Our Persian Heritage Needs To Be Translated
Z.G. Muhammad My Rambling Thoughts. I am amazed that translators receive less credit for their work than creative writers. However, had Arabs not institutionalised the translation of great works and philosophy between the eighth and tenth centuries, much of this literature might never have reached South Asian audiences. Looking at our heritage, we also have a strong translation tradition. The Sultans of Kashmir focused on translating Sanskrit literature into Persian and Persian literature into Sanskrit, creating a vast reservoir of literature that might otherwise have been lost. As late as the twentieth century, Maharaja Pratap Singh established a translation bureau under the aegis of the Jammu and Kashmir Libraries and Research Department. This bureau not only worked to preserve Sanskrit literature but also facilitated the translation of classic Sanskrit works produced in … Read entire article »
Filed under: Editor's Take, Featured, Memeiors, NostalgiaKashmir, PUNCH LINE, Z. G. Muhammad
Of My Pandit Teacher and My Concern About Him
Z,G. Muhammad It was a few day back, I visited my favourite childhood haunt, Badamwari. After years– decades that I strolled in Bagh-e-Waris Khan- it has been done up nicely, but somehow I felt some artificiality in its new get-up. I don’t know why every new construction, including the beautiful chiselled limestone fountain, looked to me in a clash with its ambience. Everything looked alien to me. Perhaps the new construction living true to our … Read entire article »
Filed under: Kashmir-Talk, Memeiors, NostalgiaKashmir
Of Supplications, Collective Prayers and Rains.
ZGM Zahid G Muhammad It sounded like folk tales, folklores of yore – whenever we heard stories about great famines that had often visited our birth burg in the past. Despite being a tale of the past fear of starvation, flood and epidemics continued to haunt our grandparents. It tormented them more ferociously than the looting sprees of desperadoes from distant lands that had ravaged our nation in the past. One would often hear vivid stories … Read entire article »
Filed under: Kashmir-Talk, Memeiors, NostalgiaKashmir, Z. G. Muhammad
My Memoir: Story of A Generation
My Memoir: My Father My Father Part V Z. G. Muhammad Literally, the evenings during the Jashin-I-Kashmir presented a lively scene as kaweyenewol, which thrilled children and made them jump, knock and cry slogans against a cruel Governor of the yore.[1] Like crows to their destination, people, poor and hardy, wealthy and elite, flocked to floodlit Shalimar garden as the sun, after sparkling golden the waters of the Dal Lake, finally dipped in its depths. The glittering ‘celestial … Read entire article »
Filed under: Editor's Take, Memeiors, NostalgiaKashmir
My Memoir and MY Father. Of Jashan-i-Kashmir Days by ZGM
My Memoir: My Story My Father Part IV Mothers are a massive influence on children; it may sound a cliché, a trite, but it is as good truth as the sun rises in the east. ‘They are the bones of the spine, as someone has said that keeps children straight and true. The way my father was, his disposition and demeanour did tell he was his mother’s child. She was a wonderful human being, her supplications like her … Read entire article »
Filed under: Editor's Take, Kashmir-Talk, Memeiors, NostalgiaKashmir, NostalgoaKashmir
STORY OF MY FATHER
My Father. I had bid farewell to a multi-coloured Watanigour willow walkermade in Islamabad. I don’t know if a rouht phitrawan (bread breaking) ceremony was arranged on my first step without a walker, as was the tradition. I had inherited the walker from my elder brother Mohammad Yousf, and it was passed on to my younger sibling Ghulam Hassan. Along with a walnut wood crib, a mace with quartz head, an old lantern, an old gramophone record … Read entire article »
Filed under: Editor's Take, Memeiors
Prof. Hamid Anwar- A Teacher and Friend
Nostalgia Hamid Anwar, a Teacher and Friend. By ZGM It was a season of mellow fruitfulness; everything around the University campus was ‘maddening spectacular’. In the lustrous Dal Lake, the reflections of Mahadev and Zabarwan shook by the heart-shaped oars of Shikaras slicing tranquil waters would make even the most stoic a romantic. With their leaves almost turned golden, the majestic Chinars, hundreds of trees with apples as red as rubicund cheeks of village damsels drooping from twigs and … Read entire article »
Filed under: Editor's Take, Memeiors