The writer is a librarian and lecturer in San Francisco. His most recent work is Cafe Le Whore and Other Stories. He blogs at moazzamsheikh.blogspot.com
In his latest book, Chaurangi, Julien brings insight, texture, detachment and sizzling register
On films that help become one with the other and let them into our hearts
The experience of translating a poem by Nasreen Anjum Bhatti exposes the challenges inherent in the process
Santokh Singh Dhir’s delightful short stories are tinged with music and humour
Anti-war novels cannot afford to be just about horror and moral failings, they need to go further to expose the economic structure
The committee’s decision may have been poor but that doesn’t take away from Dylan’s contribution to the world of American folk and rock...
For a novel that starts on a strong feminist note, the ending is symbolically quite disappointing
A novel that dabbles with race relations but fails to look beyond whiteness
Fiction about the oppression of the Palestinian people is slowly but steadily gaining acceptance
No other art form is as problematic as cinema when it comes to claims of originality
A slim book of short stories that covers a vast territory
Sophia Naz’s story is a poignant effort at recasting the tragedy and horror inflicted on the Bengalis by the rulers of West Pakistan
The poems in Dooji Aurat show a range of emotions -- from melancholic to erotic, from profane to maternal to even morbid to suffocating
Roshni Rustomji-Kerns talks about the domestic and foreign literary landscapes of the US, Mexico, India, and Pakistan
Zahid Hassan’s modern diction and raw Punjabi prose are the strength of a novel that lacks clarity of an idea or purpose
Female agency and male desire -- a look back at Arman, a 1960s blockbuster movie
I can’t think of a single Pakistani film that left me as dazed, weeping inwardly, as Bin Roye. I have had time to ponder. My thoughts I lay bare
Very few writers even dare to test a reader’s credulity. Anu Kumar stretches it, almost risking collapse, in her latest collection of short stories
That’s what friendship for me is all about -- enriching the lives around you with music, literature, and art
Three prose pieces in Aaj where tone assumes a centrality
