he Night in Her Hair is a stellar collection of popular Pakistani folk tales by the mother-daughter duo Huma Agha Abbas and Taiba Abbas, based in Lahore. Huma Agha Abbas is an artist and cultural journalist. She has a master’s degree from Jammu and Kashmir and hails from a family of diplomat. She has worked at the United Nations in the Department of Public Information. Her first book, Pakistan the Land and Its Culture, published in 2006, documents the country’s cultural history and folk heritage.

Taiba Abbas grew up in Italy and holds a master’s degree in Comparative Literature from the University of London. Her teaching career has spanned over several years at universities and schools in Lahore and Islamabad. Her first collection of poems, The Telling, was published in 1998.

Brimming with beautiful artwork, The Night in Her Hair is an aesthetically pleasing publication about Pakistan and its culture. With impeccable editorial work, well-balanced placement of stories, and engaging prose, it quickly becomes a treasured possession for the reader – a well-deserved pat on the back for a well-aligned author-publisher vision.

Each story has an accompanying artwork by Abbas Sr, who does an excellent job of enhancing the romance in the tales. “These stories developed from a collection or series of paintings my mother (co-author) started making in 2006. Now, these paintings appear as illustrations in the book. Somehow, watching these paintings on our wall brought the stories to life. Each character portrayed in them practically necessitated a retelling woven around them. So the art was already there; you could say that the tales incorporated into the book,” says Taiba Abbas.

We have all read and heard some of the tales in our childhoods, such as the popular Umar Marvi, Sohni Mahiwal, Sassi Punhu, Heer Ranjha, and Mirza Sahiban. But then there are the less-known ones (that are wisely placed at the beginning of the book), such as Kash Kash Jinn, Adam Khan Dur Khanai, Habba Khatoon Yusuf Shah, and Himal Nagrai. The latter tales give the book a refreshingly free-of-cliché element, unlike the ones we usually find in this genre.

Himal Nagrai particularly interested me as it originates from Srinagar city, wherein lies a fable from a famous Kashmiri folk tale based on semi-divine beings – half human, half serpentine. The tale strikingly blends mythology into a legendary love story.

“I felt that we needed to envision these stories and characters afresh, imagining them through the lens of the present – as they could have been, as they might have been, dreaming new possibilities for them, attempting to bridge fantasy and reality through legends,” – Taiba Abbas.

Although I’m not a huge fan of love stories, this one stands out unconventionally. The factor that sets this book apart from most folktale collections is the narrative tied around the characters. For instance, I remember Sohni being character-sketched as a rebellious, fickle teenager who knew nothing better. But she was an accomplished potter. And Mahiwal wasn’t some privileged guy entranced by Sohni’s beauty. Instead, he was initially captivated by her artwork. So when I spoke to Abbas, and she mentioned a ‘need’ to retell, I understood the sentiment. How they are perceived in modern-day Pakistan opens a whole new perspective.

Nearly all love stories have misunderstandings, and miscommunication remains a dominant force. But what’s love if it is straight and simple? Unfortunately, as many of us have learnt the hard way, true love doesn’t always turn out the way we thought it would or show up when we want it to.

Taiba Abbas elaborates, “In a way, I feel this book was inevitable. I began this endeavour in 2020 during the global lockdown. I felt like we needed to envision these stories and characters afresh, imagining them through the lens of the present – as they could have been, as they might have been, dreaming new possibilities for them, attempting to bridge fantasy and reality through legends. It has been four months since the book came out but my work hasn’t stopped. I haven’t had time to sit back and absorb it all. It feels surreal – after all those months of working around the clock, day and night, creating this book, seeing it in the hands of all its readers.”

An author’s commitment to retelling stories on a different tangent revives our love for the tales that have become a part of our culture, music and literature. Particularly in today’s day and age, where the economy is collapsing, romantic prospects are judged with the click of a button, and everyone is obsessed with being young forever; here comes a book telling us that one may still have the audacity to look for love, albeit not as naively.

Of course, many of these folktales are known to have several versions and adaptations, but they mostly stay true to the original and are not lost in translation. Abbas is currently working on her first novel; we hope that it reaches the same heights as The Night in her Hair.

The Night in Her Hair

Authors: Huma Agha Abbas and Taiba Abbas

Publisher: Ala Books & Authors, 2022

Price: Rs2,500

Pages: 363

The reviewer is a freelance journalist based in Karachi