Remembrance of Things Past was the name given to Proust’s multi-volume novel when it was first translated into English. It is said that Proust himself was averse to this name, perhaps finding it too poetic. In a later translation, the novel’s name was more accurately rendered as In Search Of Lost Time. The discarded title of Proust’s novel, but not the second one, would do well as a descriptive subtitle for Shahid Hameed’s detailed and fascinating, if somewhat meandering, remembrance of bygone days. Although he reminds me more of Stefan Zweig than Proust.

The past, as it is said, is not only an era, but another country. For Hameed, the ‘country’ of the past, and a country well remembered, is Punjab on the eve of Partition. This autobiography made me think of Proust not because of its length, but its novel-like opening. The time frame is not given immediately. The destruction of a village by the ravages of floods, and a new settlement nearby open the swift-flowing narrative; it is here that the narrator is born, and the story begins. The village was called Parjian, or Parjian Kalan, to give its proper name, and located in district Jalandhar of Punjab in undivided British India.

If anybody might wonder as to why should one bother about the detailed history of such a place, the author builds in a very poignant sentence stating without resentment or complaint that no history is ever written describing “small towns” and nobody ever mentions the tribulations people living in such areas have to go through. For this small town, this complaint is effectively addressed. In fact this village, and its vicinity, is captured in these pages in a memorable manner and it would be hard to come up with the name of any other area in pre-Partition Punjab which is so vividly described and in such detail.

Shahid Hameed chronicles his life growing up in pre-partition Punjab in one of the most remarkable works in Urdu to have appeared in recent times

Pinpointing the village on the map, he talks of the community feeling and harmony which existed among the people and uses the word “connectivity” to define the social dynamics. He explains that it was an “egalitarian” society with humane values, unlike the materialistic norms of today.

The use of such terms highlights the author’s analytical streak; a trait which is never dormant and in fact, leads him to collect various odds and ends like a magpie lining its nest. The first few pages make it clear that this is not a run of the mill, straightforward autobiography. It is the opposite of sentimental accounts which harp on about interfaith harmony, and especially, if you are writing from this side of the divide, conjure up an anticipated journey to a ‘promised land’. It steers clear of such ideological underpinnings and sticks to facts, whereby the author lets his opinions be truly and clearly known.

The author’s intentions are unmistakable and he does not confine himself to any rigid conventions. He begins in the autobiographical mode but then goes on to describe life in the area, its customs and manners, even its topography. There is a thoroughly detailed account of the crops grown in the area, harvesting, collecting and storage. The author has his story to tell and he does not seem to care if modern-day urban dwellers, such as myself, are likely to skip these pages. Meticulous to the finest details, this is the style Hameed has chosen. Even in the parts where I began to lose interest, I still kept admiring the photographic precision with which life in the world of yesterday has been described.

The author’s intentions are unmistakable and he does not confine himself to any rigid conventions. He begins in the autobiographical mode but then goes on to describe life in the area, its customs and manners, even its topography. There is a thoroughly detailed account of the crops grown in the area, harvesting, collecting and storage. The author has his story to tell and he does not seem to care if modern-day urban dwellers, such as myself, are likely to skip these pages. Meticulous to the finest details, this is the style Hameed has chosen. Even in the parts where I began to lose interest, I still kept admiring the photographic precision with which life in the world of yesterday has been described.

He describes the games young boys played, how they set traps for catching birds; the kind of teachers at his school, and even some of the lessons from the lovingly described textbooks. He cannot stop himself from spending a page on how mathematical calculations could be done quickly and mentally. Even more remarkable is the natural ease of his writing as he delineates the tremendous decline in values and the loss of human concerns from the time he is writing about to the time he is actually writing in.

A boy growing up in a village develops into a school-going adolescent who soon becomes aware of the socio-political milieu and the circumstances around him. As a young man he takes admission in Islamia College Lahore and there is a fine evocation of Lahore on the eve of Partition. The changing circumstances of the city are brilliantly evoked through the bookshops and their declining fortunes. With a flash forward he mentions meeting and striking up friendships with the city’s writers and poets, including Nasir Kazmi, Intizar Husain, Ahmed Mushtaq and above all, Muzaffar Ali Syed, whom he encounters as a bright student preparing for school exams, without any inkling that he would become one of the leading critics in Pakistan. These are the young writers who became known as the self-styled new generation in the early days of Pakistan but Hameed stops short of entering literary history. He describes his journey to Lahore just after Independence and then wraps up the tale. It is a pity that he does not recapture the early days of Pakistan with his characteristic recall as that too would have made a brilliant record.

In a previous century, Shahid Hameed could have been an encyclopaedist. Everything is described in minute detail and nothing prevents him from slipping in barbed opinions. How Hitler was transformed by a prison sentence into a shrewd political tactician draws a comparison with Asif Ali Zardari. He reserves his sharpest criticism for Liaquat Ali Khan, whom he derides for coming up with the Objectives Resolution instead of a Constitution. Harsh comments but hard to refute. Similarly his brief comments about the looting and burning in Lahore during the 1947 riots are thought-provoking.

The book is well served by the extraordinary command of language and expression the author displays. Local details are presented through local expressions and there is a wealth of Punjabi words employed by the author. He takes pains to explain and offer Urdu expressions but there are occasions when this seems to turn into nitpicking. This book establishes Hameed as a fine writer in his own right while he had until now been known as a translator only. He has tackled large projects such as rendering War and Peace and The Brothers Karamazov into Urdu. His other translations include Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice and the heart-rending Palestinian novella, Men in the Sun. Each of his translations is, as can be expected, fully annotated. Hameed has also spent many years developing an English-Urdu dictionary which promises to be one of its kind. It is easy to guess that the author of this book is a lexicographer by aptitude. He ends his book on a brief quotation from Sylvia Plath about her realisation of her limitations. It would be hard to say the same about Hameed, who has penned a spellbinding tale.

The reviewer is a writer and translator. He teaches liberal arts and Urdu and is the editor of the literary journal Duniyazaad.

Gaye Din Ki Musafat
(AUTOBIOGRAPHY)
By Shahid Hameed
Ilqa Books, Lahore
ISBN: 978-9696400721
263pp.

Published in Dawn, Books & Authors, June 26th, 2016