ISBN 0 7206 1187 3
Fiction
334pp
Paperback
£10.95
Available

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The Weary Generations

Abdullah Hussein

Translated from the Urdu by the author

‘This powerful, subtle novel is . . . as fresh now as it must have been 36 years ago’ — Sunday Times

Published ahead of Paul Scott’s Raj Quartet and long before Midnight’s Children, Abdullah Hussein’s ambitious saga of social struggle The Weary Generations was a bestseller in Urdu. Published in 1963 and now beyond its 40th edition, it has never been out of print. A vivid depiction of the widespread disillusionment and seismic upheavals of the Partition era that lead to the creation of Pakistan and Bangladesh, there has never been a more opportune time to discover one of the most important writings about the post-colonial trauma in the region.

Although it has appeared in translation in several Indian languages as well as Chinese, it wasn’t until 1999 that it first appeared in English, when the author’s translation was published in hardback in the UK by Peter Owen to major critical acclaim, and subsequently by HarperCollins in India.

Naim, son of a peasant, marries Azra, the daughter of a rich landowner. Fighting for the British during the First World War he loses an arm. Invalided home, he becomes angered at the subjugation of his countrymen under the Raj and aligns himself with the opposition. His ideals are swept away after Independence in 1947 when he realises that, as Muslims, his family is no longer safe in their Indian home and that they must migrate to the newly created Pakistan.

This paperback edition has never been more timely and its significance more apparent. Regarded as one of the half-dozen most influential novels dealing with Partition or post-colonial malaise, it is an immensely powerful novel in its own right and is essential reading for English language readers seeking to comprehend the historical origins of the tensions in the Indian sub-continent.

‘Altogether a brilliant work: one of the great fictional portrayals of the Raj and a sobering, very moving human document.’ — Kirkus Reviews, USA

‘Hussein is a wonderful storyteller . . . the narrative moves at an exciting pace, with its brief, unusual lives of the socially insignificant. These vignettes also evoke the volatility and violence of the last days of British India . . . the novel is a grim reminder that little has changed in the Indian sub-continent: tyranny continues to prevail and Naim’s struggle is repeated, generation after generation, by the weary generations, by the inheritors of British India’s troubled legacy.’ — Literary Review

‘His decision to recast himself in English may be an attempt to create a new work, relevant to our times, which universal in its particularity, forces us to look back and remember. The First World war in which Naim loses an arm is powerfully evoked . . . Hussein’s strength lies in the rich, sombre depiction of war, nationalist upheaval and exodus. The author has the ability to remind us, by turning this century’s raw and agonizing events into moments of collective epiphany, that history and story are in many languages the same thing.’ — Times Literary Supplement