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‘There is much more to Urdu than ghazals’ says author Khalid Jawed

JCB award-winning Urdu author Khalid Jawed will discuss his latest book in city today

He also called for deeper literary engagement and a broader, revitalised Urdu ecosystem beyond poetry.

Urdu author Khalid Jawed will discuss The Book of Death at a Thinkers Collective event in Chandigarh with translator A Naseeb Khan.

JCB award-winning Urdu author Khalid Jawed will discuss his latest book ‘The Book of Death’ (Westland) with translator A Naseeb Khan at an event organised by Thinkers Collective, an initiative of the Institute for Development and Communication (IDC) and Chandigarh University.

“Why do we want everything to be linear and in plain sight? It is sometimes disturbing when people insist that there should be complete clarity and all turns out well in the end, are shadows not around even in the face of bright light? Literature is not a soap opera. The contemporary audience needs to train for serious works and not expect authors to spoon-feed them. Life is seldom about clear directions and straight paths. How can literature be?” asks Jawed.

Talking about the state of the Urdu language in the country, he says that the entire ecosystem needs a reset. “Before blaming anyone, we need to look within. How many good Urdu newspapers are around? Why are they mostly concerned about minority issues only? Also, why is the language only associated with poetry and not prose? There is much more to Urdu than ghazals,” says the author of 15 works of fiction and non-fiction, and a former Professor of Urdu at Jamia Millia Islamia University in New Delhi.

Dr Pramod Kumar, chairperson of IDC, says, “It is interesting to note how Khalid Jawed navigates different worlds. His concerns are humans living on the margins, both physical and emotional. At Thinkers Collective, it is paramount for us to bring to the region artists and authors whose works not only shed light on contemporary society but also encompasses the different facets of our existence.”

Jawed will be in conversation with poet A Naseeb Khan at 6 pm on Saturday, November 15, at the IDC, Sector 38 A, Chandigarh.

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