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THANKS TO DAWN.com FOR THIS INTERVIEW
November 26, 2006
AUTHOR: In a classical sense – Shakila Rafiq
By Karamatullah K. Ghori
THE storyteller in Shakila Rafiq would have never come to life had it not been
for her encouraging husband goading her to get into print, something she had
herself craved since childhood. Shakila was born into a traditional Lucknow
family, which helped her to get a sound grounding in chaste and classical Urdu —
both the language and its rich idioms. But to her dismay, her tradition-bound
and orthodox family values wouldn’t allow her talent to become public property.
A girl getting her name into print was much too avant garde for their taste.
Shakila is convinced she would have carved a place for herself under Urdu
literature’s blazing sun much sooner than she eventually did had it not been for
that childhood rebuff.
Shakila’s family migrated to Pakistan in the early 1950s when she was still in
school. Within a year of doing her matriculation, in 1958, she got married to a
budding architect. Four children followed in quick succession, leaving her no
breathing space. There was never enough time to dust up the old stories she’d
written in secret. It wasn’t until 1972 that she got her first short story
published in Karachi’s leading literary magazine, Seep.
When asked what prompted her to finally come out as a writer, she, without a
moment’s hesitation, says that it was the tragedy of East Pakistan. Her maiden
short story, ‘Ehsas ka mujrim’ (convict of sensitivity) was a product of her
deeply troubling frustration. As if dictated by the fickle finger of fate, it
simply poured itself out on paper. There was no looking back after that.
Five collections of highly commended short stories later, Shakila is still
writing with the exuberance and vigour of a youth who has accidentally hit the
jackpot in a great lottery. Her writing is becoming more productive, robust and
versatile with time.
As for what brought her to Canada, hers is a story similar to that of the tens
of thousands of other, older, Canadian immigrants. She came in tow of her
children, and still finds it hard to reconcile with this reality, although she
is happy that her four young granddaughters can roam the streets of Toronto
without fear — a far cry from her native Karachi.
Has migration, in its all-encompassing and comprehensive sense, made an impact
on her stories? “Indeed, it has broadened my canvas and added more colour and
dimensions to it,” says Shakila with the confidence of one now at ease with the
decision to emigrate from her native environs.
She culls several references to fortify the argument that the change of scene
has lent a new finesse to her work. And yet, she insists, her staple milieu is
still the cultural and social ambience of Pakistan. She hastens to add, it shall
always be the beacon of her thoughts. Much of her creative matrix still
originates in her pristine perspective and that is where she finds her
characters and her plots.
Rajinder Singh Bedi — one of the legends of Urdu short story — used to talk
about his facility of discovering story plots and characters “even under a
boulder”? Shakila says she’s in full accord with Bedi; plots and characters
abound all around us; one only needs to have a keen eye and a perceptive mind.
She has never suffered from the inability of coming up with new characters and
plots; they follow her, and not the other way around.
How would she describe herself as a writer of Urdu short stories? Would she call
herself a classicist or one belonging to the esoteric class of innovators who
would rather write in a symbolic and metaphorical style? Shakila says, it’s not
up to the writer to classify him or herself, as belonging to this or that school
of thought on prose-writing. That’s a job best left to the readers. They are the
best judge of a writer’s merit and skills. She does not worry too much about
what critics have to say about her style and place in the pantheon of Urdu short
story. It was the great and immortal Ismat Chughtai, Ismat Apa to Shakila, who
told her, when she was still a little-known entity, not to bother much about the
critics. She has kept the golden advice as a cherished memento and a lodestar in
her journey as a writer. However, each writer is influenced by what he or she
may have imbibed, in his or her formative years, to develop a certain diction
and style of communicating thoughts.
So when forced to choose between being a classicist or a modern experimentalist,
Shakila does not shy away from calling herself an exponent of the former. That’s
because she read a lot of Urdu classical prose when she was growing up, behind
the four walls of her traditional family. An older and daunting sibling, who
dampened her youthful craving to get her name into print, happened to be a book
lover and collector in her own right. So, whenever she (the sibling) would be
out, Shakila cuddled in her library to bone up on the Urdu classics stored
there.
Burrowing her way into the sanctum of Urdu classics, Shakila fell in love with
Ismat Chughtai, a rebel not only among the few women wielding their pen as a
weapon to carve out a place for themselves in a society that wouldn’t allow them
much space but also one of the ‘angry’ writers of pre-Partition India. She
became a role model for Shakila, who paid her ‘icon’ the ultimate tribute when
she interviewed her, much later in Karachi in 1985, when she herself was still
feeling her way around the corridors of the established literati. The product of
that burden of admiration is her book, Ismat Apa, which Shakila classes as
perhaps her best literary effort, so far. It was a labour of love that she
proudly flaunts as her best.
But why Ismat Chughtai as an inspiration, out of the whole collage of great
stalwarts that Urdu literature produced in the first half of the 20th century?
Was it because Ismat managed to accomplish — throw off the yoke that her
traditional upbringing had foisted on her — something that Shakila couldn’t?
Shakila does not answer. She just smiles. Not every girl aspiring to be a
putative writer could follow in Ismat Chughtai’s footsteps, or fit into her
‘larger-than-life’ boots?
Shakila is a classicist in her prose and feels smugly content about it. The
richest treasure of Urdu short story is classicist. What about the experiment
that a generation of Urdu short story writers did with what was defined, and
also hailed for a while, as alamati, or symbolic diction? There are stalwarts,
like Intizar Hussain and Dr Enwer Sajjad who wielded their pen to lead the way
into that esoteric genre? Shakila doesn’t have anything good to say about that
trifle innovation, which burst quickly like a bubble. Symbolism, she thinks, is
like abstract art, leading everyone to interpret it to one’s own convenience and
intellect. But art or literature should not be like a jukebox. Literature is all
about communication — what is known in Urdu as Iblagh. It mustn’t be a riddle
that confuses the reader. It should, instead, have the cadence of a natural
spring flowing effortlessly and enriching everything it comes in contact with.
That was the reason why Shakila did not flinch writing for myriad Urdu digests,
boasting massive circulations. She defends that proclivity precisely for reasons
of reaching a vast readership, which is otherwise allergic to purely literary
magazines.
Shakila is a great believer in literature’s accessibility to an average reader.
Her seven-year stint as a PR factotum with the Pakistan International Airlines
must have fortified her in that principled commitment to literature’s mass
appeal. A short story by the same token must be as plainly narrative as possible
in order to sink in easily with the reader, rather than leading him into a maze.
After migrating to Canada, Shakila has been unconsciously broadening the canvas
of her storytelling by painting into it the vivid colours of her new backdrop.
The latest collection of her stories, Teergi ke Darmiyan (In the midst of
darkness) has a good number of stories composed against the Canadian or western,
perspective. The writer in her is convinced that human emotions, suffering and
the infliction of torture by an uncaring society, are the same in both the East
and the West.
I ask her the stock question: whom would she rank as her favourite short-story
writer amongst her peers? Shakila pauses for a moment and ponders pensively. She
asks if I want her only to choose from the Pakistani writers or am I casting my
net wider?
“Wider, wider,” I say.
Assured, she says, “Jogindar Pal.”
“And why Jogindar Pal?”
“Because he’s lucid and crystal clear in his narrative and development of the
story,” Shakila says emphatically. “And to me that’s what storytelling is all
about. Get the reader so involved and interested that he doesn’t get bored.
Jogindar has a unique diction and style. He’s a master craftsman.”
Does she have any regrets, feel any vacuum in her long journey as a writer who
has earned fame and recognition despite making a late entry in the esoteric
world of literature? “There’s one,” she responds, “and a big one.” Her husband,
who literally launched her as a writer, didn’t stay around long enough to see
her success — he passed away within a year of the publication of her first short
story. She has never been able to reconcile with that loss and the void it has
left in her life still rankles her.
But she has done well, both as a mother — raising four children all by herself —
and as a short-story writer of considerable fame. Her journey is still on, and
there are many milestones yet to pass.
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