Galpa : Short Stories by Women from Bangladesh

by Niaz Zaman and Firdous Azim

• ISBN13: 9780863565670
• ISBN10: 0863565670
• Format: Trade Paper
• Copyright: 2006-02-06
• Publisher: Al Saqi

Summary

This vibrant and thought-provoking anthology of translated short stories is representative of the variety of issues that women from Bangladesh tackle in their writings. It includes stories about the 1971 War of Liberation, women's "honor", mother-daughter relationships, the vagaries of marriage and contemporary political corruption. Well-established women writers such as Selina Hossain and Nasreen Jehan are represented here, along with emerging writers, the better to evoke the broad range of Bengali women's literary voices. Daring in both form and theme, these stories reveal the exciting transformation that fiction writing is currently experiencing on the contemporary literary scene.

Author Biography

Niaz Zaman is Professor of English, University of Dhaka. Publications include the prize-winning study A Divided Legacy: The Partition in Selected Novels of India and Pakistan; the novel The Crooked Neem Tree; and the short story anthology The Dance. Firdous Azim is Professor of English at BRAC University in Dhaka, Bangladesh. She has published widely on literary, cultural and women's issues, both inside and outside the country, including The Colonial Rise of the Novel (1993). She is an active member of Naripokkho, a woman's activist group in Bangladesh, and is currently working on a woman's activists' memoir project.

Table of Contents

Introduction	7	(10)
Rokeya Sakhawat Hossein, Sultana's Dream	17	(11)
M. Fatema Khanam, Chamely	28	(4)
Razia Mahbub, Troubles	32	(9)
Helena Khan, Projection	41	(10)
Rabeya Khatun, Obsession	51	(10)
Khaleda Salahuddin, Relief Camp	61	(9)
Makbula Manzoor, On the Road	70	(12)
Rizia Rahman, What Price Honour?	82	(9)
Nayan Rahman, Bon Voyage	91	(7)
Selina Hossain, Motijan's Daughters	98	(12)
Dilara Hashem, The Immersion	110	(14)
Dilara Mesbah, The Ballad of Nihar Banu	124	(7)
Jharna Das Purakayastha, Barbecue	131	(8)
Niaz Zaman, The Daily Woman	139	(8)
Syeda Farida Rahman, Roots	147	(6)
Parag Chowdhury, Why Does Durgati Weep?	153	(10)
Purabi Basu, Radha Will Not Cook Today	163	(6)
Shamim Hamid, The Party	169	(7)
Sonia Nishat Amin, Under the Lemon Tree	176	(10)
Naheed Husain, The Deal	186	(6)
Jharna Rahman, Arshinagar	192	(14)
Nasreen Jahan, Dine' rent	206	(11)
Shaheen Akhtar, The Make-up Box	217	(10)
Papri Rahman, The Rainbow Bird of Slumber and Dreams	227	(11)
Nuzhat Amin Mannan, The Wardrobe	238	(6)
Shabnam Nadiya, AJourney into Night	244	(9)
Audity Falguni, Wildflower	253	(22)
Biographical Notes	275