CAN a language survive in the modern age if it fails to offer scientific knowledge to its spealcers and readers? Hardly! We all need comforts, material and intellectual, that are impossible to imagine without what science has discovered and created for us. It must also be remembered that researches of modern linguists amply show that each human language regardless of numerical strength of its speakers or stage of development has the potential to encompass and express all human thoughts. And this is what Dr.

Rattan Suresh believes whose book Insaani Dimagh te Aqal transliterated from Gurmukhi to Shahmukhi by Maqsood Saqib has been published by Suchet Kitab Ghar.

`What modern science we are going to talk about here is the Western scientific knowledge that has flourished during the last 300 years. Vedic and Islamic sciences that precededitare notpartofour discussion. A culture can only beharmonious with the rest of the world if it is able to understand and communicate science... Spreading scientific knowledge through media is essential for the evolution and development of Punjabi. Scientists know the scientific facts but they have no skill to express them in Punjabi as they don`t know the language needed for it. Reason is that science is taught in English. After decades of rigorous study in science one develops the habit to think and understand anything related with science in English to the extent that even if they try to express themselves in Punjabi they first think it in English and then make a translation of it. Hitherto we don`t have scientists who could think of science in Punjabi. Till the time we produce scientists through schooling who can think and research in Punjabi you will have to malce do with men like me.

Dr. Suresh is being modest here which is a marl( of a man of knowledge. A look at the contents of his book shows an impressive array of subjects he writes about, some of which are; Human Gene is not aMachine, Faith, Humanity and Science, Healthy Old Age, The Emotional world of Tears, Human Mind and Rationality, How much Burden on the Earth and Obesity and its Causes. It is a wonderful book that communicates scientific facts and findings in a language that can be accessible to a very wide range of people. It is a treat as it informs as well as illuminates. It`s a must read.

Genre of novels has a huge readership the world over. The simple reason is that it tells stories. Stories in their various forms fascinate human minds as they imaginatively narrate life the way we live or can live.

Suchet Kitab Ghar has published an interesting book by Jang Bahadur Goyal titled `Vishav Sahit De Shahkar Novel`. It has been transliterated by Maqsood Saqib. The author was born in 1946. His family migrated from Lahore to Faridkot in the wake of the bloody division of Punjab in 1947. The book has an unusual format; it presents summaries of 20 classical novels from world literature. It includesCervantes`s Don Quixote, Daniel Dafoe`s Robinson Crusoe, Jane Austin`sPrideandPrejudice,Balzac`s Old Goryeo, Gogol`s Dead Souls, Dickens`s David Coperfield, Dosteovesky`s Crime and Punishment, Tolsty`s Anna Karnena, Hardy`s Tess, Gorki`s The Mother, Herman Hesse`s Siddhartha, Prem Chand`s Gaudan, Kazantzakis`s Zorba, the Greek, Pearl Buck`s The Good Earth, Aldoux Huxley`s Brave New World, Hemingway`s The Old man and the Sea, Steinbuck`s The Grass of Wrath, Irving Stone`s Lust for Life and Harvard Fast`s Spartacus.

Goyal first thoroughly introduces the novelist to us and then presents the summary of his/her selected novel.

D urdial Singh, a celebrated novelist, says: `This book offers not only the summaries of selected novels from world literature but it also gives us a history of the novel.

During the last 450 years tens of thousands of novels have been penned but the novels like the ones in this volume can`t be more than a few hundreds.` In our times whenpeople are pressed for time -they have to work for longer hours to meet the needs of consumer societythey are forced to prefer the summaries and precises of what we need to know. On this score it`s excellent work done meticulously. It takes you on a guided tour of the world of novels through its labyrinths. Readers on this side of the border would have to make some effort to go with the idiom of language used; it`s loaded with words and phrases taken from Hindi which are in fact borrowings from Sanskrit.

Sanskritised Punjabi in East Punjab and Arabised and Persianised Punjabi in West Punjab pull our language in opposite directions. Such literary shenanigans have the active support of establishment on both sides of the border.

The work is a result of painstaking research and readings. But it needed a little more attention to detail.

Don Quixote (Kuh. how. tee) is written in Punjabi as `Don Qivgazot`.

This bool< is a must have for all libraries.

Two literary magazines Baran Mah and Pancham have beenreceived. The former isn`t, to be exact, a regular literary magazine.

A selection of Punjabi writings is annually published by a group of Punjabi writers under this title. It says that Zubair Ahmed and Amarjit Chandan are its `Sanjogi`. It is slightly funny; no one in Punjab, east or west, uses the word Sanfogi for editor or compiler. It has four segments; articles, short stories, poetry and translations of poems from foreign languages and book reviews. It is a welcome anthology that makes a good read.

`Pancham` is a regular literary journal that usually offers serious writings of Punjabi language and contemporary literature. This magazine has Faiza Ranaa and Maqsood Saqib as its editors. The issue under review has a selection of short stories from east and west Punjab and also from world literature. It includes some of the big names of fiction. Fiction more than poetry is concerned with concrete life as it manifests itself at various levels. That`s why it appeals to a wider section of populace.

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