Tariq Mehmood
Tariq Mehmood is an award winning novelist and documentary film-maker. His first novel, Hand On the Sun (London: Penguin Books, 1983), dealt with the experience of the resistance to racism by young migrant to the UK of the 1970s and…
A suicide bombing is being planned in a residential street in Manchester. Behind it lie Saleem Khan’s vivid memories – some full of regret and yearning, others humorous and yet others overshadowed by the surreal brutality of the war in Afghanistan.
Tariq Mehmood is an award winning novelist and documentary film-maker. His first novel, Hand On the Sun (London: Penguin Books, 1983), dealt with the experience of the resistance to racism by young migrant to the UK of the 1970s and…
A suicide bombing is being planned in Manchester, UK. Behind it lie Saleem Khan’s vivid memories – some full of regret and yearning, others humorous and yet others overshadowed by the surreal brutality of war.
In the 1960s, he leaves his lover, his job as a teacher and his home in rural Pakistan and travels to Bradford, a town seething with racism where Asians are ‘Pakis’ and their labour is cheap. He finds a job working in a mill on an all-Asian night-shift, becomes an active trade unionist and, when the mills close down, he drives a taxi. He gives up his religion and eventually falls in love with an English woman.
But in the 1980s Pakistan draws him back. Now regarded as a smart ‘abroadi’, he gets involved as the English-speaking partner in his cousin’s transport business. When a truck driver he knows does not return to base, Saleem Khan sets out to find him and unwittingly gets drawn across the border and into the killing fields of Afghanistan. Here, among Russian soldiers, Saudi Arabian Sheikhs, American Pirs, prostitutes and the holy warriors of the Mujahadeen, who take their orders and weapons from the United States, he meets Gulzarina, the woman whose life and experiences in a war without end allow him to finally make sense of his own.
Tariq Mehmood has written a powerful tale and his voice in the current political climate is important. Through a strong sense of the spoken word, an under-heard narrative gains momentum. This book is pure entertainment but it is also a cautionary tale. A question embedded in a Song. What happens when people are ignored and suppressed for too long? Where does that energy go? It is the reader’s gain that this particular writer has put his own spark into Song for Gulzarina. https://muscattales.com/2016/11/21/speaking-in-bombs-book-review-song-of-gulzarina-by-tariq-mehmood/
SKU: | N/A |
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Categories: | Afghanistan, Fiction, Globalization, Imperialism, Political Freedom & Security, Political Science, Protest, Religion, UK, USA, Walter Rodney |
Tags: | Afghanistan, England, Fiction, love, Pakistan, political, racism, war, war on terror |
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Dimensions | N/A |
Book Format | Print Book, PDF |
The value of this brilliant, thoroughly researched, and vigorously written book extends far beyond Makerere University and the case study of its academic union that is a central feature. The authors raise questions applicable to universities worldwide: the meaning of “democracy” for members of the academy, the relationship of the university to government, and the responsibility of academics and the media to the society that they ostensibly serve. Makerere’s failure to advance gender equity is the main focus of one chapter and a leitmotif in several others. A probing and sometimes personal analysis of the Law School, with which all the authors are associated, complements its contribution to the cause of democracy in Uganda. At once reflective and challenging, the authors invite further exploration by academics and policy-makers around the world.
— Carol Sicherman author of Becoming an African University: Makerere, 1922-2000 (2005), Professor Emerita, Lehman College, City University of New York
Penned by brilliant legal academics, this anthology about that African academic giant—Makerere University—takes the reader on a fascinat- ing and engaging journey about the history of the organizational expression of African intellectuals and their links to the democratic struggles in Uganda. Arguably the best text on academia I have read in a long time, the book provides a deeply examined and superbly chronicled account of the manner in which Makerere University has been a thorn in the side of successive dictatorial governments, while also unpacking the warts that threaten to blight the academy; simply magnificent!
— Dr. Willy Mutunga, Chief Justice & President of Supreme Court, Republic of Kenya, 2011-2016
This is a very valuable and a timely contribution to our understanding of sites of struggle in African countries. It focuses on Makerere University as a site of struggle for democratisation. The authors have done a marvellous job. If the sister universities of Dar es Salaam and Nairobi were to produce studies, we would have a veritable trilogy of struggles at our universities in East Africa.
— Issa G Shivji, Professor Emeritus of Public Law & First Julius Nyerere Professor of Pan-African Studies, University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania
Alma mater to presidents, public intellectuals and pundits of all disciplines, Makerere University has attracted considerable scholarly and popular attention, both in respect of its prominence and achievements, as well as with regard to its failures and foibles. As the oldest (and arguably best-known) university in Uganda and the wider eastern and central Africa region, Makerere looms large in the history of higher education on the continent.
This book explores the relationship between a public university of unique historical importance and the contestations over democratization that have taken place both within campus and beyond. It is pivoted around the late-20th century struggles by university staff and students for improved living conditions against the backdrop of the early programs of structural adjustment and economic reform pursued by the National Resistance Army/Movement (NRA/M) government adopted soon after taking power in 1986.
Although seemingly introverted in focus, in many respects these efforts represented the earliest forms of political resistance against a regime of governance that promised a great deal, but disappointingly delivered considerably less. Collectively, the chapters demonstrate that there is neither a single narrative nor a textbook formula about the relationship between the academy and democratic struggles. Instead of forcing an unsupported and false consensus on the definitive role of Academia in politics, the book seeks to stimulate a robust debate on the subject.
CONTENTS
Preface by Hon. Justice Solomy Balungi Bossa
1. Introduction: The Academy and Political Struggle in Uganda J. Oloka-Onyango
2. The Role of Academia in the Democratization Process Benson Tusasirwe
3. For whom doth the Academic bell really toll? Unpacking the engagement of Makerere University Academic Staff Association (MUASA) in Uganda’s Democratization struggles Maria Nassali
4. Intellectuals and the Fourth Estate: Analyzing the Coverage of Makerere University Academic Staff Association (MUASA) in the Ugandan Media (1989-2020) Ivan Okuda
5. Between Activism and “Hooliganism”: Civic Engagement and Democratic Struggles in Makerere University Students Guild Dan Ngabirano
6. Juggling the Personal and the Political: The Case of Female Academics at Makerere University Sylvia Tamale
7. Contending with the past and building for the future? The Paradoxical contribution of Makerere University School of Law to dictatorship and democratization in Uganda Busingye Kabumba
8. Conclusion: The Political Economy of University Education: Revisiting democratic alternatives for Makerere and Uganda Frederick W. Jjuuko
Contributing Authors
Beyond the critique of neo-liberalism, there is therefore a pressing need to reflect about alternatives that will help Africa back out of this dead-end and find its own path. This is the perspective adopted by this book edited by Ndongo Samba Sylla, which compiles contributions of experts on Africa’s development issues. Can democracy help to achieve the changes that Africans aspire to? If yes, under what conditions? Otherwise, what is the alternative?
Critically engaging Ato Sekyi-Otu’s notion of partisan universalism, this timely volume of essays speaks directly to the onto-metaphysical issues that will give Africana thought the new foundations that will enable it to move beyond the lin- guistic turn, brush aside the ashes of Afro-pessimism, engage Badiou’s new mathematical universalism, and to launch new projects of liberation on decolonized grounds of greater epistemic independence. A must read for all concerned with the future of Africana theory and praxis. — Paget Henry, author of Caliban’s Reason.
Responding to the invitation ‘to re-member severed but shareable things’, these lovers of truth, freedom, and dignity celebrate the searing intellect, generosity, wit, and compassion of the person and the scholar Ato Sekyi-Otu. … Combined with Sekyi-Otu’s autobiographical reflections of learning to be Black in the United States and insistence that Afropessimism turns the perverse ontology of the antiblack world into a Black ontology, this is a precious contribution. Not to be missed! —Jane Anna Gordon, author of Statelessness and Contemporary Enslavement and co-editor (with Drucilla Cornell) of Creolizing Rosa Luxemburg
Ato Sekyi-Otu’s thought is one of the most important and exciting in Africa today. The texts compiled in this volume celebrate and engage with the work of Sekyi-Otu … They bear eloquent witness to Sekyi-Otu’s stature as a thinker and to his consistent commitment to the universalization of humanity in both theory and practice. Deeply anchored in African cultures and modes of life, Sekyi-Otu has shown how ideas of human universality are ingrained in African popular sayings and proverbs and are regularly reflected in artistic creations. — Michael Neocosmos, Emeritus Professor in the Humanities, Rhodes University, South Africa
This anthology in honour of Ato Sekyi-Otu is indispensable for those concerned with Frantz Fanon’s ideas of ‘ false’ and ‘ true ‘ decolonisation and about social humanist critique of post-structuralism’ s truncated version of anti-colonialism. Sekyi-Otu accomplishes precisely such a critique in his Fanon’s Dialectic of Experience and in Left Universalism, Africacentric Essays. The essays here are exemplars of such a critique which, together with Fanon and Sekyi -Otu, build a legacy for envisioning a post-imperialist world. The authors of this volume rescue post-colonial studies from a stale and unfruitful post-structuralist reading of anti-colonialism by positing an apparent paradox of ‘left ‘ or ‘ partisan’ universalism which can then be dialectically resolved. Intellectually and politically active at once, this anthology shows how Sekyi-Otu and his co- authors can help the reader to move beyond a binary and solipsistic stance towards a project of a real emancipation, a ‘ true ‘ decolonisation. In this neither the living experience individual nor the collectivity implied in the notion of the human lose their specificity and universality. — Himani Bannerji, Professor Emeritus and Senior Scholar, Department of Sociology, York University
This collection of essays celebrates the work of Ato Sekyi-Otu as a scholar, teacher and friend, marking his extraordinary contribution to the philosophy, politics and praxis of liberation. As Ato Sekyi-Otu has argued in his most recent book, Left Universalism, Africacentric Essays (Routlege 2019), universalism is an ‘inescapable presupposition of ethical judgment in general and critique in particular, especially indispensable for radical criticism of conditions of existence in postcolonial society and for vindicating visions of social regeneration’. Universalism must and can only be partisan. Edited by Gamal Abdel-Shehid and Sofia Noori, the collection includes essays by Stefan Kipfler, Patrick Taylor, Sophie Mcall, Gamal Abdel-Shehid, Jeremy M. Glick, Nigel C. Gibson, Jeff Noonan, Esteve Morera, Tyler Gasteiger, Olúfeṃ́i Táíẃò, Susan Dianne Brophy, Nergis Canefe, Chistoher Balcom, Lewis Gordon, and by Ato Sekyi-Otu himself.
CONTENTS
Africa Matters: Cultural politics, political economies, & grammars of protest provides a sampling of insightful articles from the first five issues of Nokoko, journal of the Institute of African Studies, Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada. It brings together pieces that the journal’s editorial board felt were particularly perspicacious in their analysis and resonant in their crafting. Uniting them in this book permits a new dialogue to emerge around the key themes of cultural politics, political economies and grammars of protest. Their intersection here sheds light on important issues for Africans in the twenty-first century.
Table of Contents
Introduction: On the matter of African matters—Blair Rutherford and Pius Adesanmi
Two cities: Guangzhou / Lagos—Wendy Thompson Taiwo
Catherine Acholonu (1951- 2014): The female writer as a goddess—Nduka Otiono
Filming home, plurality of identity, belonging and homing in transnational African cinema—Suvi Lensu
‘Spare Tires’, ‘Second Fiddle’ and ‘Prostitutes’? Interrogating discourses about women and politics in
Nigeria—Grace Adeniyi-Ogunyankin
The South African Reserve Bank and the telling of monetary stories—Elizabeth Cobbett
The neoliberal turn in the SADC: Regional integration and disintegration—Jessica Evans
Indian hair, the after-temple-life: Class, gender and 137 race representations of the African American woman in the human hair industry—Nadège Compaore
The role of radio and mobile phones in conflict situations: The case of the 2008 Zimbabwe elections and xenophobic attacks in Cape Town—Wallace Chuma
The story of Cape Town’s two marches: Personal reflections on going home—Stephanie Urdang
Beyond an epistemology of bread, butter, culture and power: Mapping the African feminist movement—Sinmi Akin-Aina
Setting the agenda for our leaders from under a tree: The People’s Parliament in Nairobi—Wangui Kimari and Jacob Rasmussen
Politics across boundaries: Pan-Africanism: Seeds for African unity—Gacheke Gachihi
Afterword: Incorporeal words: The tragic passing of Pius Adesanmi—Blair Rutherford
About the contributors
About the Institute of African Studies
Nokoko podcasts
ANNOUNCEMENT: Love After Babel wins Nicolás Cristóbal Guillén Batista Outstanding Book Award by the Caribbean Philosophical Association
Congratulations to Chandramohan S!
Love after Babel is a collection of poems that deal with themes such as caste, the resistance of Dalit people, Dalit literature, islamophobia and other political themes, with almost one hundred poems divided into three sections (Call Me Ishmail Tonight; Name Me a Word; Love after Babel). The introduction is by Suraj Yengde (award-winning scholar and activist from India, author of the bestseller Caste Matters, inaugural postdoctoral fellow at the Initiative for Institutional Anti-racism and Accountability, Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School).
Chandramohan’s poems are dialogues of the ‘ self’ with the ‘other’. He brings to life a world that subverts myths, literary canons, gender and caste stereotypes by pooling in sparklingly new metaphors with sensitivity and care. He draws his images from contemporary incidents as well as myths and legends of yore, and delves deep into the politicized realm, thus ‘rupturing the hymen of demarcations’ of identity, resistance, repression and love.
—Babitha Marina Justin, poet, artist and academician
Chandramohan’s poetry is an extraordinary combination of a strong individual voice, crying out against a deeply felt sense of personal abuse, and a sophisticated understanding of the long history and mythology of such abuse, in India but also in the world at large. Mythological figures like Shambuka and Urmila illluminate, and are illuminated by, modern atrocities. The poems are by turns shocking, moving, and exhilarating. —Wendy Doniger O’Flaherty is an American Indologist whose professional career has spanned five decades.
Chandramohan S has the stark ability as a poet to react to any social happening, and these turn out to be in the most responses to societal happenings, plunged into the dark interiors of human behavior. So these could be related to caste oppression. Economic exploitation, religious polemics etc. But the poetic ability or the agility is always there to handle a situation born out of politico- social situations. There lies his remarkable dexterity as a poet commentator. His lines are direct, and even angry. But that does not matter. This is poetry- at its best. No wonder then that, his poems have been published world wide. He is perhaps now one of the very few, if not the only Indian poet in English to have taken the burden of social and political repression, as a distinct and livid political idiom. To read his poems is also painful, but the poetry is in the pain!—Ananya S Guha lives in Shillong in North East India. He has been writing and publishing his poetry for the last 33 years.
Had an honor to introduce this extremely riveting collection of humanity-filled radical lines “Love After Babel” told by the incomparable art form—Dalit Poetry. Chandramohan is confidently flirtatious with his words. by
Soon after its publication in 1972, Walter Rodney’s How Europe Underdeveloped Africa gained global popularity among students, scholars, activists and people concerned with African affairs. His innovative application of the method of political economy transformed the paradigm for rendition of the continent’s past. Because it stridently took the traditional historians and the prevailing neo-colonial order to task, it was also pilloried by the defenders of the status quo. And, in these neoliberal times, mainstream scholars and pundits proclaim that it is no longer relevant for Africa.
In Walter Rodney: An Enduring Legacy, Karim Hirji makes a systematic case that, on the contrary, Rodney’s seminal work retains its singular value for understanding where Africa has come from, where it is going, and charting the path towards genuine development for its people. After giving a broad picture of Rodney and his times, Hirji examines in detail the criticisms levelled against his work, and conducts a focused review of modern day textbooks on African history. It is seen that most of the claims against Rodney lack a sound basis and that direct representations of his ideas are replete with distortions, unfair selectivity and political bias. Yet, the long term influence of Rodney on African history is unmistakable.
Hirji’s succinct, coherent defence of an intellectual giant who lived and died for humanity is an essential read for anyone with an interest in Africa and related regions.
You can read this book online for free.
Soon after its publication in 1972, Walter Rodney’s How Europe Underdeveloped Africa (HEUA) gained global popularity among progressive students, scholars and activists, and people concerned with African affairs. His innovative application of the method of political economy was a prime contributor to shifting the paradigm for rendition of the continent’s past as well as for visualizing its possible trajectory. Because it stridently took the traditional historians of Africa and the prevailing neo-colonial order to task, it was also vociferously criticized by the defenders of the status quo.
In these neoliberal times, its visibility has waned. Mainstream scholars and pundits from and outside of Africa proclaim that it is no longer a relevant work for Africa. In Walter Rodney: An Enduring Legacy, Karim Hirji makes a systematic case that, on the contrary, Rodney’s seminal work retains its singular value for understanding where Africa has come from, where it is going, and charting a path towards genuine development for the people of Africa.
Hirji considers Rodney in his unitary persona as a historian, theoretician and activist. He begins by outlining the publication history and contents of HEUA, and noting the comments it has drawn from varied quarters. This is followed by a depiction of the global context within which it saw the light of the day and the flowering of progressive thought and vision in those vibrant times. The retrogressive reversal, in thought and social reality, that has transpired since then is summed up next. An assessment of how HEUA has weathered this storm is also provided.
The next chapter presents a brief portrait of Rodney as a revolutionary, with the focus on his seven years at the University of Dar es Salaam. This is followed by an overview of the methodological framework utilized in HEUA.
These five chapters lay the foundation for the main substantive part of Hirji’s book. This part begins with a detailed evaluation of the criticisms that have been levelled at HEUA. Subsequently, by a review of eight textbooks of general African history in common use today is provided. The aim here is to assess the persistence, if any, of ideas of the type promoted by Rodney in such books and identify the manner in which HEUA is directly depicted therein. Do these books give an adequate and fair depiction of Rodney to modern day students?
The penultimate chapter argues for the continued relevance of Rodney and his seminal text for Africa (and the world) in this anti-people, pro-capital, pro-imperial neoliberal era. Hirji concludes with a lively account of his own interactions over six years with Walter Rodney. With the focus on the issue of building socialism in Tanzania, a key dimension in the evolution of Rodney’s thinking is described in a critical spirit. The fundamental question addressed is, in our often dark, demoralizing political environment, what do Rodney and his life have to teach us on the matter of navigating between hope and struggle?
The conclusion emerging from this book is that in the first place most of the criticisms of the content, style and practical value of HEUA lack merit. The representation of Rodney in mainstream books is as well replete with distortions, unfair selectivity and political bias.
Despite these misrepresentations, Rodney and his ideas retain their signal value for understanding African history, for engaging with its present day conditions, and for projecting distinctive future scenarios for the continent. Hirji’s succinct work is a consistent, coherent defence of an intellectual giant, an astute historian and a compassionate revolutionary who lived and died for humanity. It is an essential read for anyone with an interest in African history, and the fate of Africa and the regions that are historically related to it.
Walter Rodney: An Enduring Legacy
Karim F Hirji
CONTENTS
Preface
1. The Book
2. The Global Context
3. A Grand Reversal
4. Rodney, the Revolutionary
5. Rodney and Historiography
6. Criticisms of the Book
7. Rodney in the Classroom
8. Contemporary Relevance
9. Hope and Struggle
Major Writings of Walter Rodney
References
Author Profile
Críticas da obra:
“Uma provocante crítica à extração contemporânea dos recursos (talvez mais adequadamente, “exploração” dos recursos) na África Subsariana. Na sua convincente análise, e em momentos abrasadora, Bassey apresenta uma critica cativante e abrangente da crise social e ambiental que se vive na África” – Chatham House
“De escravos a diamantes e passando pelo petróleo, há muito que os países mais consumistas têm vindo a pilhar a África a seu bel-prazer. Bassey explica muito bem como tudo isso tem vindo a acontecer, frisando bem o que procura a África: Justiça. Leia a obra e junte-se ao apelo de Bassey” – Annie Leonard, autora d´A estória das coisas
“Um livro que explica, de forma perspicaz e eloquente, o que a África pode fazer para travar as novas formas de colonização exacerbadas pelo caos das mudanças climáticas” – Pablo Solon, ex-embaixador da Bolívia nas Nações Unidas
“É uma obra que, a par da forte denúncia que faz da ganância e do saque da riqueza africana, apresenta perspetivas de esperança” – Camilla Toulmin, presidente do Instituto Internacional de Desenvolvimento e Meio Ambiente
“A África e o seu ambiente. Com um estilo refrescante, o autor torna as suas ideias extremamente acessíveis. Um dos mais proeminentes ambientalistas da África, faz uma análise abrangente dos desafios que enfrenta o continente, inspirando as pessoas a agir.” – David Fig, Presidente da Biowatch South Africa e autor do Staking Their Claims
“Para aqueles que ainda estão sépticos dos efeitos das mudanças climáticas, este livro vai deixa-los não apenas incomodados e preocupados, mas também motiva-los a fazer alguma coisa” – Nigerian Compass
O nigeriano Nnimmo Bassey é arquiteto, ativista ambiental e escritor. Foi presidente dos Amigos da Terra Internacional (Friends of the Earth International) de 2008 a 2012 e Diretor Executivo da Ação pelos Direitos Ambientais (Environmental Rights Action) durante duas décadas. Em 2009, foi nomeado “Herói do Ambiente” pela revista Time e, em 2010, foi co-vencedor do prestigiado Right Livelihood Award (considerado o Prémio Nobel Alternativo). Em 2012, ganhou o Rafto Prize. É atualmente diretor da Fundação Health of Mother Earth, uma organização ambientalista de reflexão e advocacia.
For all the official historiographic efforts at forging a mythologised image of Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov as the austere, no-nonsense, professional revolutionary, the really existing flesh and blood Lenin understood and appreciated that the most materialist action an individual must carry out without fault to metabolise the struggle for communism is to breathe. Not just biologically respire but consciously breathe. Breathe for oneself and breathe for and with others. If it is indeed our desire to breathe new life into the long choking red star, a new oxygenic Communist politics of walking and breathing is what we must aspire to, inspire, respire and encourage.
See the Description below for further details.
J Rose
“Tariq Mehmood has written a powerful tale and his voice in the current political climate is important. Through a strong sense of the spoken word, an under-heard narrative gains momentum. This book is pure entertainment but it is also a cautionary tale. A question embedded in a Song. What happens when people are ignored and suppressed for too long? Where does that energy go? It is the reader’s gain that this particular writer has put his own spark into Song for Gulzarina.”
https://muscattales.com/2016/11/21/speaking-in-bombs-book-review-song-of-gulzarina-by-tariq-mehmood/
Daraja Press
Abeera Khan: Kohl: a Journal for Body and Gender Research, Vol. 2, no. 2, Winter 2016
A novel centred on a Pakistani immigrant’s plan to commit a suicide bombing in Manchester, England, in the wake of the War on Afghanistan, can easily be read as a familiar post-9/11 tragedy. We can assume it is a story of radicalisation, where a character reaches his breaking point in response to a series of unfortunate and unjust geopolitical events. On the outset, then, Tariq Mehmood’s Song of Gulzarina may seem like a predictable political commentary-cum-fable warning against the constraints of ideology and the violence of imperialism. However, it is both the author’s and the characters’ acute self-awareness of the familiarity of the plot, and their insistence on stressing the nuances of Saleem’s journey rather than the gravity of its end, that make for a compelling read.
[…]
Reading Song of Gulzarina as a calamitous tale of vengeance would be an easy interpretation, but it would not do the novel justice. Saleem is advised against his planned suicide bombing by an acquaintance who once similarly sought retribution: “But that peace only lasted the night of my sleep, the pain never stopped in the day. Your pain will never go, no matter what you do” (212). Later in his life, during a tense conversation with his estranged daughter, Saleem echoes this advice to her: “There is us and our past, daughter. This pain will just keep us here” (194). Saleem understands the futility of vengeance for a tragedy-ridden past, yet he still continues to plan the suicide bombing. Saleem’s mission, then, can be simultaneously understood as a broken man’s final attempt to violently confront the systems that have failed him, and a regretful man’s hopeful attempt at redemption for his shortcomings by orchestrating his own end.
http://kohljournal.org/song-of-gulzarina/
Daraja Press
Song of Gulzarina is a highly impressionable book, for it speaks directly and powerfully to the humanness of the reader. Song Of Gulzarina is an absolute worthy read. Lema Abeng-Nsah, Dunia: The Reader’s Magazine
Daraja Press
‘Tariq Mehmood’s Song of Gulzarina (Daraja Press) is a highly involving novel which looks at the life of Saleem Khan, who migrates from Pakistan to Bradford in the 1960s full of expectation and ends up contemplating suicide bombing in 21st century Manchester. The novel ranges between the north of England, where it follows acutely the different sorts of racism confronting Pakistanis, and Pakistan and Afghanistan, where the effects of war and imperialism are never far away. Mehmood deals with some of the really big questions of our time – race, class, oppression, empire and war – through the eyes of a failed father and lover who nonetheless gains our sympathies. The scenes from Afghanistan during the war with Russia are particularly vivid, and show the Mujadeen and Americans working together; later bombing, this time by Nato, helps to explain the bitter opposition to the west which has led to the growth in terrorism in our century.’
Lindsey German in Counterfire
Daraja Press
Claire Chambers, Huffington Post Mehmood is unswerving in his depiction of the racism that existed in Yorkshire mills in the 1970s as well as today’s virulent Islamophobia. After 9/11, a neighbour slams the door on Song of Gulzarina‘s Saleem with the words, ‘When are you lot going to bomb us then, eh?’ Despite the humiliation he suffers at the hands of many white Britons and his eviscerating hatred for Tony Blair, Saleem maintains a lifelong love for Carol, the daughter of his racist employer. … Mehmood’s novel is polemical and full of black humour
Daraja Press
5.0 out of 5 stars That rare breed – an entertaining political novel., 1 Mar. 2017
By Amazon Customer
This review is from: Song of Gulzarina (Paperback)
Political novels that are entertaining as well as thought provoking are a real rarity, but Tariq Mehmood has managed the trick here. The language is deceptively simple but in the telling of the story there are is a great deal of insight to be gained into an area of modern life in the UK that many of us see all around us, but never have access to – the life and loves of a Pakistani “Abroadi.”
This is a novel about alienation and identity, about a man caught between who he is, who he was, and who he wants to be. Saleem Khan leaves his village in Pakistan, his family and the girl he loves, to travel to the UK in order to make money to send home. Once away, he rapidly forgets his roots and becomes embroiled in life in Bradford at the end of the industrial era in the UK, but is unable to to either shed his past or fully embrace his new life. It’s the story of a weak man, always caught between his desires, his loves, the traditions from which he came and the life he is living now. In the course of his life, he wanders from one aspect of modern Pakistani life to the next, taking in leftist politics and trade unionism in the eighties, racial politics, the Taliban and radical Islam in both the UK and abroad. He falls in love with an English woman without ever falling out of love with his old girlfriend, and in doing so alienates himself from both. One after the other he looses or betrays all the things he loves and cares for, including, crucially, the respect of his only daughter.
It’s a convincing story, well told, that brings the reader in contact with elements of the life of a Pakistani Abroadi, that, for this white reader at least, I’d be otherwise unlikely to make contact with. That it manages to do this with conviction and still manages to be entertaining, is a credit to the skill of its author. Tariq Mumood has created a marvellous character in Saleem Khan, who is at once passionate and weak, romantic and cynical, loving and selfish, who looses his principles at the puff of a breeze, but who tells his story with unwavering honesty. His is a journey from naivety to cynicism, in which he never looses his visions of love, even though he is too weak to fulfil any of them. Very much to be recommended!
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Song-Gulzarina-Tariq-Mehmood/dp/0995222355/ref=cm_rdp_product
Daraja Press
5.0 out of 5 stars: This writer has a gift for witty dialogue, switching between registers with pitch perfect precision
By Muscat Tales
Tariq Mehmood has written a powerful tale and his voice in the current political climate is important. Through a strong sense of the spoken word, an under-heard narrative gains momentum. This book is pure entertainment but it is also a cautionary tale. A question embedded in a Song. What happens when people are ignored and suppressed for too long? Where does that energy go? It is the reader’s gain that this particular writer has put his own spark into Song for Gulzarina.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Song-Gulzarina-Tariq-Mehmood/dp/0995222355/ref=cm_rdp_product
Daraja Press
5.0 out of 5 stars: Powerfully gripping and humorous novel that remains mysterious at the same time whilst current issues in the world!
By Matloub Husayn-Ali-Khan on 9 Feb. 2017
I was given a complimentary copy of this very powerful novel Tariq Mehmood entitled: “Song of Gulzarina” and which had taken the author 10 years to complete and in the present political climate the narrative written – not usually heard by the reader. The story encapsulated within the novel and leaves a question mark on the many situations in which people are ignored and suppressed for a long-time – or that lid is lifted and which releases that pent-up anger and resentment.The story revolves around the main character Saleem Khan a Pakistani migrant who leaves his home, his job as a teacher and his woman in rural Pakistan and settles in Bradford, England and the story line also flits between North West of England and Pakistan.
Very early on, as the story progresses – Saleem Khan gains employment at a textile mill in Yorkshire and gets involved in fighting for Asian workers right in the form of requesting better sanitary facilities. As usual, racism rears its ugly head and a white British manager Mr Anderson reacts to an incident related to the issue of unsuitable toilets and he (Mr Anderson) racially belittles the Asian workers:
“….you filthy Paki bastards always sticking together’ Mr Anderson picked up another pipe and hit Salamat Ali Teka across the face!…’’
The rest of the plot I could relate to and this was due to having similar shared experiences to the author and when he (Tariq Mehmood) wrote his first novel ‘Hand on the sun’ that also had a romantic twist in it. So, once again, love featured here in this novel as well and this time two relationships one with a lower caste woman (Yasmin) back in Saleem’s village in Pakistan and in England Saleem fall for Carol Anderson, the daughter of his boss. Both women are committed to him but Saleem ‘is committed to the cause’ and not personal and family ties or needs which both of his love interests reflect.
Spoiler alert:
Half way through the story, the metaphoric build up takes Saleem Khan back to Pakistan during the late 1980s…during the final years of General Zia’s rule and his sudden death in a mysterious Pakistan military plane crash over Bahawalpur in August 1988. The story line builds up to the carnage of the real-life Ohjri munitions dump disaster in Rawalpindi in April 1988 and his fictitious involvement with a group of US backed Mujhadeen in a fight with a camp of soviet soldiers in the Afghan mountains. Here Saleem is clearly unprepared for this precariously dangerous situation which could have easily got him and his cousin Habib killed.The stage is then set, as the jigsaw pieces of the novel come together and the essence of the book title that is encapsulated by: “Song of Gulzarina” – a sort of ‘beautiful mysterious character’ that opens up some of the pre-conceived notions of not just wars, airstrikes and landmines. But it is really about actual humanity and profound sense of spirituality and the precursor of his (Saleem’s) redemption after suffering from many tragedies including loss of his cousin Habib, Yasmin, Carol, Gulzarina’s son Habib Junior and the partial estrangement from his daughter Aisha and Saleem’s ultimate revenge through a planned suicide.
Whilst back in England, Carol Anderson, who is fully aware, of the role of the ‘goree’ mistress she finds herself playing. At page 56: Carol confronts Saleem and lays into him:
“…so you think I wouldn’t understand, eh? So you think your white bit doesn’t understand you lot, eh… and marry your village virgins, isn’t that it?…”
The novel also brings out the issue of alcoholism and love and death as part of the narrative and the usual tragedies associated with it.
The third woman in Saleem’s life is his daughter Aisha and who suffers from racial and Islamaphobic abuse from white men in a passing car and the Muslim youth outside the mosque book stall is stood there and virtually without batting an eyelid – Saleem lays into them: “How can you just carry on selling books? I ask the bearded youth, pointing a shaking finger, you ‘saw what they did to your sisters’. The youth replies: ‘all will be taken care of in the hereafter ‘- view which ignores traditional Islamic belief (which highlights the importance of balance of both – this world – Duniya, earthly matters and deny spiritual matters focussing on the next life and instead of helping his Muslim sister; uses fundamentalist religious rhetoric to do nothing is pivotal moment in the book for me personally.
The story line in the novel keeps us in suspense as Saleem Khan wanders around Longsight/Rusholme Wilmslow Road areas in the state to activate the mobile phone at any moment. There are no prizes for guessing on who is visiting Manchester and addressing a Labour party meeting at the G.Mex centre – the architect of the invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq and in this final ending in the book shows the woman character confronts the architect of the invasion and whose son fought in Iraq and came back with loss of his arms. “You sent my son to Iraq on a lie, you bastard! You sent him on lie and he came back like this”. Finally, the woman say: “He’s a murderer and a liar”.
In the final paragraphs of the book, Saleem remembers the story when he was a child and the snake and ‘he was urgently warned to move away. As he walks, in the present tense, through Rusholme with explosives strapped to his chest, he remembers his mother telling him of how casually he played with a snake. Hence, adults were afraid of such creatures and not adults.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Song-Gulzarina-Tariq-Mehmood/dp/0995222355/ref=cm_rdp_product
Daraja Press
5.0 out of 5 stars: A must read
By Amanda on 1 Mar. 2017
This is a powerful and moving novel that makes a poetic comment on our time, pointing us to reflect on global dynamics and how these relate to our own lives.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Song-Gulzarina-Tariq-Mehmood/dp/0995222355/ref=cm_rdp_product
Daraja Press
by Helen Goodway
“TARIQ Mehmood’s novel The Song of Gulzarina is multi-layered and beautifully written, covering the period from 1940 to 2006 to the present and is set in Pakistan, Afghanistan and England…. Tariq Mehmood is a master of conjuring up pictures and atmospheres in words. The plenitude and veracity of the detail, be it in the ancestral village, migrant workers’ lodgings in Bradford, the mill, the claustrophobic office of cousin Habib’s Goods Forwarding Agency in Rawalpindi, the Tora Bora caves of Afghanistan, the streets of Manchester. It’s all there and we are there with Saleem. The culmination of the novel includes reconciliations with Carol, Saleem’s great love, and with Aisha, his beloved but conflicted daughter. But there’s a sting in the tail.”
http://www.thetelegraphandargus.co.uk/lifestyle/taleisurebook/15365394.Themes_of_migration_and_radicalisation_under_discussion_at_Bradford_Literature_Festival/?ref=erec
Daraja Press
Changiz M. Varzi Fighting warplanes with words
Tariq Mehmood′s latest novel ″Song of Gulzarina″ is an arresting tale of love, loss and longing set against the backdrop of a never-ending war. In interview with Changiz M. Varzi, the award-winning author addresses issues of identity and how racism and Islamophobia can leave an indelible mark.
https://en.qantara.de/content/interview-with-british-pakistani-novelist-tariq-mehmood-fighting-warplanes-with-words
Daraja Press
Green Left Weekly: Song of Gulzarina, by British-Pakistani filmmaker and author Tariq Mehmood, stands out as a unique piece of literature that intertwines personal issues such as migration, identity crisis and romance, with the impact of racism, Islamophobia and Western imperialism in the Middle East.
https://www.greenleft.org.au/content/song-gulzarina-racism-imperialist-and-terror-converge-pakistani-migrants-tale
Daraja Press
Song of Gulzarina is an engrossing, impassioned and thought-provoking novel touching on some central themes of our times. I think it is Tariq Mehmood’s finest work to date and I thoroughly recommend it.
Esme Choonara in Socialist Review