Fiction / Sahara
29 August 2026
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Fiction
I have not eaten today. Not on purpose. I will eat later. I simply have not thought of it yet.
Poetry / The finality of nostalgia
29 August 2026
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Poetry
Poetry / Dinner time and death
29 August 2026
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Poetry
Literary Curtains / Patriarchy inversed: Reimagining Rokeya’s Ladyland in 2026
23 August 2026
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Books & Literature
Book Review: Fiction / A novel of radical softness
20 August 2026
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Books & Literature
BOOK REVIEW: FICTION / Cooking up heat
20 August 2026
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Books & Literature
Event Report / In Transit: The Third Annual Slam Poetry at North South University
19 August 2026
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News
Essay / Poet Shamsur Rahman’s drama translation: Eugene O’Neill’s ‘Marco Millions’
15 August 2026
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Essay
Interview / In conversation with Sonia Bahl: Author of ‘Eighteen Inches Apart’
What becomes increasingly evident across Bahl’s three novels is her sustained fascination with the emotional significance of almosts and maybes.
Event Report / Letters across a lifetime: The 20th staging of Love Letters
21 June 2026
On June 19, 2026, the occasion was the 20th staging of “Love Letters”, A. R. Gurney’s Pulitzer Prize-nominated play, translated and adapted into Bangla by writer and translator Professor Abdus Selim. Directed by veteran theatre actor and director Tropa Majumdar and staged by Group Theatre at the Dr. Nilima Ibrahim Auditorium, the production brought together the acting power couple, Ramendu Majumdar and Ferdausi Majumdar. Their performances transformed what could have easily been a simple reading of letters into something deeply intimate and profoundly human.
News Report / NSU DEML offers certificate course in creative writing for the second time
16 June 2026
The Department of English and Modern Languages (DEML) at North South University is pleased to announce the second offering of its Certificate Course in Creative Writing, set to begin in Summer 2026. This innovative seven-week intensive program is designed to cultivate the next emerging literary voices by providing a structured, mentor-led environment that emphasises Bangladesh’s rich cultural narratives.
The shelf / 7 Asian healing fiction recommendations for rainy days
18 June 2026
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The Shelf
You know when the sky trades its brightness for a low, silver hue, and you wrap your fingers tightly around your tea, seeking that small, steady pulse of warmth. This is the essence of healing fiction. Often rooted in the Japanese concept of iyashikei, these stories focus on the quiet spirit through small, everyday moments. You may have already heard of Days at the Morisaki Bookshop or We’ll Prescribe You a Cat. While those popular favourites have opened a door for many, there are a few other tales worth the read.
Reflections / In the age of AI allegations
13 June 2026
Fiction / Body Selim
18 April 2026
Breaking News and the Food Chain
In the morning when I grabbed the newspaper, the banner headline arrested my attention – “Poor Poland surrenders to the mighty Nazis.” I started to peruse. While I was going through the breaking news, all on a sudden, a spider distracted me. Surreptitiously, it
14 June 2019
Wild Flowers in a Busy Street: A Review of Anabhyaser Dine
When I started reading Anabhyaser Dine (Unaccustomed Days), I did not know much about the author but that also meant I was free from any preconceived image about the writer and in no obligation to subscribe to a preconceived notion.
14 June 2019
On the Craft of Sentencing
I teach English at a private university in Dhaka, Bangladesh, having attended universities on three continents. I’m persuaded to think as such that I know what a university is and does. I wish I did! Joe Moran in First You Write a Sentence claims, “A university is a factory
14 June 2019
The Cigarette (2017)
He chose me.
14 June 2019
On Intimations of Ghalib: Translations from the Urdu
Mirza Asadullah Beg Khan (1797 – 1869), popularly known by his takhallus (pen name) Ghalib (conqueror), makes it difficult for writers to sum him up easily or definitively. He himself would probably have taken great and impish delight in that knowledge. In one of his ghazals he suggests (Shahid Alam
7 June 2019
From Jibananda Das’ Ruposhi Bangla
Having lived in the world’s pathways for a long, long time
7 June 2019
Sultan Abdul Hamid II: ‘The Unspeakable Turk’ Fights Back (Part II)
Sultan Abdul Hamid’s ties to the Indian sub-continent are a revelation for those more accustomed to seeing the name of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk on main thoroughfares or commemorative stamps. Our knowledge of the Ottomans is usually through the lens of our British authored,
7 June 2019
Musing Home
For orchid people like us, a tree from a land called home brings a sweeping breeze of mirth. That breeze dances around us and stirs our leaves of memories. Sometimes it comes in the form of a visual presence, sometimes as a crisp smell of some known delicacies, sometimes, as a familiar
7 June 2019
Truth Stranger than Fiction!
Imagine a Japanese man in Dhaka in the first decade of the twentieth century bent on being employed in the town and ending up marrying a Bengali Brahmo woman, the daughter of a soap factory owner, who has offered him a job. Think of the woman later going to a village near Nagoya with her husband
31 May 2019
Apology From A Muslim Orphan
I know you know
31 May 2019
Sultan Abdul Ha-mid II: “The Unspeakable Turk” Fights Back (Part I)
History as an oft-repeated cliché says is written by the victors. While the winners appropriate exclusive rights for their narratives, the vanquished are seemingly marginalised. Or, are they? For better or for worse, they can now have their say, on television at least. Take the case of the Ottoman Empire
31 May 2019
Remembering Abdul Quadir: Life and Anecdotes
Today, 1 June 2019, is the 113th birth anniversary of litterateur Abdul Quadir (1906-84) who was born in the village of Araisidha in Brahmanbaria. As a tribute to him, this essay offers snippets of his life and brings together some relevant anecdotes and reflections, which have literary-historical significance.
31 May 2019
Riverine Reflections
By the time James Rennell in the 1770’s, working out of Dhaka, finished surveying all the many rivers of Bengal, most of them had changed course, thus showing as much indifference to cartography as to any other form of human presumption.
31 May 2019
It’s All Relative: Relative Truths
However trite it may seem at first glance to call a book “It’s All Relative,” more layers are revealed on further examination of this collection of stories published by Bengal Publicationss. The title is perhaps an allusion to how stories bounce off each other, morphing into something different
24 May 2019
Metaphors of Writ-ing and How We Ac-tually Write
What is a metaphor? How does it help people learn to write? What good is it to even to ask such questions? Though Bangladeshi culture values literature greatly and so recognizes its value in poetry we do not think much about metaphors beyond aesthetics. People overlook the power
24 May 2019
Kazi Nazrul Islam and Our Struggle for Emancipation
I am a poet of the present, and not a prophet of the future. […] My birth in this country and this society does not mean that I shall remain constricted and confined to them. No, I belong to all countries and to the entirety of humanity.
—Kazi Nazrul Islam
24 May 2019
A Poem
A ferocious heat induced meditation
And the world was blurred in a haze
The streets were torrid cauldrons
On which the pedestrians baked.
17 May 2019
Rabindranath: Weaving Miracles and Magic in Melody
My first encounter with Rabindranath Tagore was on a cold winter’s day in early 1964. He was there as a sketch in pencil, on the mantelpiece of a Bengali home in Quetta. The flowing beard, the penetrating eyes, that sense of gravitas- all of this came alive in that sketch. I asked the host, a colleague of my father
17 May 2019
The Meal
Nishat prepares iftari, a sumptuous light meal that includes lemon sorbet, dates, fruits, nuts, begooni, samosa, beans and curd. It is the best part of fasting. But now that she is visiting Bangladesh in preparation for the upcoming Eid ul-Fitr, I manage things on my own at our new home, Dhahran.
17 May 2019
A Bibliophile’s Review of Bargain Buys: The Life and Times of Hercule Poirot
The Queen of detective fiction (1890-1976) was in 1971 bestowed the title - Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire for her contribution to literature by Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II. As with the British reigning monarch, Agatha Christie’s reign continues uninterrupted.
17 May 2019
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