Omer Tarin (not real name, pen-name), born March 1966, is a Pakistani poet in English, research scholar, social activist and mystic. In some editions of his works, the name is written as Omar Tarin.
Background
Tarin was born in Peshawar city, in 1966 to the Tarin (or Tareen) family, or clan, of the Hazara region of the North-West Frontier (now Khyber Pakhtunkhwa), while his father was posted as a senior civil servant and administrator in Peshawar. From his maternal side, he is related to the Hayat family of Wah, in North Punjab. He was educated at the Burn Hall School (now Army Burn Hall College), Abbottabad and the Aitchison College, Lahore, Pakistan, prior to graduating from the University of the Punjab, Lahore. He later obtained various higher degrees in English and Post-colonial Studies from Pakistan and the United Kingdom respectively.
Career
After a short time in the civil service of Pakistan, Tarin resigned to become a full time university lecturer and research scholar and involved himself in literary and academic pursuits. He has published four volumes of poetry in English so far, widely reviewed in Pakistan and abroad, as well as several poems published in anthologies and collections worldwide. His volumes of poetry are : A Sad Piper (1994; 1996 UK), The Anvil of Dreams (1995), Burnt Offerings (1996, 1997) and The Harvest of Love Songs (1997, 2000; and UK ed 2003). Since 2004, he has not published any new volumes of poetry although he has been publishing poems independently from time to time. In recent years, he has also been involved in various literary and historical projects of an academic nature, chiefly focussing on the colonial history of South Asia, in particular North-Western Pakistan. Recent academic publications include works on military history/campaigns on the Frontier and some work on Rudyard Kipling and Kipling's India. A number of these works are available or referenced online, and were published in the Kipling Journal, UK and the Journal of the Indian Military Historical Society, also the UK. He has diverse academic and literary interests and is a Fellow of the Royal Asiatic Society, UK, The Tolkien Society (UK), associate of the Kipling Society, and the Indian Military Historical Society (IMHS).
In addition to his literary and academic interests, Omer Tarin has also long been involved in limited social activism, especially in relation to environmental, forests and wildlife conservation, in his native area. He also makes occasional comments on various aspects of global politics and environmental issues in the media, from time to time.
Poetry
Omer Tarin's poetry holds a notable place in Pakistani poetry in English. It has a certain erudite grace, a universal, humanitarian quality and passionate involvement that raises it above the general run of much of the work recently published in Pakistan and South Asia, generally. It seems to be deeply influenced by the mystic, transcendental tradition of the great Sufi and Bhakti poets of the South Asian subcontinent, such as Hazrat Baba Farid 'Ganj Shakar', Baba Bulleh Shah, Rahman Baba, Kabir Das and even Guru Nanak, in addition to that of the classical Sufi poets and writers of Islam such as Rumi, Hafiz, Saadi and Attarâ€"in terms of its essential lyricism, its engagement with 'human' issues, problems and challenges; as well as in the experimentation with form and content, in ways that have certainly not been attempted by other poets here today. He has also a fascination with Japan and Japanese culture and esoteric, or meditative practices, which find reflection in his works. In the words of Tariq Rahman, a noted Pakistani scholar and literary critic, "a certain force of vitality" and creative 'intensity' is to be found in Tarin's writings that unveils the depths of the poet's knowledge, wisdom and deep understanding of the cultural heritage of his own society as well as Western and other world literary-symbolic traditions. One of Tarin's early poetic mentors, to whom he owes a great deal and to whom he himself paid tribute, was the late Taufiq Rafat, one of the pioneers of English poetry in Pakistan/South Asia, an important scholar of Punjabi Sufic poetry in his own right. His indelible influence is quite manifest in Tarin's own poetical development.
Tarin's poetry reflects certain basic, recurring qualities such as a broad, universal humanity; a mystical regard for nature, life and the universe; a sense of the frailty of human existence and a continued concern with the central issues of life/death and immortality; which also inform his style, and the system of symbolism and images that consequently arises from this, via which "...new patterns emerge in our perception of the world, of creation, of ourselves and our motivations".
Books
Tarin's major publications include:
- Spirals:Essays in Criticism (1992)
- A Sad Piper:Poems (1994 first ed)
- The Anvil of Dreams:Poems (1995)
- Burnt Offerings, Poems (1996)
- The Harvest Season of Love Songs Poems (1997)
- Sepoys and Sowars: Historical Essays, Ed (2000)
- Riverbeds Flowing:Selected Poems (2005)
- Selected Shorter Essays (2011)
- From Hill and Plain:Selected Short Stories (2011)
See also
- Pakistani poetry
- List of Pakistani writers
- List of Pakistani poets
- Sufism
References
Further reading
- A. Rahim, Ed. (1999) "A Select Bibliography of Pakistani Literature in English" ed A Rahim, Islamabad.
- Ian Hamilton, Ed. (1994). Section on Pakistani English poets/writers in "The Oxford Companion to 20th Century Literature".
- "Poetry International" (Asia section), Ed by Edwin Thumboo, Vol 7/8, SDSU Press, CA, USA, 2003. [1]
- Review of Pakistani Literature in English in the "Journal of Commonwealth Literature ", 1997
- Alamgir Hashmi, "Pakistani Literatura in 1993 and 1994" pub in Revista Alicantina de Studios Ingleses, No. 13 (2000)
- Tariq Rahman "Review of Pakistani English Poetry", The News on Friday, The News International, Islamabad ed, 6 December 1996.
- Tariq Rahman "A History of Pakistani Literature in English", Lahore: Vanguard Books, 1991.
- O. Tarin "Taufiq Rafat: In Memoriam", in Pulse Weekly, Islamabad, 30â€"6 Sep Oct 1998, np.
- Luminita Karim, Weekly Poetry Review, Daily The Muslim, Islamabad, 28 Oct 1994
- B. King ed (1996) "New National and Postcolonial Literatures" Oxford: Clarendon Press.
- Eric Cyprian, "Poems of Considerable Merit"; A Critical Review of Omer Tarin's "The Anvil of Dreams" in daily The Nation, Islamabad, 16 July 1995, np.
- Ayesha K. Sadozai, Vermont, USA, 2013 A Critical Note of the poem 'Safar Namah' by Omer Tarin