Sbāgata readers,
This is our monthly discussion of the literature of the world! Every Wednesday, we'll post a new country or culture for you to recommend literature from, with the caveat that it must have been written by someone from that there (i.e. Shogun by James Clavell is a great book but wouldn't be included in Japanese literature).
February 21 is Language Movement Day in Bangladesh which commemorates the Bengalie Language Movement. To celebrate, we're discussing Bangladeshi literature! Please use this thread to discuss your favorite Bangladeshi literature and authors.
If you'd like to read our previous discussions of the literature of the world please visit the literature of the world section of our wiki.
Dhan'yabāda and enjoy!
by AutoModerator
11 Comments
Try out A Golden Age by Tahmima Anam- it is a novel set during the Bangladesh Liberation War through the eyes of one family and it’s in English. It’s won the Commonwealth Writer’s Prize
Just out of curiosity- is Tagore included?
Hellfire by Leesa Gazi is a pretty interesting novel.
I recently read Babu Bangladesh and it was fantastic! Highly recommended. Also read Lajja long ago in high school but don’t remember much of it.
Would Brick Lane by Monica Ali meet the guidelines? I believe she was born there but raised in London, and I think most of the book is set in London as well, but focuses on the Bangladeshi community there. Plus there’s a 2007 movie.
Saad Z. Hossain wrote **Escape from Baghdad!**, a darkly funny, cross-genre satire of post-invasion Iraq. He’s gone on to several works in which the djinn and humans interact in the modern (or future) world. One of the rising stars of the fantasy/speculative genre.
Currently reading Byomkesh Bakshi, a classic Bengali detective story. You can’t go wrong with it.
For international folks out there I want to suggest y’all to read at least one Humayun Ahmed or Tagore book.
wow thanks for doing this! Just want to make a distinction first – Bengali literature spans both Bangladesh and West Bengal of India (from pre-1947 era), so there maybe some confusion on what is Bangladeshi literature. For example, Rabindranath Tagore would be considered one of the greats of Bengali lit, but while he was born in present-day Bangladesh, he would be considered an Indian author.
It’s also a real pity that contemporary/modern Bangladeshi literature rarely gets translated into English, and only some authors (Bangladeshi or diaspora) choose to write in English (e.g. Tahmima Anam, Zia Haider Rahman, Rumaan Alam, etc.). That being said, here are some english translations that one should absolutely try and get a copy of –
* Of Blood and Fire (Ekatturer Dinguli) by Jahanara Imam – an autobiographical account of living through the war, centered in the capital Dhaka.
* Khwabnama by Akhtaruzzaman Elias – a novel that spans the Tebhaga Andolon (a peasant movement against feudal landlords), set in the 40s and 50s. Absolutely one of my favorite authors.
* Black Ice (Kalo borof) by Mahmudul Haque – accounts of the 1947 Partition have been written mostly from Indian and Pakistani authors, but this one from Bangladeshi author Mahmudul Haque traces the traumas that the Partition can leave on an impressionable mind even into adulthood.
* In Blissful Hell (Nandito Norokey) by Humayun Ahmed – one of the earlier works by Humayun Ahmed, an author credited to have made literature accessible to people from all walks of life, and possibly one of my favorite reads of all times. Humayun Ahmed specialized in portraying the struggles of a growing middle class in Dhaka, trapped within the bounds of both capitalism and a conservative society.
If any folks here can read Bengali, here are some other Bangladeshi authors I’d highly recommend –
* Syed Mujtaba Ali
* Shahidul Jahir
* Moinul Ahsan Saber
* Imtiar Shamim
* Shahaduzzaman
* Shahin Akhtar
I guess Tasleema Nasreen is the most famous Bangladeshi author outside of Bangladesh. Lazza is a decent book to read. I also enjoy a lot of Kazi Nasrul Islam’s work. Monica Ali’s Brick Lane is a really good book well.
Tagore, of course, is the GOAT belonging to two countries.
So fun that this is the country of the week bc I just finished re-reading Bright Lines by Tanaïs (fka Tanwi Nandini Islam), highly influenced by their own experience as a member of the diaspora. It follows a diasporic Bengali family in Brooklyn, tangled in the father’s past in the war, as well as the teens/young adults self realizations about love, sex, gender, religion, and just growing up. The novel also takes us back to Bangladesh to meet their extended family and reconnect with home. The overarching theme of the novel seems to teeter around the ideas of identity and how that identity is shaped by a “home” away from home. Tanaïs makes you fall in love with these imperfect characters and stories and settings, and it’s really a joy to read. Highly recommend
**From my “Global Voices” Literary/Research Project**
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This is very, very difficult to find, not for a lack of books, but because Bangladesh is relatively new. Until the min-20th century, it was all part of Bengal. After a genocide in West Pakistan in the 1980s, Bangladesh was established as its own country.
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But when you try to search for “Bangladeshi literature” you will often get Bengali recommendations. It gets even harder when you have to look at older writers, and figure out based on a map or other research whether they’re Bangladeshi or not. At the time, they would have been simply “Bengali”
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And there is still an a region of India called “Bengal”, so there are still people today who are Bengali!!
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So. These are both SF?F. One of them is a classic of extremely progressive feminist writing – a dream of a world of solar power and peace run by women! And I think she’s Bangladeshi. It’s just s story, about 200 pages, and I highly recommend it!
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But since the work is from 1905 and I wasn’t 100% sure, I also read a new book from a Bangladeshi. It ends on a cliffhanger and there’s no plan for a sequel, so I don’t recommend that one.
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**Sultana’s Dream**, Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain.[Find the whole story here!](https://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/sultana/dream/dream.html)
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**Djinn City**, Saad V Hossain