Author of Skeena, among the most reviewed books in modern Punjabi literature, talks to Sabyasachi Nag about her craft and artisanal practices.
SN: What triggered your debut novel Skeena?
FR: Many stories were in my mind when I arrived in Toronto in 1986 as a Convention Refugee from Pakistan where I had been working as a journalist and a freelance screenwriter since the early Seventies. In Toronto, I had the opportunity to work with groups of women, South Asian, immigrant, refugee, activists, students, writers and artists. During discussions and interactions, I would feel the nagging dissatisfaction of not being able to communicate the reality of the lives of Muslim women in Pakistan and South Asia because of the connotations of words and the popular myths about us. For example, terms such as ‘violence against women’ had a Canadian context and it could only depict a partial state of violence experienced by women in other contexts. As well, there were misconceptions about purdah, women, arranged marriages, religious beliefs and cultural norms that were racist, insulting to women and to South Asian Muslim culture. Soon, I felt a strong desire to show my peers in both countries the lived experiences of women in Pakistan and in Canada to make it possible for us to communicate with each other. A fictitious story, as opposed to a work of nonfiction, began to happen around 1991.
SN: Skeena was first published in Pakistan n Punjabi Shahmukhi (Sanjh Publications, Lahore 2007) thereafter it was published in English (Libros Libertad, Surrey 2011), ‘and Punjabi Gurumukhi (Libros Libertad, Surrey 2011). Could you please talk about the title’s journey from Pakistan to Canada to India?
FR: Though first published in Punjabi, the novel was first written in English where all dialogue between Punjabi characters was depicted in both English and Punjabi. This was a direct impact of migration, because if I was still living in Pakistan, the book would have been written in one language not two. After completion, I sent its manuscript to a few readers for evaluation, one of whom read out portions of it to a publisher in Lahore who later invited me to submit a Punjabi manuscript. I went to Pakistan in 2006, converted the manuscript in Punjabi, and got the novel published in 2007. It was the first Punjabi novel that was launched in nine cities with the help of local organizations of writers, and it accompanied a declaration to enhance the status of Punjabi language. Skeena is now the most read/sold Punjabi novel in Pakistan since 2008, and it also is the most reviewed book in modern Punjabi literature. As mentioned above, it was published in 2011 in Canada in both English and Punjabi Gurmukhi. That is because here there’s a sizeable population of Sikh Punjabis who use Gurmukhi script, and marketing Skeena only in Shahmukhi script used by the fewer Muslim Punjabis like me, did not make sense. The 2011 Gurmukhi book was a limited edition, and it went out of print soon. Skeena’s Gurmukhi edition was published in India in 2019, and with that, the novel became accessible to Punjabi and English readers in India, Pakistan and Canada.
SN: Why did you write your chapbook ‘Passion Fruit’? How did you go about putting it together?
FR: ‘Passion Fruit / Tahnget Phall’ is a collection of English and Punjabi poems published together in English, Punjabi Shahmukhi and Punjabi Gurmukhi. The self-publishing of it in two languages and three scripts has to do with my insistence on keeping my mother language with me in an environment that does not deem it necessary or important for me to keep it.
SN: What does it mean/suggest for you to think about your craft with each published work? If you were to associate an image with the development timeline of your writing craft what would that look like?
FR: Not a hip literary concept, but to me, it seems like a thriving little garden with patches of fruits, flowers and vegetables- all different forms, shapes and qualities. My work is diverse in style and expression, and it takes a while to attain. Skeena is a simple story told by a Muslim woman through 40 years of her life, it is rebellious and revolutionary yet the narrative remains soft and warm. On the other hand, The Adventures of Saheban: Biography of a Relentless Warrior is funny, abrasive and satirical. Triple, an unpublished novel, is a fantasy with a poetic expression. All three were begun at the same time in 1991, Skeena was first published in 2007, Saheban in 2016, and Triple is still with me. My ebook Holier Than Life, that includes English poems from Passion Fruit / Tahnget Phal, is a collection of poems aptly described by Author Lydia Kwa as ‘at times tender, at times searing’. My award-winning Punjabi novella Keerru is a story narrated in the voices of its five protagonists that I had begun writing in Lahore in the late 1970s and it was published in 2019. As you can see, the growth is slow but I’m happy to tend this backyard garden of my writing to empower, entice and nourish the reader and myself.
SN: In pushing your work beyond your first title what were you most conscious of? What were/are you trying to achieve?
FR: I wanted Skeena to take the reader along with her to the end. For Saheban, the reader is deemed to be free to stay or to leave, and for Triple, I want my reader to be captivated. For my novella Keerru, I want the reader to be able to hear each of the five voices. Writing novels, to me, is to initiate an interaction with the reader. My desire was, and is, to tell interesting stories to empower the reader so that a meaningful interaction can take place between us.
SN: Do you remember any experience around learning to write that became formative for you in the later years?
FR: Though I studied post-graduate journalism for two years and later worked in the field, I learned to write novels by reading other novels. In my early teens, I found Urdu novels, and it was a treat with all these wonderful writers – Aag ka Darya (the River of Fire) by Qurratulain Hyder, Sarrk Wapis Jati hai (The Road goes back) by Krishan Chander, stories of Ismat Chughtai, Rajinder Singh Bedi and Prem Chand. Immediately after, I found Urdu translations of Russian novels and English translations of French and Italian novels. Reading Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment and Sartre’s trilogy around the same time must have been instructive for me as I enjoyed the passions and expressions of both. In Canada, I was fascinated by the simplicity of Joy Kogawa’s expression in ‘Obasan’, it helped me with Skeena.
Reading other novels taught me what to do and what not to do. For example, long narrative passages whether as powerful as Dostoevsky’s or as witty as Salman Rushdie’s make me skip big time to get to the story. As a result, it is rare to find long descriptions or expositions in my work. Instead, there’s extensive use of dialogue, also because when reading novels written in other languages and in the context of other cultures, the most interesting thing for me as a reader was to come upon scenes with dialogues where I could gain some insights and understandings by myself in addition to the descriptions and musings provided by the author. The use of flashbacks does not jell with me either, it rather distracts from the plot, and so, I don’t want to use long flashbacks except in a thought, or a para or two. As well, I was sniggered upon by another writer for using three different styles of writing for my first three novels because he said that authors/artists spend years to evolve and perfect one style of writing, and once perfected, they use it all their lives as it becomes their trademark. An interesting thought but it does not further my objectives. I don’t want to create any prison, however perfect, for my stories. Putting all in the same style also makes a writing boring for me, and this is one reason I find it hard to read more books by the same author. I feel that my content comes with and determines the form of my art. The style and expression of my stories and poems must stay flexible and fluid to reflect the themes.
SN: What specific incident incited/inspired your last piece of work (of any form or length)?
FR: My last piece of published work is a two-page poem titled ‘Ms. Abundant Sweet’ (Ahvaaz anthology, LCP chapbook, League of Canadian Poets, 2022). Based on my experience as a Brown Muslim woman of South Asian descent, it was written during an online interaction with another author with whom a kind of ‘pen enemyship’ had ensued that had inspired me to write a few poems exploring the intersections of gender and class with the backdrop of race.
SN: Do you have a writing routine? Or writing rituals? Or patterns you must follow regularly? Or rituals that you practice say, when you are writing in certain forms, say a longer piece of work like a novel, as opposed to a shorter piece, say a poem?
FR: I used to write first thing in the morning, a solid 4-6 hours, but that changed during the two years of COVID Lockdown, and now I am free to write at all times, day and night. I sit on the floor to work on my computer, and a consistent supply of unhealthy black tea with milk and sugar, spliffs, and cigarettes continue to be a prominent part of my writing routine.
SN: Is your writing practice influenced or in any way informed by a sense of writing to or for others? Do you have an audience in mind when you write?
FR: A constructed expression of the self, my writing is the fruit of my desire to break out of the self, to reveal, relate, manifest, to heal, and to partake with others in any possible way. The perception of ‘others’ may influence both the style and themes of my art. The question is who are the others that I write for? Well, as we already know, Skeena was written to communicate with my peers in the women’s movements in Toronto of 1980s-1990s and Lahore of 1970s. Saheban is dedicated to my coworkers at Diva: A Quarterly Journal of Women of South Asian Origin (1988-1994 Toronto). Holier Than Life is dedicated to friend and poet the late Fahmida Riyaz, and Keerru to my gay Punjabi friend who also was a co-worker and co-founder of Surrey Muse: an interdisciplinary art & literature presentation group. All are my long-time friends. This is the comfort level I must create within myself to be able to tell my stories.
In other words, an ‘audience’ or ‘readership’ is present in my mind but it is not a single category or a mass of unfaced similar kind of people. These are identifiable individuals. I write for an individual reader, and my individual reader may be a part of many or any readership or audience. For example, most of my readers may belong to population groups categorized as women, youth, POC, but I don’t write for any groups.
SN: Are there any books that you keep visiting for inspiration?
FR: There are two poetry books that are always with me, I travel with them. These are a collection of ghazals by Urdu master poet Mirza Ghalib, and the kafis of Punjabi Sufi poet Madholal Hussain. Both are a source of joy, inspiration, strength, learning, and most of all, finding my ground when it begins to shift away from my feet.
Author Bio
Fauzia Rafique is a novelist, poet and an arts organizer. Her Punjabi novel Keerru (2019) has won Ali Arshad Mir Award 2020 while her debut novel Skeena received WIN Canada’s Distinguished Novelist & Poet award in 2012, and it is Pakistan’s most sold Punjabi novel since 2008. Her humorous fantasy titled The Adventures of SahebaN: Biography of a Relentless Warrior, was launched in 2016. Fauzia’s novels have been published in Canada, India and Pakistan. She declined Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal in 2013. In 2020, Fauzia was awarded the City of Surrey’s Arts & Heritage Literary Arts Award.