Bapsi Sidhwa is the author of four internationally acclaimed novels. She lives in Houston, Texas, but was born in Karachi, Pakistan, and raised in Lahore. She graduated from Kinnaird College for Women, Lahore, and began writing in her twenties after the birth of two children.

In 1978, at a time when publishing in English was practically non-existent in Pakistan, Sidhwa self-published her novel The Crow Eaters. Since then, The Crow Eaters has been published and translated in numerous Eurapean and Asian countries. While The Bride was the first novel Sidhwa wrote, it was the second to be published. Cracking India, Sidhwa's third novel, was declared a New York Times Notable Book for1991, received the LiBerature Prize in Germany and was nominated by the American Library Association as a Notable Book the same year. An American Brat, Sidhwa's latest book, was published in 1993.

Sidhwa held a Bunting Fellowship at Radcliffe/Harvard in 1986, and was a Visiting Scholar at the Rockefeller Foundation Center, Bellagio, Italy, in 1991. She received the Sitara-i-Imtiaz, Pakistan's highest national honor in the arts, in 1991, and the Lila Wallace-Reader's Digest Writer's Award In 1994.

Sidhwa has worked on the advisory committee to Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto on Women's Development, and has taught at Columbia University, University of Houston, and Mount Holyoke College. She was the Fanny Hurst writer-in-residence at Brandeis University in Waltham, Massachusetts, and serves on the Board of Directors of INPRINT in Houston. She will be teaching at South Hampton University, England, 2001.

Cracking India has also been made into the film Earth by director Deepa Mehta. Earth was released in the United States in September 1999 and is currently playing in major cities around the country. Reviewers have praised Bapsi Sidhwa's “luminous prose, Rabelaisian language and humor … [and a style that is] earthy … but … also both delicate and precise … with words chosen as carefully as pieces of inlay in a marble wall.”

Bapsi Sidhwa: Novelist and Teacher

Honors:

American:
1986-1987 - Bunting Fellow at Radcliffe/Harvard - Mary Ingraham Institute.
1987 - Fellow for the National Endowment for the Arts.
1991 - Visiting Scholar at Rockefeller Foundation Study Center, Bellagio, Italy.
1993 - Recipient of Lila Wallace-Reader's Digest Writers' Award

Pakistani:
1991 - Recipient of the Sitara-i-Imtiaz, the highest national honor in the arts, Pakistan.
1991 - Recipient of the National Award for English Literature by the Pakistan Academy of Letters.
1992 Ð Recipient of the Patras Bokhari Award for Literature

German:
1991 - Recipient of LiBeraturepreis for Ice-Candy-Man (Cracking India) in Germany.

Zoroastrian:
2000 - Inducted into the Zoroastrian Hall of Fame during the millennium celebrations in Houston
2002 - Won the Excellence in Literature Award from the Zoroastrian Congress
1993 - Chairperson (Eurasia) Commonwealth Writers' Prize.
1996 - Judge of Michner/Barthelme Award for Fiction (Inprint, University of Houston).

Hardcover Publications: Novels

England

The Crow Eaters: Jonathan Cape - 1980
The Bride: Jonathan Cape - 1982
Ice-Candy-Man: Heinemann - 1988


United States

The Crow Eaters: St. Martin's Press - 1982
The Bride: St. Martin's Press - 1983
Cracking India: Milkweed Editions - 1991
An American Brat: Milkweed Editions - 1993

Pakistan

Bapsi Sidhwa Omnibus (four novels): Oxford University Press - 2001
Crow Eater: Ilmi Press - 1978

India

Crow Eaters: Orient Longman - 1979
Crow Eaters: Penguin - 1981
The Bride: Penguin - 1984
Cracking India: Penguin - 1992
An American Brat: Penguin - 1995

Paperback Publishers: Penguin, Fontana, Futura, Milkweed.

Foreign Publications and Translations:

Germany - List Verlag: Ice Candy Man - 1990
Germany - Rowohlt: Ice Candy Man (paperback) - 1992
Germany - D.T.V.: Crow Eaters - 2000
France - Actes Sud: Mister Candy - 1997
France - Actes Sud: La fiancée pakistanaise - 1996
Italy - Neri Pozza: Cracking India (La Spartizione del Cuore) - hardback 1999, paperback 2000
Italy - Neri Pozza: Il Talento Dei Parsi - 2000
Greece - Epaminondas Papageorgiou: The Bride - 2001
Pakistan - Sang-e-Meel: The Bride - 1993
Russia - Izevesta: The Crow Eaters - 1980

Special Note:

Cracking India(released as Ice-Candy-Man in the UK) has been made into a movie, Earth, by Canadian director Deepa Metha. It was released in the United States USA in September 1999. Cracking India has also been narrated on the BBC in 10 installments.

In addition, stories, reviews and articles have appeared in Europe, Asia, Africa, and New Zealand in publications including Pantheon Books, The New York Times Book Review, The Houston Chronicle, Harper's & Queen (London), The Economic Times, The London Telegraph, The World Paper.

Teaching Experience:

2001 - Postcolonial Teaching Fellowship, Southampton, England

1998-1999 - Fannie Hurst Writer-in-Residence (a creative writing position) at Brandeis University, Waltham, Mass.

1997 - Professor of English and Writer-in-Residence, Mount Holyoke College, South Hadley, Mass.

1989 - Assistant Professor: Writing Division, MFA Graduate Program, Columbia University, New York City, New York.

1984-1986 - Conducted novel writing workshops, Rice University, Houston, Texas.

1985 - Assistant Professor, Creative Writing Program, University of Houston, Houston, Texas.

1983 - Conducted fiction writing workshop, St. Thomas University, St. Paul, Minn.

Other fields of interest/activities:

Sidhwa, who represented the Punjab at the Asian Women's Conference at Alma Ata, was on the Advisory Committee to Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto on Women's Development till 1996. Sidhwa has worked among women to create an awareness of their rights, and protested —using street-power, the platform, and the media — against repressive measures aimed at women and the minority communities in Pakistan. She has been voluntary secretary in the Destitute Women's and Children's Home in Lahore for several years.