Name Rajathi Salma | ||
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Rokkiah Begum alias Rajathi Salma (born 1968) is an Indian Muslim author, columnist, social worker and speaker. Rajathi Salma is now a celebrated Tamil writer, her novel The Hours Past Midnight has been long-listed for the Man Asian Booker Prize.
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Early life
Rajathi Salma was born in Thuvarankurichi in Tamil Nadu, India. When Salma was 13 years old her family stopped her studies and forced her into marriage. She started composing poems on scraps of paper and sneaking them out of the house.
At the age of 17, she published Kala Chuvadu.
Books and achievement
Her debut novel,The Hours Past Midnight (2004, translated by Lakshmi Holmström) is one of the first novels by a Tamil Muslim woman. Selections from Salma’s poetry volumes One Evening, Another Evening (2000) and The Green Deity (2003) are translated by Sascha Ebeling. Salma’s poetry participates in the larger project of young Tamil female poets to resist patriarchy and to explore themes such as desire and sexuality in their creative work. An Evening and Another Evening (2000) and Green Angel (2003), both of which received wide critical acclaim. Her Novel The Hours Past Midnight (2004), which was long-listed for the Man Asian Literary Prize. Salma has published her second Novel 'Manamiyangal'( The Dreams) in May 2016.