Dawn The Review, sometime in June 1999 There were better days. Karachi used to be a different city. Stage plays were in vogue and people from a cross-section of the society used to throng the auditoriums. That was the early 1950’s. And that is when Latif Kapadia started. He was born on 27 March, 1935, …
Dawn Tuesday Review, 6-12 May 1999 It is hard to forget Allan, the most loveable conman of our television. The tall, lean character with a quizzical smile on his face, a new trick up his sleeve and, alas, an innocent stooge for his companion to upset all his schemes every week. Alif Noon went on …
Zameen, sometime in 1998 Having imbibed the classical heritage of Indo-Muslim literature, Islamic history and puritanical etiquette on one hand and such profane interests as playwriting on the other, Fatima Surayya Bajiya is someone who is likely to find herself equally at home with the younger generation as well as the old. “I am more …
Herald, July 1997 Syed Afzal Hussain, popularly known as ‘Shahji’ in film circles, is the most senior sound recordist in the the national industry. But few know that he is also the man who produced landmark films of Pakistani cinema like Lakhon Mein Aik and Naag Muni. Unlike others in the industry, Shahji’s unassuming personality belies his …
Herald (Annual), January 1997 The most important aspect of Jilani Kamran’s personality is his worldview. Here is a man who takes a positive pride in his religious identity – almost to the extent of chauvinism – and speaks the language of tolerance, love and Sufism. The combination is remarkable. Whether you speak to him or …
Dawn Tuesday Review, 6-12 August 1996 As I take out the cassette from my small tape recorder, thanking Bajiya for her time and cooperation, she asks me to keep from disclosing some of the things and keep them off the record – names of some people she had mentioned during her conversation. She had said …
Dawn, Tuesday Review, April 16-22, 1996 It is so difficult to write about A. Hameed. It is just as easy to hail him as the greatest romantic in Urdu literature as it would be appropriate to put him down as a pathetic hack-writer. He has written the best of fiction and he has written the worst of …
Dawn, Tuesday Review, March 5-11, 1996 If you ask me to describe Aslam Azhar in a single word, I would describe him as a ‘reader’. Not only because he is a reader of books but also because he is a reader of the signs of time. He has tried not only to read into the …
Dawn, Tuesday Review, February 27-March 4, 1996 Dr Qureshi evaded my request for his resume in a light vein. “There have been so many interviews about my life. Why not base this one on my thoughts alone?” And which of his works would he consider to be the pinnacle of his thought, the best fruit …
Dawn Tuesday Review, 2-8 January 1996 Professor A. H. Dani is a challenger. He revels in attacking the boundaries of knowledge and, quite often, he succeeds in stretching them beyond their existing domains. Not far from the beginnings of his career in archaeological research he questioned the long accepted notion of the historians of Alexander …