AS a writer of enviable creativity — both in terms of quality and quantity — Qurratulain Hyder created a lot of characters, but none that quite matched herself. She was perhaps way larger than life to be captured by even herself. Blunt to the point of being harsh, she was the master of all she cared to survey.

Having grown up in a family that was ahead of its times in many ways, Qurratulain Hyder — known in literary circles as “Ainee apa” — had a personality enriched with exposure not just to the written word, but also to other fine arts like painting and music. She had even worked as a professional journalist with the likes of Daily Telegraph and the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) in England.

Her basic claim to fame, however, remains and will always remain her forays into the world of Urdu fiction; most prominently, but by no means exclusively, because of Aag ka Darya which encompasses the fates of four characters that keep appearing in the narrative spread over two-and-a-half millennia. Aptly named Gautam, Champa, Kamal and Cyril, the characters represent Buddhist, Hindu, Muslim and Christian streaks in the making of what we know as modern India.

In Andaz-i-Bayan Aur Qurratulain Hyder can be seen speaking on a range of subjects while refusing to talk about her magnum opus, Aag ka Darya

To interview such a well-rounded person is always a difficult task for the best of professionals, but when one adds the spontaneous bluntness that characterised Ainee’s persona, the task is bound to become that much trickier. To the credit of Dr Jamil Akhtar, who conceived and conducted the book-length interview that is Andaz-i-Bayan Aur: Qurratulain Hyder se Baat-Cheet, he braved many a frontal attack over almost a year to have it recorded for posterity. He deserves full marks just for being committed enough. It would not have been easy for him to put up with an interaction during which it is hard to keep count of the times Ainee’s replies began with, “What nonsense!”

Ainee was 32 when Aag ka Darya was first published in 1959 and faced praise, awe, criticism and controversy in equal measure. But it could not be ignored by anyone as it turned out to be a benchmark for literary, and indeed political debates of the time. So overpowering is the novel that it has all but overshadowed the rest of her writings and that was surely something Ainee didn’t like one bit.

She was 76 when the interview published in this slim volume was conducted from June 2003 to April 2004; a span of almost 45 years separating the initial publication of the novel and the interview under discussion, and Ainee comes across as visibly tired of talking about it. Just a mention of the novel is enough to irritate her. “Oh God! Why don’t you people just forgive me for having written Aag ka Darya ... enough is enough ... I regret like hell that I chose to write it ... Your questions are all rubbish and I have a pretty low threshold for stupidity.” Indeed, she had a low threshold.

Elsewhere, when asked about her “psychological approach to history” and “civilisational continuation”, Ainee gets irked again. “I will go to some psychologist to explore what was my psychological approach when I wrote that thing ... Why don’t you understand a simple thing. People who have interest in, say, cricket, write about cricket. Those who are interested in music, write about music. I like history and it reflects in my writing. What has psychology to do with it ... I don’t like meaningless, absurd debates anyway.”

With the celebrity in her characteristically nippy mood, the interviewer didn’t do himself any good either with questions that actually begged a scathing retort. Of the many such instances, two would suffice. Asks the interviewer, “Like (Leo) Tolstoy, do you also consider death to be the ultimate truth and consider it inevitable?” Replies Ainee, “... What kind of a dumb question is this? Everyone in the world knows that ... Now would you ask me if I consider drinking water essential for life? What is the point of asking me or anyone?”

Elsewhere, the interviewer asks, “... The general perception is that (in your novels) you exaggerate the narrative which makes it difficult to find the truth. Would you like to shed some light on this?” Only excerpts of Ainee’s reply can be reproduced here. “This is nonsense ... What is truth? Whose truth? Am I a journalist who is mixing facts with fiction? Have I twisted something that (say) Pervez Musharraf has said? For a creative writer dealing with fiction, this is rubbish. Who is this stupid person saying such things ... Fiction is fiction ... what do you mean to say ... no, no, no, you can’t get away like that ... Tell me what do you actually want to say ...”

And yet the interview was completed. The credit for it must go to the interviewer who not only put up with her temperament, but also with seriously long, rambling monologues which are sometimes irrelevant to the context of the question. It is not rare to see Ainee being reminded of what the question actually is. But such reminders — polite in spirit and phraseology — never come before the writer has spoken at enough length to fill two to three pages. Indeed, there are times, when she herself asks what she was trying to say.

Quite remarkably, however, the whole talk has enough flow and substance to keep the reader engrossed right till the end. If anything, the outbursts and inanities provide an unexpected touch of hilarity that keeps the narrative light enough to carry mass appeal. For sure, the book is a major addition to literature on a writer who was known as much for her literary output as for her penchant for talking straight.

The reviewer is a Dawn staff member.

Andaz-i-Bayan Aur: Qurratulain Hyder se Baat-Cheet
(INTERVIEW)
By Jameel Akhtar
Oxford University Press, Karachi.
ISBN 978-0199069156
185pp.