The Merman and the Book of Power: a Qissa

The Merman and the Book of Power brings into the English the classical qissa genre, a fabulist storytelling form common to the oral and writteniteratures of Urdu, Persian and Arabic. The book begins with the Mongol armiesaying siege to Baghdad in 1258. Their attack does not cease from the early hours ofight to darkness. Such is the ferocity of their advance that the citizens of the city are convinced they are the manifestation of the End Time creatures Gog and Magog, imprisoned by theegendary King Alexander. It was said that their faces, red as the flames of hell, seemed buried between their shoulders. Theirice-covered, steely bodies gave off a dreadful odour, as their fierce, small eyes moved alertly in their sockets. Thick sideburns protrudedike snakes from sheepskin caps covering their shaven heads. In the night, their teeth and talons had glowed as they slunk outside the city wallsike malevolent wolves. Baghdad falls, the Mongols take over. A yearater, when the city gates open to allow a strange creature—half man, half beast— caught by Mediterranean fishermen, fresh rumours begin to circulate. Is Gujastak the Merman one of Creation’s marvels or an ill omen whose appearance signals the Apocalypse? In parallel to the Merman’s story is the story of a talismanic book that confers diabolical powers on the one who possesses it. In the hands of master storyteller Musharraf Ali Farooqi the qissa comes to glowingife as it spins a tale of magical creatures, ill-starredovers and the phenomena that might bring the world to its end.