My name is Nasreen Akhtar and I am a writer. I have always wanted to say that and now it is possible. My first book, (the foreword to which has been written by distinguished columnist for The Independent and Evening Standard, Yasmin Alibhai-Brown), is published by greenbirds, a small independent publishing house. greenbirds is owned by me so in a way I am self-publishing this book. I am a self-publishing author but not. Please allow me to explain.
I was never really into books; didn’t even like reading. I am not one of these authors who will tell you that ‘I loved to write as a child,’ or that ‘I have been writing for as long as I can remember.’ If I said all this, then I would be lying and I don’t like to do that. The truth is that as a child, I always loved language. Language and Languages; this was my passion. But in my culture anything that deviated from the prestigious fields of medicine, engineering, law and accountancy, was never taken seriously. So I casually went through my years trying to find a me that people would accept. Time got in the way and I never really found that me until fate subjected me to a life experience that brought me to a crossroads and then everything began to change.
I had to redefine, reinvent and re-establish myself. I had a background in the retail industry, and research but I wanted more. I wanted something else. I ended up with a well known writer’s association and I began to realize that books were something marvelous actually. Seeing foreign names on the spines of the books as they sat there on the shelves interested me. I often found myself flicking through these books even though I was not obligated to do so. I never really read for pleasure but now I wanted to. Memories of university life would come flooding back as I recalled trawling through the foreign language bookshops in Central London, trying to get all the hundreds of books on the reading lists and never actually managing to get through them. In those days, if I didn’t need to read something for an essay or presentation, I wasn’t really bothered about reading. Yes, I adored Spanish literature and was even tempted to read for pleasure (that is when I understood it!) but I had to be real and practical and I couldn’t ignore the comments around me, even from my peers who couldn’t understand why an Asian girl was doing French and Spanish. Somehow for them, being British Pakistani didn’t fit in with the field of Modern Languages.
So there I was, years later, with a sudden interest in books, I began to look into a career publishing not writing, because I never saw myself as a writer. I researched this field and was alarmed to find that this was an industry relatively closed to ethnic minorities, to people like me. The consolation was that initiatives had been started to break these barriers but it was alarming nonetheless. One small independent publisher had just come onto the market and they were looking for interns. Wow! Fabulous stuff! A perfect opportunity for me to go for this and ascertain if the publishing world was somewhere I could build my new home.
Having sent off my CV and spoken with them over the telephone, I was most encouraged as they were interested in my application and signed me up for an internship for the months that followed. Now all I needed was to turn up to meet the team. When I went to meet the team, sadly there was a rather different vibe. It seemed that my appearance was not the sort of thing they were expecting. The publisher flicked through the diary to see if they could accommodate me even though they had already penciled me in, and I could see it on the page in front of me. By now it was obvious especially when she said that they would let me know. So I thanked them and came home. They never did let me know but they went onto climb the ladder of success and the company is now a significant growing name in the industry. And I wish them continued success.
But this is the reality. Having to survive in a society where your name sounds a little different, perhaps even weird to some is something I have grown up with all my life; it’s nothing new to me. Then the situation was such that I was visibly Muslim, and in being so increasingly, I was made to feel that I had to apologise and make excuses for who I am and what I believe; I encountered this everywhere I went. So I set out to change this and make a space for me in this world and especially that of the publishing one.
The publishing imprint greenbirds subsequently was born as I knew that my only chance would come from giving myself a chance. greenbirds’ first title is my own book, Catch a Fish from the Sea (Using the Internet), a memoir about searching for man-of-dreams in cyberspace. My future titles are works in progress.
The beauty about greenbirds is that I don’t have to fulfill anyone’s criteria to be accepted; to be me in enough. ■
Catch a Fish from the Sea (Using the Internet) is published by greenbirds, (February 2008)
ISBN-13: 9780955521416
