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Humayun Ahmed (Bangla: হুমায়ূন আহমেদ) (born 1948) is arguably the most famous contemporary Bengali fictionist and playwright. He has been writing for over thirty five years. Formerly a professor of Applied Chemistry at the University of Dhaka, Bangladesh, he is now a full-time author and movie-maker.

Introduction

Towards the end of the 20th century Humayun Ahmed emerged as the most prominent novelist and story-writer of Bengali literature since Sharat Chandra Chattopadhyay. At least for the last two decades, Humayun Ahmed's books have been topping the bestseller list by a big margin. He has also achieved unprecedented success as a playwright since he started writing screenplays for television in late 1980s. In the early 1990s, he entered the movie-world and proved to be a successful filmmaker in spite of clear departure from the trend of traditional Bangladeshi movies. Although his novels and stories frequently build around urban middle-class life, his focus on rural Bangladesh is not at all negligible.

Humayun Ahmed often shows a fascination for creating stories around supernatural events. Also, he is considered the father of modern Bengali science fiction, having published a number of science fiction books since the 1980s. As an author, he essentially belongs to the genre whose style is characterized by magic realism In a popular survey conducted by the BBC, Humayun Ahmed was elected as one of the ten great living Bengalis.

Family and background

Humayun Ahmed was born to Foyzur Rahman and Ayesha Foyez on 13 November of 1948 in Kutubpur of Mymensingh district in the then East Pakistan, now Bangladesh. It is through him that the colloquial language of rural Mymensingh found a permanent seat in Bengali literature. His father, a police officer and literature aficionado, was killed by the Pakistani army during the liberation war of Bangladesh in 1971. Small wonder that the behaviour and attitude of police officers of Bangladesh often feature in his stories and novels. Humayun Ahmed's younger brother Muhammad Zafar Iqbal, who is a university professor, is also a very popular writer of children's books and science fiction . Recently Iqbal has also earned reputation as a newspaper columnist and a human rights activist.
Their brother, Ahsan Habib, is the editor of the only cartoon magazine of Bangladesh Unmad and a cartoonist of repute as well as popular writer. Humayun Ahmed married Gultekin, granddaughter of Principal Ibrahim Khan, in 1973. They had five children, but were divorced in 2005 as Humayun Ahmed decided to marry Meher Afroz Shaon, a young actress who was a friend of his daughter and whom he had met when she was only 12 years old. Shaon's ambitious mother Tohura Ali became an MP in 2009, after Awami leader Sheikh Hasina gave her a nomination for one of the seats reserved for women. This affair followed a similar unsuccessful one with another juvenile actress named Deepa Islam, daughter of another of his close friends. These and other similar relations brought him much infamy in the conervative society of Bangladesh. This also caused huge mental stress upon the author.

Education and teaching career

Humayun Ahmed attended the Chittagong Collegiate School and Bogra Zilla School for his secondary education. For his higher secondary education, he attended the Dhaka College. He received excellent scores in Secondary School Certificate (SSC). He obtained the second position in combined merit list of Higher Secondary Certificate (HSC) examination of the Dhaka Board. After graduating from the University of Dhaka with excellent grades, Humayun Ahmed joined the department of chemistry in the same university as a lecturer. He obtained his PhD in polymer chemistry from the North Dakota State University under the guidance of Professor Joseph Edward Glass. Professor Dr. Humayun Ahmed retired from the University of Dhaka for the sake of writing and film-making . Notably, he is an honorary fellow in writing at the University of Iowa.

Literature

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Humayun Ahmed had a meteoric rise in Bangla literature. His first novel, Nondito Noroke (tr: In blissful Hell by Mohammad Nurul Huda), written while he was still a student of the University of Dhaka, gained immediate popularity and critical acclaim. Equally successful was his second novel, Shankhanil Karagar (tr: The Conch-blue Prison), later made into a successful film by Nasiruddin Yusuf. Humayun Ahmed went on to become one of the most prolific writers in Bengali literature, having published around one hundred and fifty novels to date.

Along with his more traditional novels and short stories, Humayun Ahmed is often credited with creating or maturing many literary genres in Bangladesh. The rise of Bengali science fiction can largely be attributed to Humayun Ahmed and Muhammed Zafar Iqbal, his younger brother.

His contribution to the comic genre is also considerable. His televised drama Bohubrihi was one of the most successful productions of the national TV of the country called Bangladesh Television. Its characters are still household names twenty years later. The drama combined a subtle comic wit with a social message, as did his successful comic essay collection Elebele. Humayun Ahmed later developed Bohubrihi into a novel.

Though set in the realities of middle class life, Humayun Ahmed's works display a particular penchant for the mysterious and unexplained. He himself and his literature are often referred to as "moon-struck", and references to the full moon in his prose are numerous. In almost every one of Ahmed's novels, there is at least one character who possesses an extraordinary milk of kindness—a characteristic of Humayun Ahmed’s writing. Also, he is prone to create funny characters through which he reveals social realities and passes on his message.

Books for Sheba Prokashoni

Humayun Ahmed produced three books which were published by Sheba Prokashoni. A teacher of Dhaka University, he was deep in financial hardship when he heard that Qazi Anwar Hussain pays immediately for works of translation to be published from Sheba. He was given a book titled Man on Fire which he translated in seven days and Qazi Anwar Hussain gave him 300 Taka as soon as he appeared with the manuscript. It was published under the title "Omanush". He translated two more books for Sheba, namely, Samrat and The Exorcist.

Songs

Humayun Ahmed is not a professional song writer, but he has written a number songs mainly for the films and plays he has produced. Some of his songs are "Ami aaj bhejabo coukh somudrer joley," "Chadni poshor ratey," and "Amaaar achey jol."

Liberation war related writings

Another recurring theme in Humayun Ahmed's literature is the liberation war of Bangladesh, which affected him deeply. His father was killed by the Pakistan Army during the liberation war of Bangladesh in 1971. He, along with his mother and siblings, had to hide to survive. Humayun Ahmed has made a play titled 1971, several novels like Aguner Parashmoni (Tr. The Touchstone of Fire), Shyamal Chhaya (Green Shadows) and a recent novel named Jochhna O Jananir Galpo (Tr. The Tale of Moonlight and the Mother) based on the Liberation War. The novel Jochhna O Jananir Galpo has already received huge popularity and critical acclaim. His comic novel Bahubrihi ends with the character named Farid training parrots to say Tui Rajakar (tr. you are a traitor), with the goal of sending these parrots to Bangladeshi collaborators during the war, and this gained a huge popularity among the people of Bangladesh.

Academic writings

Dr. Humayun Ahmed wrote a notable book on 'quantum chemistry'.This book is an attempt at presenting a very complicated top-level scientific research in simple language to redner it legible to common students.

Television and Film

By 2000, Humayun Ahmed transformed himself into a prominent film and television personality of the country. His first television drama, "Ei Shob Din Ratri" (Tr. Tale of our daily life), gained unparallel popularity in the mid-eighties and drew attention of the people to this author. He followed this with the comedy series "Bohubrihi", the historical drama series "Ayomoy", and the urban drama series "Kothao Keu Nei" (Nobody Anywhere). The last one featured an idealistic gang leader named 'Baker Bhai', who is wrongly convicted, and executed. Baker Bhai became such a popular character that before the last episode was aired, people across the country brought out processions protesting his death sentence. Funnily enough, public prayers and death anniversaries have been observed for this fictional character by Humayun-fans. Last but not the least, "Nakshatrer Raat" (tr. The night of stars, a long serialized televised drama was another hit that explored many facets of modern human life and relationship.

Humayun Ahmed explored the film industry both as an author and director. He directs films based on his own stories. His first film, "Aguner Parashmoni", based on the Bangladesh Liberation War, received critical acclaim and won the National Film Award in eight categories, including Best Picture and Best Director. The theme of the Liberation War often comes across in his stories, often drawing upon Ahmed's in-depth memories of that war.

Ahmed's film Shyamal Chhaya received an Oscar nomination for best foreign language film. It was an entertaining moview with a storyline around the war of liberaiton war of 1971. The movie portrayed a realistic picture of the liberation war without malice and prejudice. Shaymol Chhaya has proved to be a captivating movie. In our polarised world where portraying practising Muslims negatively can bring international accolade very easily, Humayun Ahmed didn't take advantage of the situation. Instead of exploiting that sick anti-Muslim sentiment, he preferred to illustrate a story that is unarguably very close to reality

Literary style

Until recently Bengali fiction has largely been dominated by the works and style of Bengali writers from the West Bengal. Humayun Ahmed has distinguished himself with a unique simple literary diction that quickly became extremely popular. His prose style is lucid and he resorts to dialogues rather than narration by a all-knowing story-teller. As a result his writining is compact and can be easily understood by a large audience. However, he depends heavily on a few stereotypical characters which behave in a predictable way, but are, nevertheless, very popular, because of the romanticism they carry. He has dealt with rural as well as urban life with equal intensity of observation. Frequently, he captures contemporary issues in his writings from a different angle. He is an optimist who is prone to focus on the positive aspects of humanbeings. His portrayal of a hooligan or a prostitute is usually non-judgmental. His human touch to stories hugely appeals to emotional Bengali psychology. Also, it should be noted that, his storylines often blend reality with supernatural episodes. This blend is in some ways similar to magic realism. In the contemporary literary world, perhaps none exists today who writes as spontaneously as Humayun Ahmed

Criticism

Humayun Ahmed has received considerable criticism from the literary critics of the country. One of the most common one leveled against him is that the quality of his work has deteriorated after he gained popularity and started writing for money at the request of his publishers . His brother Muhammed Zafar Iqbal once said "Humayun Ahmed has a great camera, but he only takes picture of birthday parties", referring to his brilliant prose but allegedly trivial subject matters. The main criticism was that he was repeating the same theme and structure time and again for decades. However, from 2003, he is writing more serious and information-containing novels.

Some also criticize his decision to resign as a Professor of University of Dhaka to become a full time writer-film maker. But as he is considered as one of the most popular Bengali writers, his career as a professor of chemistry is blurred and he claimed that more time is needed to write and direct movies in the black era of Bengali films.

Awards

• Bangla Academy Award 1981
• Shishu Academy Award
• Ekushe Podok 1994
• National Film Award (Best Story 1993, Best Film 1994, Best Dialogue 1994)
• Lekhak Shibir Prize (1973)
• Michael Madhusudan Medal (1987)
• Bacsas Prize (1988)
• Humayun Qadir Memorial Prize (1990)
• Jainul Abedin Gold Medal
• ShellTec Award (2007)

It may be noted that the Japanese TV channel NHK made a program Who is who in Asia about the life of Humayun Ahamed.

Works

Selected novels

• Lilaboti (2006)
• Kobi (Poet)
• Nondito Noroke (In A Blissful Hell)
• Shongkhoneel Karagar
• Mondroshoptok
• Durey Kothay (Far Away)
• Sourav (Fragrance)
• Nee
• Phera(Return)
• Krishno Paksha (Dark Moon)
• Saajghar(Dressing Room)
• Bashor
• Gouripur Junction (Gouripur Junction)
• Nripoti (Emperor)(Drama)
• Omanush (Inhuman)(Adaptation of Man on Fire (novel) by A. J. Quinnell)
• Bohubrihi
• Eishob Din Ratri (These days and nights)
• Ashabori
• Daruchini Dwip(Daruchini Island)
• Shuvro
• Nokhkhotrer Raat (Starry Night)
• Nishithini
• Amar Achhey Jol (I Have Tears)
• Kothao Kew Nei (No One No where)
• Aguner Parashmony (Philosopher stone of fire)
• Srabon Megher Din
• Akash Jora Megh
• Mohapurush (Great Man)
• Rupali Dwip(Silver Island)
• Kalo Manus (Black man)
• Ke Kotha Koy (Who's Talking)
• Maddhanya (2007) (Noon)
• Maddhanya 2 (2008) (Noon)
• Eshtishon(Station)
• The Exorcist (Adaptation of The Exorcist by William Peter Blatty, published from Sheba Prokashoni)
• Moddhanya Akhanda (2008)
• Tithir nil tualey (Tithi's blue towel)
• Mrinmoyee
• Mrinmoyeer mon valo nei
• Noboni
• Kuhurani
• Aj chitrar biye (Today is Chita's marriage ceremony)
• Tumi amay dekechile chutir nimontrone (When u invited me in the vacation)
• Shedin choitromash (That was the month of choitro)
• Prothom prohor
• Opekkha (The waiting)
• Oporanno (Afternoon)
• Aj ami kuthao jabona (I will not go anywhere today)
• Ondhokarer gan (Song of the dark)
• Jokhon dube jabe purnimar chad
• Chader aloy koyekjon jubok (Some young people in the moonlight)
• Tetul bone juchona
• Jodio shondha
• Ai! Shuvro, Ai!
• Onnodin
• Tumake (To you)
• Ononto ombore
• Pakhi amar akla pakhi
• Nil oporajita (Blue flower)
• Dui duari
• Brishti bilash
• Nil manush (Blue man)
• Jonom jonom
• Jolpoddo
• Jol juchona (Watery moonlight)
• Shomudro bilash
• Chaya shongi (Shade mate)
• Megher chaya (Shade of clouds)
• Priyotomeshu (Dear)
• akjon mayaboti
• Mirar gramer bari (Village of Mira)
• Choitrer ditio dibosh (Second day of choitro)
• Amar chelebela (My childhood days)
• Kichu shoishob (Some childhood days)
• Dekha odekha (Seen unseen)
• Cheleta (That boy)
• Lilua batash
• Asmanira tin bun
• Pencil a aka pori (A fairy drawn by pencil)
• Uralponkhi

Books on liberation war

• 1971
• Aguner Parashmoni
• Shyamal Chhaya
• Anil Bagchir Ekdin
• Jostnya O Jononeer Golpo (tr. The story of Mother and moonlit night)

Misir Ali books

Misir Ali, the character of Humayun Ahmed, a very intelligent lonely professor of Psychology at the University of Dhaka unveils secrets.

• Debi
• Nishithini
• Nishad
• Onish
• Brihonnola
• Bipod
• Misir Alir Omimangshito Rohoshso
• Ami Ebong Amra
• Tandra Bilash
• Ami e Misir Ali
• Kohen Kobi Kalidash
• Voy (Story collection)
• Bagh-Bondi Misir Ali
• Misir Ali'r Choshma (2008)
• Misir Ali! Apni Kothai?(2009)

Himu Series

• Moyurakkhi-(1990)
• Darojar Opashe-(1992)
• Himu-(1993)
• Parapar-(1993)
• Ebong Himu-(1995)
• Himur Hatay Koyekti Nill Poddo-(1996)
• Himur Ditiyo Prohor-(1997)
• Himur Rupali Ratri-(1998)
• Ekjon Himu Koekti Jhijhi Poka-(1999)
• Tomader Ei Nogore-(2000)
• Chole Jay Bosonter Din-(2002)
• Shey Ashe Dhire-(2003)
• Himu Mama-(2004)
• Angool Kata Joglu-(2005)
• Halud Himu Kalo RAB-(2006)
• Aj Himur Biye-(2007)
• Himu Rimande-(2008)
• Himur Moddhodupur-(2009)

Comedy

• Tara tin jon
• Abaro tin jon

Science Fiction

• Tomader Jonno Valobasa (Love For You All)
• Anonto Nakhatrobithi
• Fiha Sameekaran (Equation Fiha)
• Erina
• Kuhok (Enchantment)
• Ema
• Omega Point
• Shunyo (Zero)
• Onno Bhuban (The Other World)
• Ditio Manob
• Ahok (Collection)
• Manobi

Supernatural

• Advut Sob Golpo
• Kalo Jadukar
• Pipli Begum
• Kani Daini
• Kutu Miah
• Poka (Insect)
• Parul o tinti kukur
• Nil hati
• Bhoot bhutong bhutou
• Mojar bhoot

Satire

• Elebele (1990)
• Elebele 2 (1990)

Scientific writings

• Quantum Rosayon

Poems

• Grehothagi Josna (Kakoli Prokasoni)

Collections

• Five Novels of Nineteenseventies
• Five Novels of Nineteeneighties
• Five Novels of Nineteenninties
• Best Novels
• Premer Golpo Somogro
• Odvut Sob Uponnas
• Nirbachito Kishor Uponnas
• Bhoot Samogro
• Nirbachito Golpo
• Golpo Samogro
• Moktijoddher Uponnas Samogro
• Chhotoder Sera Golpo

Filmography (as Director)

• Aguner Parashmony: 1995
• Srabon Megher Din: 2000
• Dui Duari: 2001
• Chondra Kotha: 2003
• Shyamol Chhaya: 2004
• Noy Nombor Bipod Sonket: 2006
• Nondito Noroke
• Amar Ache Jol

Television drama

• Amra Tin Jon
• Aj Robybar
• Ayomoy
• Bohubrihi
• Eishob Dinratri (Story of Our Days)
• Kala Koitor
• Kothao Keu Nei
• Nokhkhotrer Raat
• Project Himalay
• Shedin Choitromash
• Tara Tin Jon
• Urey Jai Bok Pokkhi
• Brikkhomanob

Books in English translation

• 1971
• Gouripur Junction (2008)

References

1. Shamim Ahsan : ‘A Grand Convergence of Minds’, The Daily Star, Vol. 1, No. 142, 2004, Dhaka
2. Faizul Latif Chowdhury (2007), Review of Lilaboti, Prothom Alo, Dhaka.
3. Shamim Ahsan : Igniting Children's Imagination, The Daily Star, Vol. 1, No. 112, 2003, Dhaka
4. Chobi Bananor Galpo by Humayun Ahmed
5. Humayun Ahmed, "Ball Point", Shaptahik 2000, 31 October 2008, Dhaka, Bangladesh.
6. Mirza, 'Kudos to Humayun Ahmed', The Daily Star, 10 december 2004, Dhaka.
7. Chowdhury, F. L. Humayun Ahmed : A Short Introduciton, Desh Prokshan, 2006, Dhaka.
8. Rubaiyat Hossain : 'Bad girls and middle-class morality', The Daily Star, May 2007, Dhaka
9. Chowdhury, F. L. Humayun Ahmed - Time for a Change', Ditiyo Chinta, 1992, Mymensingh

External links

• An English Article on Humayun Ahmed's Novels
• 1971, a short by Humayun Ahmed translated into English
• Bangla Article on Humayun Ahmed
• Article on Humayun Ahmed from South Asian LIterary Recordings Project
• A Bangla Article on Humayun Ahmed's Joshna O Jononir Golpo

• Bangladeshi novelists
• Bangladeshi writers
• Bengali writers
• Bengali-language writers
• Bengali people
• Bangladeshi film directors
• Dhaka University alumni
• Dhaka University faculty
• 1948 births
• People from Mymensingh District
• Living people