ISLAMABAD: An Algerian novel that has been published in Urdu language is a historical precedent and a pioneering step in establishing a bridge of cultural communication between Algeria and Pakistan as well as the entire Indian subcontinent.
The novel titled When Life Desires Youby Algerian writer Dr Fadila Melhag was published by the Karachi Editor’s Club in Urdu language translated by Dr Lubna Farah, who is the head of the translation department at the National University of Modern Languages (Numl), and in English language by Prof Siham Hamouda from Tunisia. It was published in Arabic in Egypt in 2021 and French and Spanish in 2022.
The Karachi Editor’s Club also issued for the first time in Pakistan two collections of short stories by Dr Fadila Melhag in Urdu language (Outside the Field of Literacy) and (For Display…Unpaintable) translated by Dr Lubna Farah.
A statement issued by the Algerian embassy said Fadila Melhag had a brilliant academic career and had many certificates in various areas such as a certificate from the Higher School of the Judiciary - Algeria, a doctorate in law, specialising in human rights and international humanitarian law, a certificate of professional competence as a lawyer and a diploma in postgraduate studies specialising in diplomacy. She also had a European university certificate from France in the field of cyberspace.
The embassy said Fadila Melhag published several literary works in Algeria, Lebanon, Egypt and France, three novels, eight books of poetry, three short story collections and several books on law.
The novel When Life Desires Youdealt with issues of clandestine immigration through the experience of a long journey between the south and the north and from a miserable neighbourhood in the cities of the southern bank of the Mediterranean.
Young people migrated across the sea on a simple boat carrying big dreams. They found themselves in a strange world. They arrived in Europe, where they embarked on a journey that revealed the suffering of African and Asian people and the third world in general, due to the complicity of major interests in the West, who run the world from behind the curtain.
The novel dealt with the problems of the four corners of the world, and in part it concerned the Indian subcontinent, through the character of the Bengali man (Talukder), who was exposed to plots planned in the Western world, was exploited and changed the course of his quiet life into a painful and violent context.
The embassy said suspense, excitement and strangeness were distinctive features in Fadela Melhag’s novel, in which realistic romance was accompanied in an attractive manner. It addressed the topic of clandestine immigration from a perspective that went beyond the stereotype of a secret boat. It interrogated the intrigues of distant history and the aspirations of the geography of the present.
“It was a beautiful, exciting novel worthy of discovery, reading and study,” the embassy said.
Published in Dawn, February 29th, 2024
