Abdullah Hussein 

Abdullah Hussein. Born in Rawalpindi, raised in Gujarat, a small town near Lahore, Hussein found a job in a cement factory and took to writing out of sheer boredom. What emerged from his pen was a chronicle of modern India,

In 1963, an unknown writer wrote a novel and sprang it on an unsuspecting Urdu-speaking world. It made him immortal. The novel was Udaas Naslein, its writer

one that reflected the angst of an entire generation and came to be regarded as the foremost Urdu novel of its time. Udaas Naslein was chosen for translation under the UNESCO’s collection of Representative Works in World Languages. For selection, a book must be at least 25 years old and in continuous print. Translated into English by Hussein himself under the title The Weary Generations, it was published in India by HarperCollins. Immaculately dressed, and very tall, Hussein is quite the pucca Englishman! He is also famously reclusive and chary of talking about his craft. Upon retiring as a chemical engineer in the United Kingdom, he ran a liquor off-licence in London and now lives in the Hertfordshire countryside.