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zamaanaa baRe shauq se sun rahaa thaa
ham hii so gaye daastaaN kahte kahte
Sad news for Urdu lovers: Ainee aapa is no more. Through Mayank Austen Soofi I got to know about her demise. She was one of the shining lights of Urdu literature and her absence will be acutely felt.
Eminent Urdu writer Qurratulain Haider passed away early on Tuesday after suffering from prolonged illness, a family source said.
Haider, who was around 80, had been undergoing treatment at the Kailash Hospital in neighbouring Noida. She was diagnosed with a chronic lung ailment but the immediate cause of her death was saidto be a pneumonia attack.
A towering figure of Indian literature, Haider was a recipient of many prestigious awards including the Jnanpith Award. Some of her famous works include ‘Aag Ka Darya’ (River of Fire), and ‘Aakhir-e-Shab’ Ke Hamsafar’ (Travellers unto the night). [Deccan Herald]
Her short biography:
Born in January 20, 1926 in Aligarh, Uttar Pradesh, Qurratulain Hyder is one of the most celebrated of Urdu fiction writers. A trendsetter in Urdu fiction, she began writing at a time when the novel was yet to take deep roots as a serious genre in the poetry-oriented world of Urdu literature. She instilled in it a new sensibility and brought into its fold strands of thought and imagination hitherto unexplored. She is widely regarded as the “Grande Dame” of Urdu literature.
After graduating from Lucknow University, she moved to Pakistan in 1947, then lived in England before returning to India in 1951. She has been writing since she was 11 years old. She stayed in Juhu Hazari Baug Building in Juhu Scheme,Mumbai for a couple of years before moving to Noida near New Delhi, where she had been staying till her demise.
A prolific writer, she wrote some 12 novels and novellas, four collections of short stories and has done a significant amount of translation of classics. Aag Ka Darya (River of Fire), her magnum opus, is a landmark novel that explores the vast sweep of time and history. It tells a story that moves from the fourth century BC to the post-Independence period in India and Pakistan, pausing at the many crucial epochs of history. The [London] Times Literary Supplement wrote that “[River of Fire] is to Urdu fiction what A Hundred Years of Solitude is to Hispanic literature. Qurratulain Hyder has a place alongside her exact contemporaries, Milan Kundera and Gabriel Garcia Marquez, as one of the world’s major living writers.” Other books include Patjar ki Awaz (‘The Voice of Autumn’, 1965); Roushni ki Raftar (‘The Speed of Light’, 1982); the short novel Chae ke Bagh (‘Tea Plantations’, 1965); and the family chronicle Kare Jahan Daraz He (‘The Work of the World Goes on’). Amitov Ghosh writes that “hers is one of the most important Indian voices of the twentieth century.” [Wikipedia]
Raza Rumi visited Hyder in March earlier this year and wrote a touching post at this blog. An excerpt:
On my first visit to Delhi, I was invited for lunch at Ainee Apa’s house. She lives in Noida close to Delhi. Quite symbolically, the real-mythical Jamna River separates the two localities. In Noida, I buy rajneegandha flowers (much loftier than the prosaic ‘tube roses’) and standing under a jaman tree, wonder why life is treating me so well. I was, after all, buying flowers for Ainee Apa.
She is entertaining a guest who had brought some books for her to read. There is no electricity and she repeatedly apologises for the humid afternoon and her utter helplessness in getting the supply restored. Evidently frail, there is nevertheless something electric in her manners and conversation. It takes me a while to register the reality of that afternoon. Her house is full of books; I later find that each room has bookshelves and yet more bookshelves. The walls are adorned with a decade’s worth of her paintings, some of which I recognise as they feature in her books. [Indian Muslims]
Ainee aapa, you will be deeply missed. inna lillaahe wa inna ilaihe raajiuun.
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Qurratulain Hyder was simply a symbol of proud for Indian Muslims. May Allmighty Allah (SAW) give her place in Jannah…Ameen !
A romantic and nostalgic journey has reached its climax, what a loss! what a loss!, Today the bright lamp of urdu has gone off forever. dont expect anymore “river of fire’s”.
She was the last shining star of the Golden era of Urdu Literature. All have been taken away……Krishan, Manto, Ismat Chughtai, Faiz, Sahir, Balwant, Shaukat Siddiqi and others !
But she will live on in Talat and Hari Shankar and Gautam and Kamal and Champa Baaji and Bhaiya Saheb…….all those people from “Aag Ka Darya” who were not fictitious characters but our companions and friends from whom we got to learn so much and who lived and breathed with a lot of us !
Ainee Aapa will not die……because she is a ray of light,a beautiful thought and the color of the rainbow on the skies of Urdu Adab.
Zaidi
Ainee Aapa’s loss is irreparable for literature.
Her books need to be translated widely in other major languages of the world.
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