Star Books Report

In a book launch held at the capital’s Bengal Shilpalay today, Gyantapas Abdur Razzaq Foundation and University Press Limited held a discussion session on Professor Razzaq’s Political Parties in India, his 1950 PhD thesis for the London School of Economics, published now for the first time in book form. 

A designer and illustrator whose work focuses on human rights, feminism, and South Asian identity, Malik has just created an artwork based on Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain’s novella Sultana’s Dream (1905), which imagines a feminist utopia where women dominate the world of science, labour, and their homes. 

On November 8, the High Commission of India hosted a book launching ceremony wherein the Bangla version of Operation X (HarperCollins Publishers India, 2019) was unveiled.

Amitav Ghosh traces back to the lineage of nutmegs originating in the Banda Islands to argue how colonisation deeply influences the geopolitics even in the contemporary world, a violent phenomenon that has led to natural disasters linked to climate change.

Participants reviewed Bangla translations of two significant works of Korean literature—Korear Kobita (Korean Poetry) translated by Chhanda Mahbub, and Korear Golpo (Short Stories of Korea), edited by Soroishwarja Muhommod. Both translations were published by Ujan Prakashan and assisted by the Literature Translation Institute of Korea, who also helped organise the contest. 

Tanzanian novelist Abdulrazak Gurnah has just been announced as the recipient of this year’s Nobel Prize in Literature "for his uncompromising and compassionate penetration of the effects of colonialism and the fate of the refugee in the gulf between cultures and continents."

Bangladeshi poet and novelist Farida Majid passed away at a private hospital in Dhaka on the morning of Tuesday, September 28. 

The 2021 Booker Prize shortlist was revealed on September 15, with six of the previously announced 13-novel longlist making the cut. Each of the six authors are to receive GBP 2,500, while the winner, to be announced on November 3 at the BBC Radio Theatre, will receive GBP 5,000. Notably, and much like 2020’s competition, only one British author is named in the shortlist.

The annual competition, which has been hailed as “India's most valuable literature prize”, offers INR 2,500,000 (USD 35,000) to its winner for distinguished work of fiction by an Indian writer working in or translated to English.

Zubaan Books has released a hardback edition of Inherited Memories: Third Generation Perspectives on Partition in the East, concerning the still-felt ramifications of the 1947 partition.

From August 2021, Daily Star Books was excited to have joined Bookcentric’s monthly reading challenge, which invites readers to read and review books following each month’s designated theme. Under August’s theme of books with nautical themes, here is what our readers read—and reviewed—last month!

The prestigious Commonwealth Short Story Prize competition returns for its 11th iteration, opening its doors for short story submissions from September 1 to November 1, 2021 (11:59pm in any time zone). 

Journalist Mohammad Al-Masum Molla, one of The Daily Star’s lead reporters of environmental, political, and human rights issues, sees the launch of his new book, Bhasan Char: Bastion in the Bay (Agamee Prokashoni, 2021), on August 25. 

South Asia Speaks, a literary mentorship programme for early career writers in South Asia, will open applications starting September 1 and closing on September 30, 2021.

Star Books Report

Goethe-Institut Bangladesh, in collaboration with Dhaka Lit Fest, North South University, and University of Liberal Arts, Bangladesh, are hosting a series of author talks and readings from August to November 2021, with the aim of bringing German literature to Bangladeshi readers. 

Famed poet Helal Hafiz's physical condition has deteriorated. He has not been able to eat for the last two weeks.

Journal for Service Quality Enhancement (JSQE), a new international academic journal devoted to the development and improvement of service quality in business and commerce, was launched on July 31, 2021.

Shaheen Akhtar’s 'Beloved Rongomala', translated from the Bangla novel, 'Shokhi Rongomala' (Bengal Publications, 2015), by Shabnam Nadiya, will now be published by India’s Eka imprint of Westland Publications. The novel tells the story of Queen Phuleswari, a child bride, and of Rongomala, a woman of legend—a low caste mistress to the king who protested the limits to which her rights were confined by the class and caste prejudices of 18th century southern Bengal.

This year’s Booker Prize longlist, the most prestigious literary award for fiction published in the UK, was released yesterday, with well-loved names such as Kazuo Ishiguro, Rachel Cusk, Patricia Lockwood, and Richard Powers making the cut alongside the critically acclaimed Anuk Arudpragasam, Sunjeev Sahota, Damon Galgut, and others.