Rokeya Hossain’s feminist utopian novel recognised as ‘Memory of the World’

Sultana’s Dream, the utopian novel of a world without men written by Bengali author Begum Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain in 1905 British India, has been recognised by UNESCO as part of its ‘Memory of the World’ register, a recent statement by the UN body stated.

Hossain’s work, the Ramacharitmanas by Tulsidas, Panchatantra and Sahrdayaloka Lochana by Anandavardhana are among 20 items recognised during the 2024 cycle of the Memory of the World Regional Register.

The 20 items were recognised at the 10th General Meeting of the Memory of the World Committee for Asia and the Pacific convened from May 7-8 in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia.

The 10th General Meeting was hosted by the Ministry of Culture of Mongolia, the Mongolian National Commission for UNESCO, and the UNESCO Regional Office in Bangkok.

“The 2024 cycle also celebrated science and literature, recognizing Bangladesh’s sci-fi feminist author, Rokeya S. Hossain, who imagined both helicopters and solar panels before they had been invented in her 1905 utopian narrative, Sultana’s Dream,” the statement noted.

It added:

Regional literary traditions were celebrated through the recognition of Philippines’ Indigenous Hinilawod chants, the East Asian legend of the Nine Tripods found on the bronze bas-reliefs in Viet Nam’s Nine Dynastic Urns and the globally re-adapted Pañcatantra Fables of India.

The works

Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain was born in 1880 in a Bengali Muslim zamindar family in what is now the Rangpur division of Bangladesh. She was married to Khan Bahadur Sakhawat Hossain, an Urdu-speaking bureaucrat, who encouraged her to write.

Writing in the magazine Lady Science in 2019, writer Thomas Lewton noted:

In 1905, “Sultana’s Dream,” a science fiction short story of feminist utopia, appeared in the pages of The Indian Ladies’ Magazine. As the first magazine in India established and edited by a woman for women, the periodical was an ideal fit for Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain’s “Sultana’s Dream,” one of the earliest science fiction stories written by a woman. In Rokeya’s feminist utopia, women rule the world as society lives peacefully and prospers through their inventions of solar ovens, flying cars, and cloud condenser, which offer abundant, clean water to the population of “Ladyland.” And the men, who are deemed “fit for nothing,” are shut inside their homes.

In 2013, columnist Rafia Zakaria wrote in the Pakistani daily Dawn: “In the condescension she heaps on them in Sultana’s Dream, Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain is careful to underscore how the toleration of suffering enables its persistence. The women who bear it in silence allow the perpetuation of oppression and are complicit in its persistence.”

Tulsidas composed the Ramcharitmanas, an epic retelling of the story of Rama in the Awadhi language in 1574 Common Era, during the reign of the Mughal Emperor, Akbar. Written in the Harigitika meter, the composition is extremely popular to this day across most of North India.

The Panchatantra, India’s answer to Aesop’s Fables, though attributed to Vishnu Sharma, has no known author. Written in Sanskrit, it imparts teachings through stories of anthropomorphic animals. The tales went from the subcontinent to Persia and Arabia and from there, reached Europe.

Sahrdayaloka Lochana by Anandavardhana is a text on Indian poetics. The author lived during the reign of Avantivarman, the fabled monarch of Kashmir during the ninth century.

The other 16 items included:

• Australia and Tuvalu – Funafuti: The Edgeworth David 1897 Expedition Documents
• China – Archives Relating to the Chengdu Traditional Teahouses
• China – Huizhou Genealogy Archives
• China – Printing Blocks Housed at the Derge Printing House
• Indonesia – Indarung I, The First Cement Plant in Southeast Asia (1910-1972)
• Indonesia – Indonesian Sugar Research Institute’s Archives 1887-1986: The Role of ISRI’s Research Activities to the World Sugar Industry
• Indonesia – The Tambo Tuanku Imam Bonjol Manuscript
• Malaysia – Al-Tarikh Salasilah Negeri Kedah: Genealogical History of Kedah State
• Malaysia – The Royal Correspondence of Baginda Omar (Surat Persendirian Baginda Omar)
• Mongolia – Family Chart of Hereditary Lords of the Khalkha Mongols, the House of Genghis Khan
• Mongolia – Mongolia’s First Postage Stamps ‘Eldev Ochir’
• Philippines – Doctrina Christiana en Lengua Española y Tagala (Christian Doctrine in Spanish and Tagalog), Manila, 1593
• Philippines – Hinilawod Epic Chant Recordings
• Uzbekistan – Images of Khorezm Oasis by Khudaibergan Devanov (1879-1937)
• Uzbekistan – “Turkestan Album” 1871-1872
• Viet Nam – Bas-reliefs on the Nine Bronze Urns in Huế Imperial Palace

The Memory of the World Programme of the UNESCO aims to facilitate preservation of the world’s documentary heritage, particularly in areas affected by conflict and/or natural disaster.

It also aims to enable universal access to documentary heritage worldwide and enhance public awareness about the significannce of documentary heritage among the wider public.