Salimullah Khan

Jasim Uddin’s 1971

There has not been much research on to what extent the shadow of 1971 has been reflected in Bangla literature.

Bangladesh began badly: Remembering the roots of the impasse

Nationalism is not a political doctrine, not a programme. If you truly want your country to avoid regressing, halting, failing, it is necessary to march past national consciousness to political and social consciousness.

The origin of the om: Ahmed Sofa’s aura

With the death of Ahmed Sofa on July 28, 2001, Bangladesh (or modern Bengal in historical perspective) lost not simply one of its most original thinkers; it also marked the passing of an age.

Anti-colonial movements as passive revolution: Abdur Razzaq’s insights on 1947

This stain-splattered daybreak, this night-bitten dawn,

Mary Frances Dunham: In memoriam

The blood of the farmer is very sweet and everybody wants to taste it;

Was the Russian revolution a proletarian revolution?

What we call Russian revolution, from a long-term view, is a revolution in three episodes. Lenin called 1905 a "dress rehearsal" and, as Paul Dukes among others notes, he was the first to argue that October must follow on from February. So did Trotsky.

Bloodless genocide: The allegorical gaze of Ahmed Sofa

Ahmed Sofa, known in his lifetime as a firebrand, now appears to be no less memorable for his poems. I do not know yet how posterity is going to read him. But it is all apparent now.

Abdul Karim's discoveries - Origins of modernity in Bengali literature

Abdul Karim discovered that there existed also Muslim writers of quality in Bengali literature and, what's more, their quantity also is far from negligible. In diction their works, for instance, those of the 17th century lauraetes Kazi Daulat (1600-1638) or Syed Alaol (1607-1680) are no less 'elevated and dignified,' i.e., Sanskritized in measure than Bharatchandra Ray's (1712-1760) or Madhusudan Datta's (1824-1873) of later fame.

April 14, 2015
April 14, 2015

Nazrul's passages from modernity

Lyric poetry makes for poor translation.

March 26, 2015
March 26, 2015

The Gaze as 'little object a': Bangladesh at the United Nations in 1971

'Since wars begin in the minds of men, it is in the minds of men that defences of peace must be constructed.' −UNESCO, The Constitution

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