DAWN - Books and Authors; April 20, 2008

April 20, 2008

Welcome to a generous selection of articles from DAWN's Weekly Books & Authors.
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COVER STORY: Reading Beowulf in Pakistan Beowulf? The protagonist may not have chosen the place of action, but there he was. The penchant for epic battles or minor skirmishes was always well-known in the area; accounts of these sold like hot roti and cha. In peace, romance or mystical ways of the sufis were seen as contiguous....		EXCERPT: Ancient treasures This book is an endeavour to bring to light the visual excellence that signifies Gandhara art and culture Aftab Ahmad Khan is a calligrapher, ceramist as well as a forensic expert. He has written more than 30 books on subjects varying from Islamic calligraphy, art photography, police science...

REVIEWS: Beyond the fairytale August 31, 1997. Do you remember where you were on the day Diana died? The white-hot superstar of Brit royalty, the glamour girl of the ’90s and possibly the most photographed woman on the planet met a fiery, heartrending death early that Sunday morning. More than two billion people worldwide...		REVIEWS: For the children I wish I could travel by the road that crosses the baby’s mind where reason makes kites of her laws and flies them A team of physicians, psychologists, community health nurses, sociologists, public health....

ARTICLE: The ‘woman warrior’ celebrates victory Maya Angelou, author of the best-selling books I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, Gather Together in My Name, and the Heart of a Woman, has also written several collections of poetry including Just Give Me a Cool Drink of Water ’fore I Die. She read her poem On the Pulse of Morning at the...		REVIEWS: Gift of nature It is only with reluctance that one embarks upon reviewing a dictionary encompassing rather unfamiliar terms and concepts related to health and medicine, and understandably so. But after only a few pages into this book, the reader enters an unusual world of pleasurable surprises....

REVIEWS: A desolate province A popular Chechen singer called Liza Umarova, one of the people the Norwegian war journalist Asne Seierstad met during her travels for this book, says that in Grozny ‘the extreme has become everyday’. Extremes of terror and violence, of grief and cynicism have been muffled for the last...		REVIEWS: With or without Prize-winning columnist for the New York Times, and since this annual prize is awarded for excellence in journalism and literature, one is a little surprised at the cheap fiction type front cover illustration. With the sub-title of ‘When sexes collide’, and certain aspects of the stuff presented...

ARTICLES: Falling in love again I am an admitted bookworm; to misquote a popular cliché, all I’ve ever really wanted to do is read books in interesting places. That is, until the A-Levels came along. The combined workload of literature, world history, sociology, and psychology, not to mention the many essays required....		ARTICLES: Collecting first editions How different is a lively book reader from an avid book collector? Not much. It does not take much time for an enthusiastic book collector (and they are a vanishing species) to note the value and collectability of a single issue from the first print, or edition, of a famous title....

REVIEWS Books are a testimony of the publisher’s credibility. This collection of opinion pieces, short articles and speeches of Syed Faiyazuddin speaks volumes about the loutish taste of the publisher. Totally unfocused, unsynchronised and above all without any matter of depth, this book...		AUTHOR: Slave, abolitionist and author Mary Prince may have been the only Caribbean woman ever to come to Britain hopeful about the weather. It was 1828, and a myth was circling the empire that the English air could heal rheumatism. Luckily, her other hope, that she be free from slavery in Britain, had some basis in reality.....

AUTHOR: Literary Buzz, Preserving the truth There are a couple of cardboard boxes of cassette tapes on the floor of historian Orlando Figes’ living room, and my first thought is they must be Figes’s nerdy collection of bootleg jazz recordings. In fact, the recorded interviews are part of one of the most valuable archives of oral history....		REVIEWS: A tale of two classics For a long time classics consisted of an exclusive group of books, focused entirely on Greek and Latin masters and regarded as the intellectual birthright of the privileged ones. The canon was defined by the exclusion of works written by African-Americans, foreigners, women and others...

REVIEWS: A living legend Mazhar Jamil, a noted Urdu writer, has documented the life of Sobho Gianchandani with great respect and assiduousness. He has presented the facts without any exaggeration and portrayed a real picture of the person. Sobho may be counted among the senior most members of the...		LITERARY NOTES: Remembering Nasir Kazmi Pakistan Academy of Letters’ latest publication is a volume on Nasir Kazmi compiled by his son, Basir Kazmi. We were introduced to this volume in an inaugural function organised by the Academy in its auditorium. The function was attended by the poet’s friends, admirers, and readers of poetry....