Literature and Fiction

A much-longed daughter is born with hair the colour of sunlight on the river. The shock of Daria’s silvery hair makes the midwife wet herself in the birthing room — an omen for the village gossip. The impropriety surrounding Daria’s birth travels round the village of Gulab Ganga, as the neighbours and relatives speculate what the future has in store for such a girl. Daria grows up affected by the rumours that circulate around the village each and every time she does anything atypical of a girl of her background.

From the Gangetic plains to the Karakoram Heights is volume I of Maidu1-Haq’s memoirs, Unknown, Unhonoured and Unsung. It recounts his early schooling at Delhi, his engineering studies at the Bengal College of Engineering, Shibpur, his military training at the Indian Military Academy, his experiences during his various postings as a soldier in the Pakistan Army.

Shahid Suhrawardy (1890-1965) was a man for all seasons: poet, translator, art critic, theatrical producer, academic, public servant, diplomat, man about town and bon vivant. This volume brings together for the first time his entire poetic output — two collections of his own poetry and one of his collaborative translations from Chinese. Beginning as a poet in the Edwardian manner, he quickly metamorphosed first a modern poet. He is the first modern poet of the South Asian subcontinent, and indeed one of the first generation of modern poets in the English language.

Crowded and disordered, the city of Dhaka, routinely deals out unexpected blows, setbacks, and isolation as well as success and epiphany to its denizens, some of whom populate this collection of nine stories. The city comes of age over the course of these tales, from its sleepy start as a provincial capital to the great, dysfunctional megalopolis it is today. So, too, the ages of the city are mirrored by the characters of these stories who face youthful challenges to love and ambition as well as more mature pressures and disappointments.