KARACHI, Oct 9: It was an event that proved cerebrally stimulating for all those who attended it. Distinguished art critic Dr Akbar Naqvi delivered a thought-provoking lecture, peppered with anecdotes from his life’s journey, at the launch of his book ‘Khujwa recollected — Autobiographical Essays’ at Unicorn Gallery on Sunday.

Dr Naqvi clarified at the outset that the book was not about the feats that he had accomplished in his life in the realm of art and erudition. Instead it was a search for identity which began with one of his earlier books ‘Image and identity’. He said he considered himself a part of the subcontinent — he’d prefer to call it ‘alhind’ in Arabic. He told the discerning audience that after writing ‘Image and identity’ about Pakistani artists he for seven or eight years mulled over what to pen next and decided to look for his identity and go back into his memory about his ancestral village, Khujwa, in India. He remarked: “I’m my village. That village is me.” He said though that village had now changed and his family didn’t live there anymore, he still fondly remembered it. He said he belonged to a family of wanderers.

Dr Naqvi said the book worked on multiple levels: it was an account of what he’d seen and heard as much as it was about his ancestors as to who they were and what they did. He argued that identity was not a static phenomenon; it was like a magnet which attracts everything from the outside but its core remained the same. He then read excerpts from the book which was about Syed Jalaluddin Surkhposh Bukhari, a Suhrawardi saint. The other notable Sufi of his family was Jahanian Jahangasht.

At that point he described the difference between Chishtia and Suhrawardi orders.

Reading some lines from another chapter, Dr Naqvi said his family had black (African) blood as well and gave the details in that regard as to how one of his elders got married to a slave lady and from then on African blood came into the family. After that the family reached Gujarat, in India. Speaking of Gujarat, he said when communal riots broke out in the region a great many Muslims took refuge in the roza of one his Sufi saints. He reasoned that happened because Sufis preached religion through practice, by learning local languages, meeting people, engaging them in a dialogue and by being respectful of others.

Dr Naqvi said the book was part oral history and part what he discovered by reading Sufi literature. He said his wife wanted to visit Khujwa, but he didn’t have the heart to go there. He said the village had grown, however he loved it for what he’d preserved of it in his memory. He commented it was tragic that history was often confused with religion. He said it was his immediate ancestor, Ghulam Mohammad, who laid the foundation for Khujwa in 1823. He said Ghulam Mohammad’s father was a Sunni, which led him to narrate the tale of how he (Dr Naqvi) himself got married to a Sunni woman.

Dr Naqvi said many of his forefathers were people of all seasons; they compromised without relinquishing their values. He spoke about his grandfather with great affection and stated that whenever he underwent an ordeal in his life (when he was a rebel) the memory of his grandfather guided him to the right path. He rounded off his talk by reverting to the question of identity and read out the following couplets by Ghalib and Iqbal:

Poochte hain wo ke Ghalib kon hai Koee batlao ke hum batlaen kia Dhoondta phirta hai kion Iqbal apney aap ko Aap hi goya musafir aap hi manzil hoon main Sensing that some hadn’t understood the lines, Dr Naqvi said he considered those culturally poor who didn’t understand Urdu because each Urdu word carried many meanings. “Self-denial is the biggest disease,” he stressed.

Responding to a question regarding the West’s comprehension of Sufism, Dr Naqvi said Sufism was mistaken for spiritualism in the West; Sufism had a lot to do with worldliness.