Homage to legendary poet: Year of Faiz to end with a ‘fitting tribute’

Digital archive of poets and artists to facilitate learning of literature.

ISLAMABAD:

As the year of Pakistan’s arguably best-loved poet, Faiz Ahmed Faiz, enters its last quarter a special tribute will be held at Marriot on Friday.

The initiative is being carried out to give the poet a “fitting tribute” through an evening of celebration by acknowledging Faiz through various mediums. The organisers, Grapevine Consultants, believe very little has been done in the capital city to celebrate the legendary poet.

The event will showcase a performance by Indo Mithas students on Faiz’s “The Unicorn and the Dancing Girl”. Public figures Sahra Raza and Abbas Ali Khan will recite Kalam-e-Faiz and an interactive poetry recitation has been organised by Kishwar Naheed and Nasir Bukhari.

The event will also focus on ways to preserve the literary heritage created by Pakistani writers, poets and artists through a digital archive. The archive, once uploaded, aims to provide an impetus for a technology-savvy generation to absorb and assimilate the work of the country’s writers and the nuances of the language helping to understand how both minds and souls can be impacted by great literature.

The executive director of grapevine consultants, Tallat Azim, said the occasion is more a labour of love.

“While we wish we could have carried the event to a much larger scale, we decided that something should be done to celebrate the legacy of Pakistani poets in the capital city.”

Published in The Express Tribune, October 27^th, 2011.