Naiyer Masud

Who is Naiyer Masud?

Naiyer Masud is one of the foremost short story writers in Urdu. He was born in Lucknow in 1936 and has spent nearly all his life there, working until his retirement as a Professor of Persian in Lucknow University. He is the author of many scholarly books and translations, but is best known for his short stories, collected in the volumes Ganjifa, Simiya, Itr-e-kaafoor, and Taoos Chaman Ki Myna. For the last, he was awarded the 2001 Urdu prize of the Sahitya Akademi and the Saraswati Samman in 2007. He also received the honor of being the subject of the 1997 entire issue of the Annual of Urdu Studies. A large selection of his stories have been translated into English by M.U. Memon in the volumes The Snake Catcher and Essence of Camphor. Masud is the son of Syed Hasan Masud Rizvi Adeeb, also a Lucknow University Professor of Persian and a famed scholar of dastaan, and the brother of the noted satirist Azhar Masud.