In his book, Nomads and Soviet Rule: Central Asia under Lenin and Stalin (I.B. Tauris, 2018), Alun Thomas examines the experiences of Kazakh and Kyrgyz nomads in the NEP (New Economic Policy) period and demonstrates the Soviet state’s treatment of nomads to be far complex and pragmatic. He shows how Soviet policy was informed by both an anti-colonial spirit and …

The artist took photography as seriously as painting By Celia Stahr Frida Kahlo, like her father, used photographic images—often with written words accompanying them—much the way she used painted images: as a repository for her profound and sincere emotions and ideas. When Frida was in San Francisco she continued this photographic tradition. The calculated image she projected for the camera was intended …

Abhrajyoti Chakraborty on a giant of the Bengali renaissance   When Rabindranath Tagore died in 1941, crowds gathered outside his ancestral mansion in Calcutta hoping to catch a last glimpse. As soon as the body was brought out of the house, everyone charged toward it at once. Hairs were plucked from his beard, wreaths tossed from buildings on the funeral …

Mamata Banerjee, the Chief Minister of West Bengal, and her party supporters attend a protest march against the National Register of Citizens (NRC) and a new citizenship law, in Kolkata, India, December 16, 2019. Reuters/Rupak De Chowdhuri Fiction in time of fake news. Below is the text of the 2020 Clark Lecture in English Literature instituted by Trinity College, Cambridge. We …

Raza Naeem on the modernism of Muhammad Hasan Askari (1919 – 1978) It is often stated that a new age of European culture and civilization began from the 15th or 16th centuries – the famed Renaissance (Rebirth). Martin Luther’s Reformation was an outcry of the same but Muhammad Hasan Askari is very upset with both the Renaissance and the Reformation …

In Askari’s view, the West became victim to depravity in its quest for progress Raza Naeem on the modernism of Muhammad Hasan Askari (1919–1978)   In order to understand the depth and causes of Muhammad Hasan Askari’s disenchantment with modernity, Marxism and “the West”, it is necessary to go over the fundamental Marxian ideas that became so distasteful to him …

SDPI honors the living legend with 'Lifetime Achievement Award' for his contribution to Urdu language, literature

By Raza Naeem Raziya Sajjad Zaheer (1917-1979), who passed away in Delhi 40 years ago today, was one of Urdu’s most accomplished but least celebrated and acknowledged women writers. She was a novelist, short-story writer and translator, and a Communist activist and Progressive writer born in Ajmer in 1917. She won the Nehru Award in 1966. She had been contributing short …

Pakistanis are familiar with Mevlana Jalaluddin Rumi – a 13th-century Sufi mystic, poet and Islamic scholar – as famous poets and writers in the South Asian nation had inspired by him. “Rumi has deeply influenced the literature and the poetry of this region. It is a fact that Rumi is so much popular or a source of inspiration for many …

Artists, historians, and writers are marking Punjab's secular epic, 250 years after it was penned by Waris Shah

  Reshma Parveen-Musofer   In literature agency is defined as a personal capacity. It is the feeling of gaining control over ones action. When a person has a good understanding, feels confident about something and is able to make decisions is an agentic person. However agency is exercised and enacted in a context where other factors like the structure, the …

Raza Naeem on the style and sensibilities of one of the boldest Urdu short-story writers   Ismat Chughtai’s prose carried within it a creative jewel in addition to its spontaneity and sharpness. She was not necessarily the most elegant stylist but possessed her own style. In fact,  her style was most suitable for the novel and short-story and it had …

Raza Naeem offers an exhaustive review of this year’s edition of the Faiz International Festival   The Faiz International Festival (FIF) has actually become the harbinger of the onset of the chill which marks the transition from summer to winter. This year it also came as a welcome relief from the political theatre in the country surrounding the declining health …

Saira Mujtaba talks to Raza Naeem about two leading lights of the Progressive Writers Association – who both passed away in the last week of October   These months not only bring a hint of winter in the air, but also a remembrance of two iconoclast Urdu writers whose writings will surely make the temperatures of the soul rise: for …

A new book highlights gaps between aid agencies and communities, the efficacy of aid in poverty reduction and human development Herald Report The debate over development strategies and policies being applied in the developing countries to eradicate poverty has been going on ever since the introduction of the neoliberal economic agenda and the structural adjustment programmes. Independent economists and academics …