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The Friday Times, 72 FCC Gulberg 4, Lahore, Pakistan |
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Writing aloud (but to the same audience)
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Erum Haider |
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The KLF, for all its merits, seemed somewhat overrun with anxious hand-wringing over the crisis that Pakistan is currently facing, with perhaps less attention paid to the quality of writers that have emerged from the country in the last couple of years. The fact that Pakistan is in dire economic straits is a concern for everyone, but the fact that few world-class fiction books have been published since Daniyal Mueenuddin’s ‘In Other Rooms, Other Wonders’ is a far more troubling fact for the ardent reader of Pakistani prose. It seemed at times that the reality of elitism and extremism, terrorism and terrified-ism had taken over a festival devoted ostensibly to the much more bookish and impracticable craft of reading and writing. “Look, the point is, there are bombs going off all around us. But if somewhere a boy happens to fall in love with a girl we can’t tell the poet not to write about it,” said acclaimed Urdu writer Fahmida Riaz in the session titled “Literature in the Age of Extremism.” It is impossible to divide the two worlds, as this session suggested. Writers, poets and authors of all hues agreed that in reflecting life around them, the inevitable bomb, or reference to terrorism, was bound to creep in. Such is the reality of living in Pakistan. Even beauty and art can only tolerate so much, however, when the tranquility of poetry seminars is interrupted by the rattle and hum of earnest civil society members crowding the hallways to listen to Ahmed Rashid, Pervez Hoodbhoy, Maleeha Lodhi and other politics-parsing pundits. Intellects such as theirs will never be unwelcome anywhere; however, as the conference hall shrank under the weight of hundreds of attendees, it became abundantly clear that this was the same well-tuned choir they’ve always addressed. Dr. Hoodbhoy recalled growing up in Karachi when it had a population of one million – “as many of my friends in the audience will remember.” The fact is, this city today is a world away from the Karachi they remember. And that’s because it’s teeming with young people: children of the Class of ‘71, children of migrants, children of families across Pakistan; a staggering youth bulge of some 7 million Karachiites under the age of 25 who were sorely under-represented at sessions such as “Where are we today?” and “Re-imagining Pakistan.” The “youth” in Pakistan are a constant source of stress for Pakistani civil society and their Western friends, yet there seem to be few good ideas on how to involve them in events such as these. The spatial divide is just one symptom of this condition, says Hoodbhoy: “Outside the high walls of DHA we encounter a majority that is united against people like you and me, who will then fight amongst themselves.” The threat of extremism inevitably spills over into an unhappy realization that the polarization of “liberals” and “extremists” runs perplexingly close to the divide between the Cambridge O-level crowd and the Intermediate crowd, the increasingly rich and the exceedingly poor, the English-speaking and the vernacular, those who managed to make it all the way out to Carlton Hotel (situated at the very end of the Manhattan-like peninsula that makes up the DHA and Clifton areas of Karachi) and those for whom the trip was too far. Zahid Hussain, author of ‘The Scorpion’s Tail’, takes a relatively optimistic view, while acknowledging that terrorists operate within a climate of fear that engulfs both liberals and moderates. While there is vocal support for the murderer of Salmaan Taseer, for example, we cannot assume that the majority of people subscribe to this view. “We cannot afford to become diffident,” said Hussain to murmurs of agreement from the front rows, adding that a society of intolerance is not our fate. But evidence to the contrary is ubiquitous. Nasim Zehra’s address from the podium was the stuff of “awareness campaigns.” An attempt by Senator Nilofer Bakhtiar to recite the fateha for Taseer has been rejected, Zehra tells us. A senior politician asks for a text message to be declared blasphemous for calling the late Governor “Shaheed.” The prosecutor for the trial of the assassinated political leader fails to show up in court. Each one of these blows is suffered with sighs of appreciative horror from the audience. Appeals from the panel were made to the army, to civil society to reimagine itself, to break away from the past: “Pakistan cannot continue to see itself as an alter-ego to India,” said Zehra. The existential threat must be taken seriously by the Pakistan army, said Hoodbhoy. “We’ve got to look after ourselves,” he asserted, before we pledge support for other countries. In doing so, however, it certainly helps to be cognizant of the world around us. According to Ahmed Rashid, Pakistan “missed” two important moments in history to change the tide of its national security narrative. To have scaled back dependency after the fall of the Soviet Union and invested instead in regional alliances would have been enormously beneficial. Similarly, taking the attack on the World Trade Center as a sign that Pakistan can no longer use non-state actors would have led down a very different road. Civil society needs to push for change, according to the panelists, and find alternatives to the religious-nationalist narrative. Those desperate for some literary element in this discussion may want to take note of the irony of a secular, economically-elite class that is historically disinclined to popular shows of strength wanting to take on a populist, street-savvy force. “It takes extreme passions to bring people out on the street,” noted leading columnist Khalid Ahmed, articulating a need for liberals to do what they do best – talk, and use channels of influence. The fact is that the liberals of Pakistan remain confined to echo chambers filled with like-minded people, unable to reach out to conservative groups, moderate forces, political actors, or even a younger generation. By accident or by design, none of the panelists felt it necessary to situate politicians in either the history or the future of the country. Poverty and inequality, being the forte of politicians, also evaded analysis. Religion and faith, being the specialization of extremists, also failed to make an appearance. Particularly in the light of the haunting assassination of January 4th, desperation has replaced curiosity and indignation has replaced humility. We’re no longer looking to read, but to write and assert. And even our fiction writers, instead of living with and mirroring the fear and hopelessness of war, poverty and the rising tide of intolerance – as their peers in India, Turkey, Iran, and elsewhere have – have resorted to using their pulpit to analyze and explain the world they live in. This being a literature festival, it was still possible to seek reprieve from the charged atmosphere of political discussions, and slip into a session on translation, or emerging writing in Pakistan, or a recitation of Punjabi poetry. Between the calls of appreciation heaped on Mudassir Aziz and Ali Akbar Natiq, and the roars of laughter elicited by Mohommad Hanif, it is comforting to think that there are writers who can make us laugh and cry – at ourselves, and our vanity, in these difficult times. The writer is a Research Analyst based in Karachi |
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The Friday Times, 72 FCC Gulberg 4, Lahore, Pakistan |
|
Writing aloud (but to the same audience)
|
|
|
Erum Haider |
|
|
|
|
|
The KLF, for all its merits, seemed somewhat overrun with anxious hand-wringing over the crisis that Pakistan is currently facing, with perhaps less attention paid to the quality of writers that have emerged from the country in the last couple of years. The fact that Pakistan is in dire economic straits is a concern for everyone, but the fact that few world-class fiction books have been published since Daniyal Mueenuddin’s ‘In Other Rooms, Other Wonders’ is a far more troubling fact for the ardent reader of Pakistani prose. It seemed at times that the reality of elitism and extremism, terrorism and terrified-ism had taken over a festival devoted ostensibly to the much more bookish and impracticable craft of reading and writing. “Look, the point is, there are bombs going off all around us. But if somewhere a boy happens to fall in love with a girl we can’t tell the poet not to write about it,” said acclaimed Urdu writer Fahmida Riaz in the session titled “Literature in the Age of Extremism.” It is impossible to divide the two worlds, as this session suggested. Writers, poets and authors of all hues agreed that in reflecting life around them, the inevitable bomb, or reference to terrorism, was bound to creep in. Such is the reality of living in Pakistan. Even beauty and art can only tolerate so much, however, when the tranquility of poetry seminars is interrupted by the rattle and hum of earnest civil society members crowding the hallways to listen to Ahmed Rashid, Pervez Hoodbhoy, Maleeha Lodhi and other politics-parsing pundits. Intellects such as theirs will never be unwelcome anywhere; however, as the conference hall shrank under the weight of hundreds of attendees, it became abundantly clear that this was the same well-tuned choir they’ve always addressed. Dr. Hoodbhoy recalled growing up in Karachi when it had a population of one million – “as many of my friends in the audience will remember.” The fact is, this city today is a world away from the Karachi they remember. And that’s because it’s teeming with young people: children of the Class of ‘71, children of migrants, children of families across Pakistan; a staggering youth bulge of some 7 million Karachiites under the age of 25 who were sorely under-represented at sessions such as “Where are we today?” and “Re-imagining Pakistan.” The “youth” in Pakistan are a constant source of stress for Pakistani civil society and their Western friends, yet there seem to be few good ideas on how to involve them in events such as these. The spatial divide is just one symptom of this condition, says Hoodbhoy: “Outside the high walls of DHA we encounter a majority that is united against people like you and me, who will then fight amongst themselves.” The threat of extremism inevitably spills over into an unhappy realization that the polarization of “liberals” and “extremists” runs perplexingly close to the divide between the Cambridge O-level crowd and the Intermediate crowd, the increasingly rich and the exceedingly poor, the English-speaking and the vernacular, those who managed to make it all the way out to Carlton Hotel (situated at the very end of the Manhattan-like peninsula that makes up the DHA and Clifton areas of Karachi) and those for whom the trip was too far. Zahid Hussain, author of ‘The Scorpion’s Tail’, takes a relatively optimistic view, while acknowledging that terrorists operate within a climate of fear that engulfs both liberals and moderates. While there is vocal support for the murderer of Salmaan Taseer, for example, we cannot assume that the majority of people subscribe to this view. “We cannot afford to become diffident,” said Hussain to murmurs of agreement from the front rows, adding that a society of intolerance is not our fate. But evidence to the contrary is ubiquitous. Nasim Zehra’s address from the podium was the stuff of “awareness campaigns.” An attempt by Senator Nilofer Bakhtiar to recite the fateha for Taseer has been rejected, Zehra tells us. A senior politician asks for a text message to be declared blasphemous for calling the late Governor “Shaheed.” The prosecutor for the trial of the assassinated political leader fails to show up in court. Each one of these blows is suffered with sighs of appreciative horror from the audience. Appeals from the panel were made to the army, to civil society to reimagine itself, to break away from the past: “Pakistan cannot continue to see itself as an alter-ego to India,” said Zehra. The existential threat must be taken seriously by the Pakistan army, said Hoodbhoy. “We’ve got to look after ourselves,” he asserted, before we pledge support for other countries. In doing so, however, it certainly helps to be cognizant of the world around us. According to Ahmed Rashid, Pakistan “missed” two important moments in history to change the tide of its national security narrative. To have scaled back dependency after the fall of the Soviet Union and invested instead in regional alliances would have been enormously beneficial. Similarly, taking the attack on the World Trade Center as a sign that Pakistan can no longer use non-state actors would have led down a very different road. Civil society needs to push for change, according to the panelists, and find alternatives to the religious-nationalist narrative. Those desperate for some literary element in this discussion may want to take note of the irony of a secular, economically-elite class that is historically disinclined to popular shows of strength wanting to take on a populist, street-savvy force. “It takes extreme passions to bring people out on the street,” noted leading columnist Khalid Ahmed, articulating a need for liberals to do what they do best – talk, and use channels of influence. The fact is that the liberals of Pakistan remain confined to echo chambers filled with like-minded people, unable to reach out to conservative groups, moderate forces, political actors, or even a younger generation. By accident or by design, none of the panelists felt it necessary to situate politicians in either the history or the future of the country. Poverty and inequality, being the forte of politicians, also evaded analysis. Religion and faith, being the specialization of extremists, also failed to make an appearance. Particularly in the light of the haunting assassination of January 4th, desperation has replaced curiosity and indignation has replaced humility. We’re no longer looking to read, but to write and assert. And even our fiction writers, instead of living with and mirroring the fear and hopelessness of war, poverty and the rising tide of intolerance – as their peers in India, Turkey, Iran, and elsewhere have – have resorted to using their pulpit to analyze and explain the world they live in. This being a literature festival, it was still possible to seek reprieve from the charged atmosphere of political discussions, and slip into a session on translation, or emerging writing in Pakistan, or a recitation of Punjabi poetry. Between the calls of appreciation heaped on Mudassir Aziz and Ali Akbar Natiq, and the roars of laughter elicited by Mohommad Hanif, it is comforting to think that there are writers who can make us laugh and cry – at ourselves, and our vanity, in these difficult times. The writer is a Research Analyst based in Karachi |
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