Sunday 25 November 2012

Ardeshir Cowasjee: Postcard from the edge

On hearing about the death of Pakistani writer and Karachi-ophile Ardeshir Cowasjee I recalled a year ago, how I wrote a series of blog posts titled the Grand Old man of Karachi . It was a four part series where I took excerpts from his columns that I found most memorable. It ranged from reminding the people of Pakistan that the state was not defined by religiosity to documenting state manipulation and nepotism.

He was a critic at his heart and many of his admirers found that side of him as abrasive and difficult. Despite that knowledge, I decided to e mail him the link to the series. I was honest in my e mail writing that as a regular reader of his column I was also critiquing his views.

To my surprise he replied and below are a few excerpts of his e mail:

 

Reading it brought back so many memories of things that I had actually forgotten I had written.
Not of course the major issues of the Supreme Court and Asghar Khan's petition -but anecdotes such as the Rafi Raza one.
What a fine job you have done and I am indeed impressed and grateful.
Disrespect does not come into it at all.
Thank you - and may you have a good new year.
AC
 So the critic took criticism.. i can think of no finer measure of a man..Rest in peace 
 

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

He replied to my email also and was gracious in his reaction to my comments.

Anonymous said...

I think we were all his fans. He will be missed. He will live on in our memories and in us ad he touched us all.