MUSHARRAF ALI FAROOQI is an author, novelist and translator. He was born in 1968 in Hyderabad, Pakistan. His critically acclaimed translation of The Adventures of Amir Hamza by Ghalib Lakhnavi and Abdullah Bilgrami was published in 2008. His children’s picture book The Cobbler’s Holiday Or Why Ants Don’t Wear Shoes was published in 2008; and his novel The Story of a Widow was published in India in 2009. A translation of contemporary Urdu poet Afzal Ahmed Syed Rococo and Other Worlds is forthcoming in 2010. Farooqi is currently collaborating on the graphic novel Rabbit Rap illustrated by Michelle Farooqi.
Musharraf Ali Farooqi’s definitive English translation of The Adventures of Amir Hamza (2008) presents the spellbinding story Amir Hamza, adventurer and uncle of prophet Muhammed, who travels to exotic lands, defeats countless enemies, and encounters along the way warriors and kings, tricksters and fairies, courtesans and magical creatures.
“Non-Urdu-speaking readers can at least appreciate an epic ‘on par with anything in the Western canon.’…the classical pantheon populated by the indomitable Achilles, cunning Odysseus and righteous King Arthur will now be joined by a new, beloved hero: mercurial, mighty Amir Hamza, astride his winged demon steed, soaring to the heavens.” —Time
“Extraordinary. Farooqi has translated into English what most of us thought was untranslatable. The Adventures of Amir Hamza have beguiled readers in many languages for centuries.” —C.M. Naim, Professor Emeritus of Urdu Studies, University of Chicago
Book 2 of Tilism-e Hoshruba
The Master of the Tilism, Emperor Afrasiyab, seals the region of Batin the Hidden, making the trickster Amar Ayyar a virtual prisoner in the tilism. Unable to escape, Amar Ayyar avenges himself on the sorcerer emperor, causing death and destruction in Batin.
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