Nish

“Akhila, may you also have the good fortune of having your children arrange your wedding,’ and spat out enough bitterness for a lifetime.”
― Banu Mushtaq, Heart Lamp: Selected Stories

“marveling at how every Afghan story is marked by death and loss and unimaginable grief. And yet, she sees, people find a way to survive, to go on. Laila thinks of her own life and all that has happened to her, and she is astonished that she too has survived, that she is alive and sitting in this taxi listening to this man's story.”
― Khaled Hosseini, A Thousand Splendid Suns

“He broke the contract first. When someone threatens your body, you have every right to protect yourself.”
― Parini Shroff, The Bandit Queens

“This sisterhood to which those of us who identify as women belong is the cushion I place my translation on. The coping mechanisms we devise, the solutions we find and the adjustments we make around men are survival strategies nurtured across generations. The particulars may be different, but at the core is a resistance to being controlled, ‘tamed’, or disallowed the exploration of our full potential. These experiences, both Banu and I believe, can be found anywhere in the world. Some of us step on the cindering balls of coal and carve a space for ourselves. Some of us learn to exist too close to the fire. None of us are left unscarred.

__ Translator's Afterword”
― Banu Mushtaq, Heart Lamp: Selected Stories