Rauf Parekh

Literary Notes: Pashto proverbs: wisdom handed down through centuries

‘THOSE who live in a glasshouse should change clothes in dark’, goes the anti-proverb, parodying the last part ... Published 08 Nov, 2022 05:13am

Literary Notes: Intertextuality, postmodernist critical theories and Zamir Ali Badayuni

JULIA Kristeva, the feminist and critic, is usually credited with coining the term intertextuality. It basically... Published 31 Oct, 2022 03:40am

Literary Notes: Little-known Pakistani language Shina gets a bilingual dictionary

PAKISTAN is a linguistic paradise from a linguist’s point of view as in just two of its regions —... Published 24 Oct, 2022 07:08am

Literary Notes: Sir Syed’s newly discovered lectures, speeches collected in three volumes

OCTOBER 17 marks birth anniversary of Sir Syed Ahmed Khan (1817-1898), one of the colossi who helped shape not only... Published 17 Oct, 2022 07:30am

Literary notes: Is Urdu just a sweet-sounding poetic language?

ELENA Bashir in her article ‘Urdu and linguistics: a fraught but evolving relationship’, published in Wisconsin... Published 03 Oct, 2022 06:45am

Literary Notes: Determining grammatical gender in Urdu with authenticity

PUT in simple words, gender tells us whether a noun or pronoun is male or female. Technically speaking, in grammar,... Published 26 Sep, 2022 04:30am

literary Notes: Can a poet afford to despise spotlight?

IN this era of selfies, often described as the era of narcissism, how can a poet hide their poetry from the public... Published 19 Sep, 2022 04:00am

Literary notes: Sabras: the earliest book of literary prose in Urdu

NO matter how strange it may sound, the fact is though Urdu was born in North India, its earliest written literary... Published 12 Sep, 2022 04:43am

Literary Notes: Karachi’s Ghalib Library: half a century of service to literature

AS the year 1969 was approaching, the lovers of Mirza Asadullah Khan Ghalib (1797-1869) were preparing for a... Published 05 Sep, 2022 03:32am

Literary Notes: Urdu doha, its Hindi tradition and Khan-i-Khanan

ASIDE from his military and political feats, Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan (1556-1627) is renowned as a poet and ... Published 29 Aug, 2022 03:48am

Literary Notes: Linguistic studies in Urdu and Ahsan Marehravi

MAREHRA, also reverently known as Marehra Sharif, is a city in district of Etah, UP, India. Those who belong to... Published 22 Aug, 2022 06:04am

URDU WRITING HAS AN IDENTITY OF ITS OWN

Over the years, Pakistani Urdu literature has developed differently from its Indian counterpart and reflects ideological battles Published 14 Aug, 2022 07:12am

Literary notes: Baital Pachcheesee: an old Sanskrit legend and its Urdu versions

BAITAL is a Sanskrit word and is also used in Urdu, though not commonly these days. Baital means ghost, demon, ... Published 01 Aug, 2022 04:04am

Literary notes: Balochi lexicography and new dictionary in four languages

MANSEL Longworth Dames (1850-1922) was a strange fellow: he learnt several eastern languages, such as Balochi and... Published 25 Jul, 2022 06:00am

NON-FICTION: WOMEN IN URDU POETRY

Her male-sounding name notwithstanding, British writer George Eliot (1819-1880) was a woman. Born Mary Ann Evans, she was a... Published 24 Jul, 2022 10:00am

literary Notes: Kashmir’s history, language and literature encapsulated

LALLESHWARI, also known as Lalla Arifa, was a 14th-century woman mystic poet from Kashmir. Her poetry is believed to... Published 18 Jul, 2022 07:47am

Literary notes: Zia Ahmad Badayuni: a remarkable but forgotten scholar

Badayuni was known for explaining and teaching qaseedas by Khaqani and Maumin with great ease. Updated 04 Jul, 2022 08:10am

literary notes: Lutfullah Khan’s treasured tapes transcribed, though partially

ARABIC word naql has many connotations. For example, it may invoke the ideas of copying, imitating, mimicking,... Published 27 Jun, 2022 06:56am

Literary notes: Three research works on Urdu and Persian

WE are not a nation of bookworms and have never been. Yet there is a considerable percentage of population that ... Published 20 Jun, 2022 07:25am

Literary notes: Moulvi Syed Mumtaz Ali and other feminist Moulvis

IT is a general perception, albeit flawed, that religious-minded Muslims and especially Muslim scholars are against... Published 13 Jun, 2022 07:07am