The HarperCollins Book Of Urdu Short Stories

by Muhammad Umar Memon (Editor)

Fifteen stories by leading writers including Naiyer Masud,Balraj Manra, Jeelani Bano, Intizar Husain, and others. Carefully translated, readable text, reflecting the imagination and richness of contemporary writing in the Urdu tradition.An informative preface by Memon, Professor at the University of Wisconsin, and a noted author and scholar. Text quantities available.

256 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2005

About the author

Muhammad Umar Memon is a critic, short story writer, renowned Urdu translator and editor of The Annual of Urdu Studies from Pakistan. He is Professor Emeritus of Urdu Literature and Islamic Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Dr. Memon was born in Aligarh, India in 1939. In 1954, his family moved to Karachi, Pakistan where he earned his bachelors and masters degrees. After his graduation, he taught at Sachal Sarmast College and Sind University. In 1964 he won a Fulbright scholarship to the United States. This move enabled him to earn a masters degree from Harvard University and eventually a doctorate in Islamic Studies from UCLA. Dr. Memon joined the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1970 and retired from there after 38 years of service. He has remained active as a scholar: besides working on translation of Urdu works into English he serves on the editorial board of Pakistaniaat: A Journal of Pakistan Studies and is also an advisor to the Urdu Project.

Reviews

[Neha Gupta · Rating 3 out of 5]

A great collection of stories from authors never heard earlier. Sometimes you find stories immortalising the authors and sometimes you find authors immortalising the stories. Well this is how I felt about the collection. After reading the story I couldn’t recall the name of a single author but each story left a deep mark on me. Probably they were the finest pieces from some unknown authors of the Urdu language. Translator Muhammad Umar Menon himself states that he has intentionally not taken the more well known authors of Urdu literature from pre-independence era like Manto, Chugati, Premchand, Krishan Chandar, and Rajinder Singh Bedi as they have been read and translated and popularised so much that it was important to bring in the stories of the next generation authors who wrote post independence era. Most of the stories are of Pakistan or pre-independence Bangladesh so it takes you a step forward and shows you the world of 50s to 70s as the next generation taking the legacy to higher levels.

I liked almost all the stories – ‘Composition one’ where in a very subtle way a relationship between a plant, sun and shadow has been beautifully picturised, ‘Pose’ – where a woman sees the real world thru the artificial eyes of a mannequin in a display window, ‘Lucky Vikki’ – a cute story of how boys will be boys, ‘Recognition’ – a day in the life of a woman who realises she is lost in her various roles of a wife, mother, daughter – is there more to it or is there more to her, ‘The back room’ – the way each house has its back room with hidden stories, ancient secrets, rumours passed from generations, similarly each person has a back life with hidden stories, emotions and feelings, ‘Some other man’s home’ – this was a classic one where a mad man sees his own house & family falling apart like a stranger would without realising that he is the centre of it all – probably the sanest of them all, ‘The refugee’ – life goes a full circle when a man picks the pieces of a story with his son from where his own father left , ‘Hearth & home’ – have been so preoccupied with stories about India-Pakistan partition that finding out that something similar happened at the time of Pakistan-Bangladesh split is difficult to fathom, the culture clashes and division of minds rather than lands. Only one story which I couldn’t figure out was ‘The obscure domain of fear & desire’ there is no doubt that it was very well written and captured the monologues of a mind caught between realms fear and desires.. but I simply found it too lengthy and just too deep to understand... Anyone who figures it out please do help me understand.

On an overall a pleasurable read.. worth all the time and heart you put into it!!