The first edition of A History of Pakistani Literature in English (1947-1988) was published in paperback by Vanguard Books, Lahore-Karachi-Islamabad-Peshawar, in 1991. OUP, known for their keen focus on the publication of quality books on subjects ranging from literature (of all denominations) to science and technology, have recently (2015) launched the second edition of the book in hard cover.
Its author Dr Tariq Rahman is a distinguished scholar having held some highly prestigious assignments at Universities of Texas, California, and Heidelberg besides his present occupation as a Dean with Beaconhouse National University at Lahore.
With such an erudite background, only he could have, in all earnest, taken up the difficult challenge of composing an authentic history of Pakistani Literature in English within the ambit of its formative period spanning the years 1947-1988 or even 1940-1988 which would also embrace the period of its germination as a distinctive literary domain. Notwithstanding the author’s semi-apologetic plea that because of his ‘desultory and incomplete reading’ of (Pakistani) literature (in English) after 1988, he was reluctant to get this book republished, it is not understandable as to why he has chosen to exclude the period beyond 1988 to-date, from the scope of his study in the current edition whence the Pakistani literature in English seems to have come of age, attaining a measure of maturity, perfection, and finesse distinctive of some of the avant-garde literatures across the globe.
Of late many a university in the country has introduced Pakistani literature in English as a regular feature of its syllabus. This was not the case when this book was first published. The book in view does not owe its popularity merely to this solitary reason; its intrinsic value in the backdrop of what has happened to the making of the Pakistani literature in English during the period specified in its title, can hardly be gainsaid.
In the Introduction to their renowned work Histoire de la Litterature Anglaise, authors Emile Legouis and Louis Cazamian (as also Raymond Las Vergnas, the author of Book VIII) envisaged that ‘a history of literature must before all deal properly with writers who, if interesting are more or less original; and with periods which, however similar to others, are more or less unique.’ They were also of the opinion that ‘direct, unhampered study of ages, men, and artists’ was quintessential to such a vision of literary history. The author of the present book seems to have consciously or unconsciously adopted this approach in the book. He seeks to survey and assess the Pakistani literature as ‘one of the new literatures of the Third World written in the English language’ without taking recourse to any ‘non-literary criteria’ of evaluation. It is in effect ‘the first major attempt to survey the history of English literature in Pakistan’ in an extended but chronological order.
Apart from the Preface to the OUP Edition, Acknowledgements, Introduction (to the first edition), Appendices, References and Indices, the book contains twelve chapters. One of the seminal features of the book is its author’s perspicacious style marked by his liberal but inquisitive approach, intimacy with the constituent material, and an enviable linguistic felicity. He seems to have also discreetly examined the parallel trends in Urdu literature of the relevant times vis-à-vis its English counterpart to authenticate and reinforce, as it were, the raison d’etre of his narrative. Furthermore, the author has tried to fill the gap in the historiography of Pakistani literature in English caused by, what he is inclined to call, lack of an estimable body of criticism in it.
In the introductory part, he traces the genes of the sub-continental literature in English in the pre-Partition era, with special reference to fiction, to bring home his point that art and not politics determines the validity or otherwise of a particular literature. Language, nationalism, alienation and expatriation were some of the core issues that characterised the literary criticism of those times leading the critics to canonise literature as per their own pre-conceptions or prejudices.
In pre-Partition fiction, Feroze Khan Noon (novel Scented Dust), Mumtaz Shahnawaz (novel The Heart Divided), and Khwaja Ahmad Abbas (short stories Saffron Blossom; Revenge; The Man Who Did Not Want to Remember et al, and novel Tomorrow is Ours etc.) are discussed rather summarily in the context of the development of the genre of fiction. The Indian author has been alluded to chiefly because his work in fiction represents ‘the liberal-socialist aspect of the Indian Muslim consciousness which ought not to be ignored in any historical survey of literature’.
Nostalgia is the theme of writer Ahmed Ali’s ace novel Twilight in Delhi (1940). He was one of the founding members of All India Progressive Writers Association synchronous with the advent of the much trumpeted Progressive Movement in the sub-continental literature. Rashid Jahan, Sajjad Zaheer and Mahmud-uz-Zafar were his comrades-in-arms. Ahmed Ali was also wary of some hackneyed literary traditions; hence he proceeded to artfully craft nostalgia, an aestheticised instinctive sensuality, and a sense of ennui or world-weariness in his fiction which Twilight aptly reflects. His other novel Ocean of the Night (1964) based again on the theme of decline or degeneration, being inferior in quality, has been cursorily disposed of. The author concludes in the interest of literary history that Ali is perhaps a better poet than a writer of fiction. The opinion may well be contested on the authority of critics like E M Forster, Bonamy Dobree, and Gerhard Stilz who have commended Ali for the genuineness of his theme, style, and approach besides the internal evidence testifying to his creative skills that can be assimilated from a close reading of the text of the novel.
The prominent writers of the fifth decade of the preceding century, as discussed in the book, include Zaib-un-Nisa Hamidullah and Zahir H Farooqi, both involved with fiction. The writers of the next decade are Nasir Ahmad Farooqi (novel), Ayesha Malik (short story), H K Burki (short story), Mehdi Ali Seljouk (fiction), Ikram Azam, Sagheer Husain, Abdul Qayyum Khan Arif (fiction), and Zulfikar Ghose who has been treated separately in chapter 6. These writers highlight themes of snobbery, pretension, injustice, bureaucratic high-handedness, struggle against circumstances, and the like, in their works.
Zulfikar Ghose, a renowned Pakistani expatriate writer living in the US, has been allocated a whole chapter in the book with a view to portraying his craft and calibre as a novelist (The Murder of Aziz Khan and other novels), self-biographer (Confessions of a Native-Alien), and poet. His major themes are alienation, rootlessness, deracination, and utopia.
The writers of the seventh and eighth decades of the last century, as adumbrated in the book, are Raja Tridiv Roy, Bilal Ahmad Jeddy, Younus Said, Akhtar Tufail (short story), Mehr Nigar Masroor (novel), and Bapsi Sidhwa who has also been treated separately in chapter 8 in view of her unique literary stature as a fiction writer (The Crow Eaters, The Bride, The Ice-Candy Man); Adam Zameenzad (novel), Abdur Rashid Tabassum (short story), Tariq Mehmood, and Mahmud Sipra (novel). The popular narrative of their writings pivots on social vices, political distortions, and fundamentalism etc.
Poets (Hasan) Shahid Suharwardy, Ahmed Ali, Itrat Hussain Zuberi, Shahid Hosain, Ghose, Maki Kureshi, Kaleem Omar, Salman Tariq Kureshi, Mansoor Y Sheikh, Nadir Hussain, Taufiq Rafat, Daud Kamal, Alamgir Hashmi, Waqas Ahmad Khwaja, Hina Faisal Imam, and Athar Tahir with passing references to Khaled Ahmad, Mahbub Ghani, Shuja Nawaz, Naveed Rehman, Yasmine Kaikobad, Raja Changez Sultan, and a few others are the subject of the narrative in the poetry section. The common themes with these poets are alienation, a recurring sense of loss, spiritual chaos, romantic love, symbolism, death, decay, unrequited love, validity of emotion, nostalgia, and factitiousness of the urban living. Ejaz Rahim, a prolific native English versifier of international acclaim is conspicuously absent from this chapter.
In the chapters on drama and prose, the author has briefly discussed the art and person of playwright Hanif Kureshi, and prose writers Feroze Khan Noon, Mrs Ikramullah, Zulfikar Ghose, Anwar Mooraj, Omar Kureishi, MR Kayani, and the inimitable Khalid Hasan.
In the last chapter titled Conclusion, the author has digressed into elucidating and commenting on the Third World literatures in order to project the implied impact of his survey of the indigenous literature in English in quasi-relativistic terms. At the end, he is led to pronounce confidently that ‘This survey cannot, of course, make great writers emerge all of a sudden. But it can make readers, ordinary readers as well as critics, aware as to where Pakistani literature written in English stands at present. And this awareness might shift more attention to creative writing in Pakistan’ lending it more substance and prestige in the comity of the Third World literatures in English. The post-1988 literary scenario in the realm of Pakistani English literature has a different story to tell in the wake of a post-20th century boom in the publication of practically all genres of Pakistani literature in English which would eventually need another volume of such history to cover.
A History of Pakistani Literature in English (1947-1988)
Author: Tariq Rahman PhD
Publisher: Oxford University Press, Karachi
Pages: 352; Price: Rs995