BOOKS have always been perceived as potentially dangerous weapons because they are quite capable of affecting and changing the thinking of common people, which in turn, may jeopardise the authority or interests, or both, of those in power.

Yes, books are quite capable of stirring mass unrest, bringing about revolutions and toppling governments. For instance, one of the contributing factors in French Revolution was the influence of ideas for social change, inspired by the writings of intellectuals, such as, Voltaire and Rousseau. That is the reason why governments and those in power fear the power of books, try to suppress books they perceive as dangerous and persecute those who write, publish or promote such books.

Some books proved so influential that they changed the course of history, as Robert B Downs’ Books that changed the World proves, ironically though Downs’ list of 16 influential works include four that were banned.

Much has been written in English on the topic, but in Urdu rarely has there been any effort to record and analyse books that the authorities proscribed and got their writers and/or publishers persecuted. Now Dr Aqeel Abbas Jafri has come up with a book that lists and describes books that were burnt, banned, censored, challenged, denounced, resented, prohibited by law or were subject to some kind of persecution. It is based on 120 Banned Books: Censorship Histories of World Literature, written by Nicholas J. Karolides, Margaret Bald and Dawn B. Sova.

Jafri has subtly titled his work Ma’atoob Kitaben, as it discusses not only the banned or censored books but takes into account all kinds of books that somehow had to suffer from the wrath of the society or the government. Also, it is not just a translation of the English book but with much research and hard work Jafri has added 20 more books and examined 140 books that were target of hostile treatment in different countries and different times. Out of 20 added works, six are the ones banned on the charges of being obscene and salacious. Other 14 are from the Indo-Pak subcontinent, banned or resented for various reasons.

The book has been divided into different sections and it separately discusses books banned or ill-treated on the basis of political ideas, religious thoughts, explicit sexual contents or social theories that these books deliberated upon. Jafri has introduced every book with a brief biography of the author, a summary of the book, printing history and details about how the book was censored or persecuted.

The list includes some of the best-known works and some of them even became best-sellers. Some of the famous banned books examined include: Animal Farm (George Orwell), Doctor Zhivago (Boris Pasternak), Mein Kampf (Adolf Hitler), The Prince (Machiavelli), Ninety-Five Theses (Martin Luther), On the Origin of Species (Charles Darwin), Age of the Reason (Thomas Paine), Analects (Confucius), Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief Systems (Galileo Galilei) Umhaat-ul-Umma (Nazeer Ahmed Dehlvi), Arabian Nights (Richard Burton), Confessions (Rousseau), Fanny Hill (John Cleland), The Kama Sutra (Vatsyayana), Madame Bovary (Flaubert), Lady Chatterley’s Lover (D.H. Lawrence), Brave New World (Aldous Huxley), The Flowers of Evil (Charles Baudelaire), just to name but a few.

The banned or cursed books from the subcontinent that have been discussed are: Masnavi Zehr-e-Ishq (Mirza Shauq Lakhnavi), Soz-e-Vatan (Premchand), Angare (Sajjad Zaheer, Ahmed Ali, Rasheed Jahan and Mahmood-uz-Zafar), Gold and the Guns on the Pathan Frontier (Khan Abdul Qayyum Khan), Manto’s short stories (Sa’adat Hasan Manto), Mushahidaat (Hosh Bilgrami), Aafat Ka Tukra (Khan Fazl-ur-Rahman), Sat Gavache Log (Fakhr Zaman), Gurg-e-Shab (Ikramullah), A’urat: Aik Nafsiayti Mutal’a (Kishwer Naheed), Noor Jahan Aur Main (Shaukat Husain Rizavi and Ahmed Muneer), Jinnah of Pakistan (Stanley Wolpert), Jinnah: India-Partition-Independence (Jaswant Singh), I Am Malala (Malala Yousafzai).

As Jafri has mentioned, aside from these works, many more Urdu books were either banned or became disputed for certain reasons. He has named them and some of them were written by well-known literary or political figures, such as, Abul Kalam Azad, Abdul Haleem Sharar, Habib Jalib, Ismat Chughtai, Mumtaz Bhutto and Air Marshal Asgher Khan. Udas Naslen narrowly missed the ban after being nominated for Adamjee Award.

Jafri has mentioned that the only effort so far made in Urdu to discuss the banned or denounced books is Khayalaat, a magazine that introduced such works in 1972. Some other sources that somehow have relevant information include issue 3 of Irtiqa, a magazine published from Karachi; special issue on erotica published by Isbaat, a magazine published from Mumbai; Kitaab Number of Niqaat, a journal published from Islamabad and Ali Iqbal’s book Roushni Kam Tapish Ziyada. Now with Jafri’s book published, we have some reliable material collected in one volume.

The 648-page book is published by Varsa Publications, Karachi.

drraufparekh@yahoo.com

Published in Dawn, January 1st, 2024