Compositions, 1964-1971

Balraj Mana (trans. Haider Shahbaz)

Balraj Manra was an avant-garde modernist and Marxist writer who changed the course of Urdu literature with his "compositions": a handful of innovative, hybrid texts that use surrealist imagery and visual experimentation to challenge conventional prose form. Published in small, independent literary journals from 1964 to 1971, these texts were composed of commentary on left and Third World politics, dream imagery, song lyrics, notes on modernity, and overheard conversations. By merging avant-garde techniques with Marxist politics, Manra's "compositions" unsettled the authority of social realism over progressive politics in South Asia. Translated into English for the first time by Haider Shahbaz, these works invite readers to reimagine the relationship between aesthetics and politics.

"Shaped by Marxism, the specific politics of South Asia in the late 1960s, and the rise of neocolonialism, Manra’s compositions are formally experimental and politically uncompromising. Their much belated arrival in English expands the maps of who wrote experimental literature and why." —Juliana Spahr