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From the magic realm of a glass wharf to the sorrows of a community of wastelanders. From the visceral immediacy of filial bonds to memories that haunt, Naiyer Masud s fictional world is an experience. The Essence of Camphor, the first ever English translation of Masud s work, is evidently an example of Masud s unique and original style that is unparalleled.
A Collection Of Some Of The Most Memorable Urdu Stories About The Partition And Its Aftermath In This Valuable Addition To The Growing Body Of Literature On The Partition, Muhammad Umar Memon Brings Together Works By The Finest Urdu Writers Of This Century . Manto'S Haunting Story Sahae Is About A Pimp Who Meets With A Tragic End While Trying To Save The Belongings Of One Of His Girls During The Communal Riots In Bombay. Rajinder Singh Bedi S Lajwanti Poignantly Describes The Anguish Of Sundar Lal, Whose Wife Has Been Abducted By The Other Side . Ismat Chughtai S Roots Is A Heart-Rending Tale Of An Old Matriarch, Abandoned By Her Family, Who Prefers To Lose Her Life To Marauding Mobs Rather ...
A bohemian and an iconoclast, the figure of Saadat Hasan Manto looms large over the literature of the Indian subcontinent. We know of his stories on the horrors of Partition and the struggles of prostitutes. But neither Partition nor prostitution gave birth to the genius of Manto. They only furnished him with an occasion to reveal the truth of the human condition. My Name Is Radha is a path-breaking edition of stories which delves deep into Manto’s creative world, and refreshingly brings into focus Manto the writer rather than Manto the commentator. Muhammad Umar Memon’s inspired selection of Manto’s best-known stories along with those less talked about, and his precise and elegant translation showcase an astonishing writer being true to his calling. ‘The undisputed master of the modern Indian short story’ Salman Rushdie ‘An errant genius’ The Hindu
of The Occult have no discernible plots, their terrains are unidentifiable, the characters that inhabit them have no names. Houses possess domains where you are overcome with fear or desire without knowing why. A lone dark cloud that brings sudden rain traverses the interpenetrating landscape of the five stories. Time passes swiftly in some locations and is knotted thickly at others. An exquisitely made artefact could either be the model for a palace or a memorial of it. Has the woman fleeing managed to escape once again or has she drowned in the fast-flowing river? A narrative thread from one story may be taken up and twisted in another. Together the stories create a shimmering maze where meaning is elusive but from which the enchanted reader never wants to exit.
Even Shorn Of Its Immense Humanity, Masud'S Lyricism Would Dazzle, For He Is, Without Doubt, A Poet'S Storyteller' -Agha Shahid Ali Readers And Critics Have Compared Masud To Kafka, Borges And Murakami. But It Is Best To Speak Of His Style As Pure Masud, For No Other Writer Has Rendered A Fictional World Quite Like That Of This Master Storyteller. His Prose Is Spare And Seductive And His Stories Have A Shimmering, Elusive Quality. Although Individually Perfectly Formed And Complete, Yet Each Story Appears To Have No Beginning Or End, Drawing The Reader Into A Seamless Narrative Structure. The Coming Of Age Of A Young Boy Who Looks For Domains Of Fear And Desire In The Houses He Inspects, A Man'S Life Shaped By His Father'S Dreams And His Mother'S Devotion, A Walk Down Memory Lane To Fulfil A Mother'S Dying Wish, A Beautiful Girl With Deformed Feet The Reader Begins To Inhabit A World Where Illusions Are As Stark As Day, And Experience Masud'S Writing In A Metaphysical, Almost Sufi-Like, Sense.
Along with Manto s open letter to Nehru that reveals his state of mind after the Partition, this collection captures the best of Manto s literary powers. Part of the Pakistan Writers Series, which presents English translations of Urdu fiction from Pakistan, Black Margins encompasses the range of Manto s thematic and formalistic concerns.
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It is the sunset of the Mughal Empire. The splendour of imperial Delhi flares one last time. The young daughter of a craftsman in the city elopes with an officer of the East India Company. And so we are drawn into the story of Wazir Khanam: a dazzlingly beautiful and fiercely independent woman who takes a series of lovers, including a Navab and a Mughal prince—and whom history remembers as the mother of the famous poet Dagh. But it is not just one life that this novel sets out to capture: it paints in rapturous detail an entire civilization. Beginning with the story of an enigmatic and gifted painter in a village near Kishangarh, The Mirror of Beauty embarks on an epic journey that sweeps through the death-giving deserts of Rajputana, the verdant valley of Kashmir and the glorious cosmopolis of Delhi, the craft of miniature painting and the art of carpet designing, scintillating musical performances and recurring paintings of mysterious, alluring women. Its scope breathtaking, its language beguiling, and its style sumptuous, this is a work of profound beauty, depth and power.
“[Manto’s] empathy and narrative economy invite comparisons with Chekhov. These readable, idiomatic translations have all the agile swiftness and understated poignancy that parallel suggests." ---Boyd Tonkin, Wall Street Journal Stories from "the undisputed master of the modern Indian short story" encircling the marginalized, forgotten lives of Bombay, set against the backdrop of the India-Pakistan Partition (Salman Rushdie) By far the most comprehensive collection of stories by this 20th Century master available in English. A master of the short story, Saadat Hasan Manto opens a window onto Bombay’s demimonde—its prostitutes, rickshaw drivers, artists, and strays as well probing the...