Muhammad Umar Memon: The Eminent Writer & Poet of Sindh

Muhammad Umar Memon, Professor Emeritus of Urdu Literature and Arabic Studies, (University of Wisconsin–Madison), Memon is an eminent accomplished scholar, translator, poet, Urdu Short Story writer, and the editor of The Annual of Urdu Studies.
Muhammad Umar Memon retired from the institute of University of Wisconsin after 38 years of service but has remained active as a scholar: besides working on translation of Urdu works into English, he serves on the editorial board of Pakistaniaat: A Journal of Pakistan Studies and is also an advisor to the Urdu Project.

Biography of Muhammad Umar Memon

Memon was born in Aligarh, India in the year of 1939. In 1954, his family shifted to Karachi city, Pakistan where he earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees. After his graduation, he taught at Sachal Sarmast College and Sind University. In 1964 he won a Fulbright scholarship to the United States. This move enabled him to earn a master’s degree from Harvard University and eventually a doctorate in Islamic Studies from UCLA. Memon joined the University of Wisconsin-Madison in the year of 1970 and retired from there after 38 years of service. At UW he taught Urdu, Islamic Studies as well courses in Arabic and Persian.

Scholarly and creative work

While a complete list of his scholarly and creative works can be found on his website, some major works are listed below:

• Muhammad Umar Memon; Aḥmad ibn ʻAbd al-Ḥalīm Ibn Taymīyah (1976). Ibn Taimīya’s struggle against popular religion: with an annotated translation of his Kitāb iqtiḍāʾ aṣ-ṣirāṭ al-mustaquīm mukhālafat aṣḥāb al-jaḥīm. Mouton. ISBN 978-90-279-7591-1. Retrieved 30 July 2011.
• Studies in the Urdu Gazal and Prose Fiction. Madison: University of Wisconsin press, 1979.
• Memon, Muhammad Umar (1998). An epic unwritten. New Delhi ; New York: Penguin Books. ISBN 978-0-14-027227-7.
• Memon, Muhammad Umar (2005). The Harper Collins book of Urdu short stories. New Delhi: Harper Collins Publishers. ISBN 978-81-7223-611-3.