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Biography and
Translations by Dr.Sharif Fayez
Nasrullah Partow Nadiri was born in
1952 in Jershah Baba village of Badakhshan province and completed
his elementary and high school education in his birthplace. In 1970
he graduated from Kabul Teacher Training School and received his
bachelor from the Faculty of Natural Sciences of Kabul University in
1975.
Since childhood, Nadiri loved
reading literature, particularly poetry. The beautiful mountainous
setting of his village inspired him to write his own lyrics. After
graduating from Kabul Teacher Training School, he wished to study
journalism at Kabul University, but, as a graduate of a public
teacher training school, he was required to study either social or
natural sciences at Kabul University. Nevertheless he believes his
study of geology and biology has enriched the rationalistic aspect
of his poetry and his sense of reality, which is reflected in his
works.
Like many other Afghan artists and
intellectuals, Nadiri was arrested by the Communist Regime in Kabul
on charges of anti-regime political activities and imprisoned in the
infamous Pulcharkhi Prison in the fall of 1984. He remained in
prison until the end of 1986.
In September 1997, he fled to
Pakistan, where he worked for the Dari program of the BBC World
Service until 2002. His cultural reports for the Dari program of
BBC Radio enjoyed popularity among educated Afghans in Afghanistan,
Pakistan, Iran and abroad. Nadiri is a civil society activist and an
outspoken social and political critic.
Images of poverty, imprisonment,
drought, Taliban-style tyranny and obscurantism, destruction and
death abound in his poems. Unlike many of his contemporaries, he
has written more blank verses than fixed forms. “The Other Side of
Purple Waves” is considered one of the best blank verses in modern
Afghan poetry. His published collections include: An Elegy for Vine,
Leaden Moments of Execution, and A Lock on the Gate of Ashes. |
