Listening to voices: How Kabul became the "heroine" of a book

 

I met journalist and author Taran N. Khan in Aligarh. We were introduced to each other through her uncle, when I wrote about their ancestral home in my photo essay "People and Homes of Aligarh". 

When Taran published a book about her travels and walks in Kabul, I was interested, as a writer, to know about her writing process that culminated in her brilliant and eloquent part-memoir, part-travelogue titled "Shadow City: A woman walks Kabul." 

Taran’s book has now won the Stanford Dolman Travel Book of the Year and the +Tata Lit Live First Book Award. 

Such a beautifully written book and by an author who is from Aligarh makes me feel inspired and motivated to keep writing. Below is an excerpt from the interview:

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Meher: Did you go to Kabul with the intention of writing a book?

Taran: "I didn’t go with the intention of writing a book at all. I went there to work with Afghan media professionals. So I was working there with Afghans and they were actually the process. They opened many stories for me, introduced me to their families and friends, and took me around the city, and it was through them that I found these stories that grew into this book.

I started trifling with the idea of a book sometime in 2011. I had already been writing for different publications [such as The Hindu and Gulf News], and the longer I spent there, the more it seemed like these stories were scratching the surface of something bigger. So I started writing longer, more reflective pieces and then it became clear to me that maybe there’s a book. I think I was trying to see what it was that I could say that would be useful, true to myself and also true to what I had seen in the city. At the same time, it had to be something that made sense to readers as well." Read the full interview on Newsclick.in.