of this poetic genre. At the turn of the 20th century, the
Ordos scribe Keshigbatu composed songs and poems that deal with love and politics.
He also wrote a concise history of the Mongols and a versified reader for children.
Mongolian Writers
1. Dashdorjiin Natsagdorj, he was a direct descendant of Genghis Khan
on both his father Radnajab and mother Dulmaa's side. His ancestors held the
public office of golova (head) of a stepnaya duma (steppe council, local
selfgovernment unit) in the territory of future Buryatia and the hereditary title of
Taisha (Genghisid prince) until 1822. They were members of the
YenshööbüSongool tribe (a Buryaticized Khalkha tribe) and were descendants of
Okhin Taij who had submitted to Peter I of Russia in 1696 after fleeing from
Inner Mongolia. Okhin Taij was the grandson of Choghtu Khong Tayiji who was
descended from Dayan Khan making him a descendant of Genghis Khan via
Kublai Khan in the line of Tolui.

2. Sengiin Erdene. Among his most notable works are "Amidralyn Toirog",
"Bayan Burd" (Oasis), "Zanabazar", "Malyn Kholiin Toos" (Dust Raised by
Livestock), "Naran Togoruu" (Sun Cranes) and "Khoit Nasandaa Uchirna". He
was awarded with the State Awards of Mongolia in 1965, the Awards of the
Mongolian Writers' Union in 1976 and the title of People's Writer of Mongolia in
1994.

3. Vanchinbalyn Injinash (1837-1892) was a Mongolian poet, novelist and

historian from a Mongol area in modern-day Liaoning, China. His verses, stories
and novels are distinguished by their markedly civic sentiments and strong social
criticism. The Blue Chronicle, a historical novel, is perhaps one of his best
known works, it is about the events of the 13th century, and upholds humanistic
and profoundly patriotic ideals. In another of his important works, One-Storey
Pavilion, a two-part social novel, he describes life in southern Inner Mongolia,
and the tragic fate of its young people under the Manchu yoke, and their struggle
for human dignity.

4. Chadraabalyn Lodoidamba was born in Govi-Altai province in 1917. His

father was a cowherd who introduced him to Mongolian folklore. He was sent to
a monastery but ran away from it. He graduated from the National University of
Mongolia in Mongolian language and literature. He later studied in Moscow. He
was Chair of the Afro-Asian Soldiarity Committee and then Minister of Culture till
his death in 1970. He initially wrote short stories but is best known for his novel
Тунгалаг Тамир [The Clear Tamir], which was seen as the Mongolian Тихий
Дон (Part 1: And Quiet Flows the Don; Part 2: The Don Flows Home to the Sea).

5. Ryenchinii Choinom was a Mongolian poet. He was born in 10 Feb

1936 in the Darkhan Sum of the Khentii Province and died in 1978. Choinom’s
poems are famous for their fearlessness and realism. Throughout his life, his
 poems were widely popular but never received any official recognition under
communist Mongolia. Many of his love lyrics became popular songs. He was
jailed under pretext of writing poems that neglect the “Socialist achievements”
and his works were prohibited.
Literature in Palestine
In the writings of many Palestinian authors the Palestinian tragedy in modern
times is expressed, deciphered and shown to the world. Through varying literary forms
and genres the Palestinian literati encapsulated the Palestinian cause and envisaged
the looming horrors that afflicted the dispossessed, exiled and disabled Palestinians.
Few great Palestinian Writers, like Mahmoud Darwish (1941-2008), Ghassan Kanafani
(1936-1972), Jabra Ibrahim Jabra (1920-1994), Emile Habiby (1921-1996), and other
living poets, novelists and short story writers chronicled the Palestinian Nakba
(catastrophe) and expressed in very innovative literary styles the human tragedy of a
people who lost their land and was dispelled to other parts of geography.
Palestine was a rich site of production of highly stylized forms of poetry, drama
and even novels, but the Palestinian literary life came to an end with the advent of the
Palestinian Nakba and the founding of Israel in 1948; very few printed books and
manuscripts were rescued and the historian had to reconstruct the rich literary scene
that existed for decades in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. For that reason, and
because of the Palestinian diaspora, and the discontinued lives of Palestinians,
literature produced by Palestinians after 1948 was mainly a literature of Exile.
In this sense and context, Palestinian literature is a literature of exile, a quest for
identity in a hostile world, a writing of fractured lives and hopes in a non-contextual
personal life and human tragedy as well. The Palestinian represents the exile, or the
diasporic creature in the contemporary world par excellence. In his After the last sky
Edward Said (1935-2003) portrays vividly the lives of Palestinian individuals and
various distant, dispersed and dispossessed Palestinian communities.
He explains the deep sense of exile and the vulnerability of the Palestinian. He
says: "The stability of geography and the continuity of land – these have completely
disappeared from my life and the life of all Palestinians. If we are not stopped at
borders, or herded into new camps, or denied reentry and residence, or barred from
travel from one place to another, more of our land is taken, our lives are interfered with
arbitrarily, our voices are prevented from reaching each other, our identity is confined to
frightened little islands in an inhospitable environment."
Palestinian literature reflects that sense of instability and vulnerability. The
Palestinians were forced to live in the diaspora, inside the Arab world or outside; inside
Palestine as 'as home exiles' or in refugee camps denied citizenship, prevented from
practicing many professions and forced to live in a ghetto, in certain Arab states.
Poems, short stories, novels and plays written by Palestinians echo the existential
sense of loss, pain and exilic life that Palestinian individuals and people experience at
home or in diaspora. The articulation of this kind of experience in literature is best
encountered in the works of Mahmoud Darwish, Ghassan Kanafani, Emile Habiby and
Jabra Ibrahim
Jabra, in addition to other living Palestinian creative literary figures.
Palestinian Writers
Since the Nakba, in 1948, millions of Palestinians have been compelled to exile.
Palestinian literature is conditioned by the situation brought by the Israeli-Palestinian
conflict, and it is no longer only the literature of those writing from inside (those in Israel
and the Palestinian Territories) but also of those settled across the globe.
Consequently, the themes of migration, displacement, exile, isolation, identity, loss,
longing for the homeland, desperate waiting, injustice, oppression and hope are
recurrent.
1. Adania Shibli, a well-known Palestinian writer was born in Palestine in
1974. She currently lives between Jerusalem, Ramallah and London. This young
author has twice been awarded the Young Writer’s Award by the A.M. Qattan
Foundation for her novels Masaas (Touch, 2002) and Kullluna Ba’ed Bethat al
Miqdar ‘an al Hub (We are all Equally Far from Love, 2004) both published by
Lebanese publisher al-Adab. Shibli’s short stories and essays have also been
published in various literary journals and magazines, and spoke to us about the
new generation of Palestinian writers.
2. Mahmoud Darwish. When reading his poems and texts from the 1970s
and 1980s, and then those from the late 1990s until his death two years ago,
one can identify a shift in his style of writing. If following the criteria for a strict
categorizing of a new versus an old generation of Palestinian writers, Darwish’s
later works would be filed under the new generation without question.
3. Ghassan Kanafani was a man of great originality and many talents. He
wrote
short stories, novels, and plays as well as journalistic articles and analytic
studies; Arab publishing houses (including Dar al-Tali‘a, Mu’assasat al-Abhath
al‘Arabiyya, and Manshurat al-Rimal) have published editions of his collected
works. Many of his works have been translated and published in sixteen
languages.
4. Fadwa Tuqan (1917-2003), the Grande Dame of Palestinian letters, is
also known as "The Poet of Palestine." She is generally considered to be one of
the very best contemporary Arab poets. The sister of the poet Ibrahim Tuqan,
she was born in Nablus in 1917. She began writing in traditional forms, but later
became a pioneer of Arabic free verse. Her work often deals with feminine
explorations of love and social protest. After the Nakba ("Catastrophe") of 1948
 she began to write about Israel's occupation of Palestinian territories. Then, after
the Six Day War of 1967, she also began writing patriotic poems. Her
autobiography Difficult Journey―Mountainous Journey was translated into
English in 1990.
5. Among Palestinian women, Samira Azzam was a pioneer in the field of
journalism and broadcasting and in terms of underground nationalist activity.
She was also active in the field of translation. She also produced five short story
collections as well as literary and critical studies. The Egyptian critic Raja
alNaqqash called her the “princess of the Arabic short story.” In his obituary of
her, Ghassan Kanafani addressed her as “My teacher and instructor.” As
regards her literary output, Kanafani stated: “One cannot describe her output as
feminist. Rather, one might call it a ‘literature of exile’ because it revolves around
a national cause more extensive from the human point of view than a mere
reflection of women’s psychological or sentimental reality.”

Literature in Pakistan
Pakistani literature came to be defined after the country in 1947, gained its
nationhood status. Its literature emerged from the literary traditions of South Asia. The
literature emerged nearly in the whole country and got its value in some of the major
languages like Urdu, Punjabi, Sindhi, Pushto, Seraiki, and English.
One of the most prominent Urdu literature writers is Sadat Hassan Manto. He
used to write short stories of South Asia. He has a great contribution to Pakistani
literature, although he had been a writer before independence as he was born in 1912
and died in 1955, after a few years of the inception of the country.
Now, the writing style and ways have changed of Pakistani literature because it
has divided into the class system and other complexities. Today’s literature has
involved experimentation in Urdu literary forms and English literature. Urdu writers of
this time have started imitating many fictions and writings from English literature.
Pakistan has been publishing several Urdu fictions and Urdu poetry and many
other things in digests since the 1960s but leading publishing in it has always been pulp
fiction. Muhiuddin Nawab has been writing for 33 years in Suspense Digest called
Devta.
Some digest writers shifted to television drama script writing like Umera Ahmed.
She is the most-liked and appreciated writer of the 21st century with Urdu literature
contribution. Her many novels were dramatized and almost all Pakistanis dramas based
on her novels got super hit. For example; Humsafar, shehr-e-zaat, maat, and Zindagi
gulzar hai, were the most liked dramas.
 On the other hand, the people of Pakistan are being observed to be appreciating
the playwright Khaleel-ur-Rehman Qamar who also has a vast contribution to Pakistani
literature. His written most of the stories are said to be based on real stories. His most
super hit script writing that was dramatized was “Mere Pass Tum Ho”. Other plays are
Zara yaad kar, pyarr afzal, and pyar k sadqey etc. His writings are appreciated due to
the powerful dialogues he writes.
Moreover, Razia Butt is another renowned writer. She was the 20th-century
writer whose most liked novel “Bano” was then dramatized with the name “dastaan”.
Today, people do not like to read more rather than rely on watching the stories or
listening to poetry, etc through digital means. That is why plays or novels are directed
and produced.
English being an international language of the country has much Pakistani
literature. Many English Pakistani writers have great contributions in literature like
Shahid Suhrawardy, Alamgir Hashmi, Daud Kamal, and Ahmed Ali, etc.
The Persian language is the lingua franca of South Asia. This language is
adopted by most educated countrymen. Urdu being the national language of Pakistan
and lingua franca is the most influential language has a great contribution in Pakistani
literature. Although both are two different languages, Urdu speakers usually get
influenced by the Persian language, for instance, Allama Iqbal had a great contribution
to Persian language literature being an Urdu speaker.

Pakistani Writers
1. Possibly the most renowned of Pakistani authors, Saadat Hasan Manto
was born in a time and place of turmoil, namely the pre-Independence era of
Punjab (a region that was later split between India and Pakistan). This volatile
period served as inspiration for many of his short stories including Tamasha –
based on the Jallianwala Bagh massacre of Amritsar. His upbringing also
resulted in him penning largely secular works. He achieved great fame in script-
writing for the Indian film industry as well, before leaving for Pakistan where he
found his true calling. It was here in 1955 that he published Toba Tek Singh, his
most famous short story. A satire, it tells the tale of inmates in a Lahore asylum
who are transferred to India following the partition. The story is a metaphor for
the incongruous sentiment that a large number of sub continental citizens shared
on the day of the partition – of not knowing which country they belonged to
anymore. The story, amongst others, features in his short-story collection,
Mottled Dawn.
2. Amongst the new generation of young Pakistani authors is Mohsin
Hamid, born in Lahore and educated in Princeton and Harvard. He has
garnered widespread acclaim following his novels Moth Smoke (2000) and The
Reluctant Fundamentalist (2007). Moth Smoke, his debut novel, dealt with the
conflict of cultures that modern-day Pakistan faces between the nouveau-riche,
the traditional elite and those operating in the seedy criminal underbelly of the
country. The book is set against the background of Pakistan becoming a nuclear
power. The name of the book is drawn from a beautiful Urdu allegory in which a
moth is attracted to fire — succinctly explaining the self-destructive predilections
of the protagonist, Daru Shehzad, a banker and drug-addict. The novel was
nominated for the PEN/Hemmingway award and was a New York Times Notable
Book of The Year.

3. Mohammed Hanif’s second novel, Our Lady of Alice Bhatti, was released
in
2011 to rip-roaring commercial success. It told the story of a Christian nurse in a
Karachi hospital as she treated and worked with a wide assortment of eccentric
characters. An allegory for the plight of religious minorities in Pakistan, the book
is interspersed with genuinely funny lines. A case in point is one of the
characters’ take on love: ‘It’s futile to predict what love will make of you, but
sometimes it brings you things you never knew you wanted. One moment all you
want is a warm shower, and the next you are offering your lover your chest to
urinate on.’ The author has been internationally praised for his wit and humor.
Hanif is also a playwright, an occasional documentary-director and is currently
employed in the BBC’s Urdu division in Karachi.

4. Kamila Shamsie’s Burnt Shadows, was published in 2009 and was the
recipient of the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award and an Orange Prize finalist. It
narrated a Japanese woman’s accounts of her travels around the globe in the
aftermath of the devastation in Hiroshima. The novel’s success was attributed by
critics to its highly inventive imagery and lyrical prose, reminiscent of other realist
mystical narratives such as Salman Rushdie. In fact, Rushdie himself had this to
say of Burnt Shadows: ‘This is an absorbing novel that commands in the reader
a powerful emotional and intellectual response’.

5. Daniyal Mueenuddin was brought up in Lahore, Pakistan and Elroy,

Wisconsin. A graduate of Dartmouth and Yale, many of his stories have
appeared in The New Yorker, Granta, Zoetrope and The Best American Short
Stories 2008 (selected by Salman Rushdie). He was a legal practitioner in
America for quite some time but had to return to Lahore to look after his family’s
farm as it was in danger of being taken over. He was based on the farm in
Pakistan’s southern Punjab for quite some time, which inspired his collection of
short stories In Other Rooms, Other Wonders (2009). The book was a recipient
of The Commonwealth Writer’s Prize among other awards, and described life in
his native Pakistan through the eyes of individuals from different walks of life –
electricians, woman servants, and even farm managers. It looks at class
conflicts within a differentiated Pakistani republic and also comments on the
feudal structure that still exists in some parts of the country. The author
commented that many of the essays of Leo Tolstoy and Anton Chekhov have
had a tremendous effect on his writing — a fact substantiated by the thematic
choice for his debut.