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When first published in 1958 this anthology of short stories was considered ‘...the most significant literary production of Pakistan. Due to popular demand there have been two previous reprinting, in 1971 and 1987. The stories presented here were written over a period of years and contain a number that have been set in the countryside or among peasants. The handful of stories set in Karachi is different. Thematically similar to the Urdu writing of the time, they depict the unsophisticated lower middle class or a more proletarian world of itinerant labour. Many of Zaibunissa Hamidullah’s concerns—marriage and the role of women, and the treatment of the weak and ageing—are as relevant and contemporary today as they were in the time in which they were written. Some of the settings of the stories are in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh), which used to be a living part of an unrealized vision of a composite Pakistani national culture. This volume is excellent material for high school or undergraduate courses. |
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