FLASH FICTION / Chand raat at Mohakhali

The Ekushey Boi Mela, which was inaugurated on February 15, witnessed good footfall over the weekend, which led to crowd gatherings near popular pavilions. 

Bengal Boi has been hosting their spring fair, Fagun Shomirone, at their premises in Dhanmondi, Dhaka, which is due to end on Saturday, February 26. 

As the Ekushey Boi Mela comes and goes, I feel a certain dread of losing creatively admired people who are anticipated in our cultural celebration of intellectualism.

This year, while strolling across the Ekushey Boi Mela, I came across a variety of styles in stall decor.

Countless stories, poems, essays, and novels have been written about the Bangla language movement of 1952. Biographies of martyrs have been authored.

Growing up in a bicultural household, I was exposed to two languages, two cultures, as a child. I picked up both the languages as my mother tongue—Bangla and Rakhine. Eventually, a third language,

Popular publication house, Gyankosh Prokashoni, hosted an Author Talk at its stall premises yesterday, on February 18. In an attempt to connect authors with their readers, Gyankosh took on this initiative and mentioned that such enterprise would help in bringing people closer to reading and promote bookish conversations. 

A day unforeseen as such! None mourns the dead Nor do they fear death; Intrepid, what illumination Brightens their weary frames, and faces; steps Evince staunchness clad determination, ignite thus The tenacious resolve!

He did not look at me once. His eyes were engrossed in deep thought; to me he seemed to be dipping in the deep waters of memory. Bent with age, he sat at his desk.

The man set out for town at the wake of dawn. It was the month of Phalgun. A nip of chill was still in the air. Wrapping himself in a tattered shawl, he started walking. He had a long way to go, a small river to cross. And then, the town would come into view.

In the digital age, eBook reader apps have partially, or in some cases, fully replaced conventional printed books.

Amar Ekushey Boi Mela has been one of the most celebrated literary events of the country for decades. Every February, this book fair celebrates our love for language and literature, with a festive mood that lasts for a month. But what does it take to prepare for a fair this big? 

This novel explores the adventures of one Rustam, better known as Palowan Bhai. In Dhaka, even the wild animals fear Palowan Bhai for his quick-to-rise temper. But what happens when he visits the calm community of a village?

Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic (Houghton Mifflin, 2006) unfurls with heated family dysfunction, subtle and soaring ugliness, shame, and queer confusion. This is a story of a closeted gay father and his queer daughter, and how their bearings align.

First, the government authorities are always behind in planning and leave things for the last minute to reach concrete decisions, and often, these decisions don’t take into consideration pragmatic solutions that are sustainable and maintainable in the long term.

After so many years, more than a decade or so, when you pass my home, don’t forget to take a look at the humble roof of haystack and wattle if not the humble me waiting to have a look at your eyes for an epoch.

North Avenue beach was crowded with the Gold Coast moneyed, the downtown young and rich, the tanned, tight-bodied volleyballers, all of them white, and a healthy portion of the rest of the city’s masses, a United Colors of Benetton sampler, among which numbered the five of us. School was out for the summer, the next three months sprawled before us like the city from the Skydeck of Sears Tower.

Sirjaul islam Quadir is both an individual and a representative of his time says Prof. Sirajul Islam Chowdhury in his ever-eloquent words put together in the forward to the book.

In a particularly American but artsy, cinematic production depicting the friendship between David Lipsky and David Foster Wallace,

Shortlisted for the JCB Literature Prize 2021, Name Place Animal Thing (Zubaan Books, 2021) by Daribha Lyndem evokes feelings of nostalgia in a reader merely with its title—it is a popular game among kids. Now, as I hold the novella in my hand, my heart is in a strange turmoil.