Sarah Anjum Bari

Beginning to read Fine Gråbøl’s What Kingdom, translated from the Danish by Martin Aitkin, is like sitting in a silent room, alone, and a voice begins to speak as though from beside you.

The walls of Dhaka city represent the volume and chaos of thousands of people jostling for ever-shrinking space.

It's true, I feel differently about books that I previously disliked or enjoyed reading and books that I want as a physical presence in my life

It’s hard not to recall our many conversations about literature as I try to summarise Shah Tazrian Ashrafi’s debut collection of short stories. They were always short discussions, opening and closing off in spurts, as happens over text. Exclamations over a new essay collection by Zadie Smith, or a new novel by Isabel Allende.

In the foreword, I wanted to capture how I, as a child, grew up listening to different stories: ghost stories, mythical stories from both Sanatana and Islamic religious scriptures, and fairy tales from 'Thakurmar Jhuli', compiled by Dakkhinaranjan Mitra Majumdar. It was a time when there were no boundaries for my imagination.

Like many veterans, I joined a creative writing MFA program because I wanted to evolve as a writer.

Here was a woman who was but a dot amidst the throngs of people who watched the Bosphorus Bridge being opened in October 1973, as fireworks erupted over a Turkey that now seamed Asia to Europe.

I always tell the authors to make subjective, qualitative decisions. So many of my authors say no to higher offers from publishing houses if they don’t feel comfortable with the publisher or editor.

Last week, one of Dhaka’s oldest bookstores announced that they will be closing shop after running for 60 years

Zeenat Book Supply, a New Market staple for book lovers since 1963, will close shop on May 1, 2023.

Zeenat Book Supply, a New Market staple for book lovers since 1963, will close shop on May 1, 2023. 

Using a Fulbright fellowship, Tarfia decided to come to Bangladesh to research the war and interview the women whom the Bangladesh government, in 1972, titled Birangona (war heroines). These interviews resulted in 'Seam' (Southern Illinois University Press, 2014).

Safe, vibrant public spaces are so rare in Dhaka that the months from January to early March feel like a gift from the universe when the Bangla Academy comes alive with the Dhaka Lit Fest, followed by the Dhaka Art Summit and the February extravaganza of the Ekushey Boi Mela. Since 2020, the Gulshan Book Fair has added to the series of treats for those of us who crave creative festivals in this city.

Schwartz’s narrator speaks in the choral “we”, and like a daisy chain, they connect all these women’s shared yet individual experiences of feeling closed in, being violated, feeling misunderstood by society, until they all shed their names and managed to “escap[e] the century”.

The collection comprises essays, poetry, short fiction, feature pieces, interviews, research reports, and photographs and artwork that explore the physical, psychological and political experiences of menstruation across South Asia. 

For those who are especially interested in literature in book form, the first two floors of the exhibition hold treasures. 

Daily Star Books’ panel on January 8, Day 4 of the Dhaka Lit Fest sought to take the audience to a more existential aspect of what the festival attempts to do. Who chooses which stories deserve to become books? Who chooses whether news of those books will even reach readers? Does book criticism truly help the flow and business of literature within and across national borders?

With a Books page you're creating a running history of the ideas and the parallel history or the imagination of a country.

Media platforms that critique literature are, therefore, at the heart of the book ecosystem. They shape a book’s public perception and can bolster (or destroy) sales.

Someone has to pay the price when traditions, community beliefs, and environmental issues are unheeded.