एक लड़की की जिन्दगी

by Qurratulain Hyder

Hindi
183

183 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1996

About the author

Qurratulain Hyder was an influential Indian Urdu novelist and short story writer, an academic, and a journalist. One of the most outstanding literary names in Urdu literature, she is best known for her magnum opus, Aag Ka Darya (River of Fire), a novel first published in Urdu in 1959 from Lahore, Pakistan, that stretches from the 4th century BC to post partition of India. Popularly known as "Ainee Apa" among her friends and admirers, she was the daughter of writer and a pioneer of Urdu short story writing Sajjad Haidar Yildarim (1880–1943). Her mother, Nazar Zahra, who wrote at first as Bint-i-Nazrul Baqar and later as Nazar Sajjad Hyder (1894–1967), was also a novelist and protegee of Muhammadi Begam and her husband Syed Mumtaz Ali, who published her first novel.

She received the 1967 Sahitya Akademi Award in Urdu for Patjhar Ki Awaz (Short stories), 1989 Jnanpith Award for Akhir-e-Shab Ke Humsafar, and the highest award of the Sahitya Akademi, India's National Academy of Letters, the Sahitya Akademi Fellowship in 1994. She also received the Padma Bhushan from the Government of India in 2005.

Reviews

[Sharayu Gangurde]

I am in two minds over this book. Parts of it were sheer brilliance and the end felt like somebody pushed me from a tall cliff into a dry river bed. The lyrical interpretations of Sinhalese history, its locales, Buddhist and Hindu philosophies spewed by the two main characters, Sita and Irfan in course of their conversations in Lanka, the golden land; the gorgeous narrative of the Sindh and interiors of Karachi had me hooked and absolutely transfixed with the story. However, women always are seen to be more forgiving than men and in reality they are, Sita just seemed to be someone who captivated attention wherever she went. Her Colombia education made her a free thinking liberal woman unafraid to smoke cigarettes and drink in the company of men, for which I don't judge or despise her, but the men around her exploited her emotionally. Sita's vulnerability tugged my heart and the way her life came to be drifted apart at places and in the company of people she thought she knew and loved her, just saddened me. I am terribly miserable about the way the book shaped her character and my empathy for her cannot be judged in stars.