Mohammad A. Quayum

Mohammad A. Quayum (born 30 June 1954) is an academic, writer, editor, critic and translator.

Quayum was born in Gopalganj, Bangladesh on 30 June 1954. He has taught at universities in Australia, Bangladesh, Malaysia, Singapore and the US, and is currently Professor of English at International Islamic University Malaysia, and Adjunct Professor in the College of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences at Flinders University, and School of Education at the University of South Australia. He is the founding editor of Asiatic: IIUM Journal of English Language and Literature, and has to date published 34 books and more than 140 journal articles, book chapters and encyclopaedia entries in the areas of American literature, Bengali literature and Southeast Asian literature. Between 1993 and 2000 he served as co-editor of the journal World Literature Written in English (now Journal of Postcolonial Writing). He is on the advisory board of the Journal of Postcolonial Writing, Transnational Literature, Interdisciplinary Literary Studies: A Journal of Criticism and Theory, The Rupkatha Journal on Interdisciplinary Studies in Humanities, Journal of Postcolonial Cultures and Societies, Writing Today: International Journal of Studies in English and The Apollonian: A Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies. He is also on the editorial board of The Literary Encyclopedia.

Quayum is regarded as a leading critic of Malaysian-Singaporean literature and of the Bengali poet and Asia's first Nobel Laureate, Rabindranath Tagore.

Quayum obtained his B.A. Hons and M.A. degrees in English Literature from the University of Dhaka, Bangladesh. He earned a second master's degree with First Class and Distinction from Lakehead University, Canada, in 1984. In 1991 Quayum was awarded the PhD degree by Flinders University, Australia for writing a thesis entitled, "Saul Bellow in the Emerson-Whitman Tradition: A Study of His Later Novels in the Light of American Transcendentalism," which was later published in a modified form as Saul Bellow and American Transcendentalism by Peter Lang, New York, in its Studies in American Jewish Literature Series, in 2004. His thesis was examined by three eminent Saul Bellow scholars: Professor Daniel Walden, Pennsylvania State University, USA; Professor Leila Goldman, Michigan State University, USA; and Professor Gloria Cronin, Brigham Young University, USA.

Quayum has published more than 34 books with leading publishers such as Brill Publishing, Cambridge Scholars Publishing, Macmillan, Marshall Cavendish, Orient Longman, Pearson Education, Penguin Books, Peter Lang, Routledge, National Library Board (Singapore) and Silverfish Books. He is also the author of more than 80 research articles in journals such as Asian Studies Review, American Studies International, CRNLE Journal, Crossroads: Interdisciplinary Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, English Studies in Africa, Interdisciplinary Literary Studies, Journal of Commonwealth Literature, Journal of Human Values, Journal of Postcolonial Writing, Journal of South Asian Literature, Journal of Transnational American Studies, Kunapipi, MELUS, Metamorphoses: A Journal of Literary Translation, New Literatures Review, New Zealand Journal of Asian Studies, Notes on Contemporary Literature, Postcolonial Text, Saul Bellow Journal, South Asia Research, South Asian Review, Studies in American Jewish Literature, Transnational Literature, Wasafiri, Writers in Conversation and World Literature Written in English. Quayum has also published numerous book chapters and encyclopedia entries.

Quayum’s books have been reviewed widely in international journals including American Studies International (USA), Ariel (Canada), Asiatic (Malaysia), Cha: An Asian Literary Journal (Hong Kong), Chaos (Bangladesh), Dialog (Panjab University, India), Diliman Humanities (Philippines), Indian Journal of Gender Studies, Journal of Commonwealth Literature (UK), Journal of Postcolonial Cultures and Societies (USA/India), Journal of Postcolonial Writing (UK),Journal of the School of Languages (JNU, India), Kajian Malaysia: Journal of Malaysian Studies, Kitaab (Singapore), Overseas Singaporean, Quarterly Literary Review Singapore, RELC Journal (Singapore), RIMA (Review of Indonesian and Malaysian Association, Australia), Rupkatha Journal (India), South Asian History and Culture (Routledge), South Asian Review (USA), Sun Yat-sen Journal of Humanities (Taiwan), The Book Review (India), The Book Review Literary Trust (India), Transnational Literature (Australia), Visva Bharati Quarterly (India) and World Literature Written in English (UK). His books have also been reviewed in many magazines and newspapers in Bangladesh, India, Malaysia and Singapore.

Authored

• Beyond Boundaries: Critical Essays on Rabindranath Tagore. Dhaka: Bangla Academy, 2014. ISBN 984-07-5203-0.
• One Sky, Many Horizons: Studies in Malaysian Literature in English.Kuala Lumpur: Marshall Cavendish, 2007. ISBN 9789833845415
• Saul Bellow and American Transcendentalism. New York: Peter Lang, 2004.ISBN 0-8204-3652-6.
• Colonial to Global: Malaysian Women's Writing in English 1940s–1990s. Malaysia: IIUM Press, 2001 and 2003. ISBN 983-9727-38-9. (With Nor Faridah A. Manaf)
• Dictionary of Literary Terms. Kuala Lumpur: Prentice Hall, 2000. ISBN 983-9236-51-2.

Translated

• Atiqur Rahman: Selected Poems. Dhaka: Bangla Prakash, 2017. ISBN 978-9-8492677-3-7. (With S. Nahleen)
• The Revolutionary (Kazi Nazrul Islam's Kuhelika). Dhaka: Nymphea Press, 2016. ISBN 978-984-92297-1-1. (With Niaz Zaman)
• Rabindranath Tagore: The Ruined Nest and Other Stories. Kuala Lumpur: Silverfish Books, 2014. ISBN 9789833221486.
• The Essential Rokeya: Selected Works of Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain (1880–1932). Leiden, New York: Brill, 2013. ISBN 9789004255852.
• Rabindranath Tagore: Selected Short Stories. New Delhi: Macmillan, 2011. ISBN 0-230-33277-3.

Edited

• Tagore, Nationalism and Cosmopolitanism: Perceptions, Contestations and Contemporary Relevance. UK: Routledge, 2020. ISBN 9780367218720.
• Malaysian Literature in English: A Critical Companion. UK: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2020). ISBN 978-1-5275-4929-6.
• Religion, Culture, Society: Readings in the Humanities and Revealed Knowledge. Kuala Lumpur: Silverfish Books, 2017. ISBN 9789833221646. (With Hassan Ahmed Ibrahim)
• A Feminist Foremother: Critical Essays on Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain. New Delhi: Orient Longman (Orient Blackswan), 2016. ISBN 9789386296009. (With Md. Mahmudul Hasan)
• Twenty-two New Asian Short Stories. Kuala Lumpur: Silverfish Books, 2016. ISBN 978-983-3221-52-3.
• The Poet and His World: Critical Essays on Rabindranath Tagore. New Delhi: Orient Longman. ISBN 978-81-250-4319-5.
• Imagined Communities Revisited: Critical Essays on Asia-Pacific Literatures and Cultures. Kuala Lumpur: IIUM Press, 2011. ISBN 978-967-4-18215-1. (With Nor Faridah A. Manaf)
• A Rainbow Feast: New Asian Short Stories. Singapore: Marshall Cavendish, 2010. ISBN 978-981-4302-71-5.
• Sharing Borders: Studies in Contemporary Singaporean-Malaysian Literature. Singapore: National Library Board in partnership with Singapore Arts Council, 2009. ISBN 978-981-08-3910-9. (With Wong Phui Nam)
• Peninsular Muse: Interviews with Modern Malaysian and Singaporean Poets, Novelists and Dramatists. Oxford, Bern: Peter Lang, 2007. ISBN 978-3-03911-061-2.
• The Merlion and the Hibiscus: Contemporary Short Stories from Singapore and Malaysia. Penguin Books, 2002. ISBN 0-14-302812-X.
• Singaporean Literature in English: A Critical Reader. Malaysia: University Putra Malaysia Press, 2002. ISBN 983-2373-50-6. (With Peter Wicks)
• Malaysian Literature in English: A Critical Reader. Kuala Lumpur: Pearson Education, 2001. ISBN 983-74-1956-3. (With Peter Wicks)
• Saul Bellow: The Man and His Work. New Delhi: B.R. Publishing, 2000. ISBN 81-7646-167-9. (With Sukhbir Singh)
• In Blue Silk Girdle: Stories from Malaysia and Singapore. Malaysia: University Putra Malaysia Press, 1998. ISBN 983-9319-45-0.

Festschrift

• Festschrift: The Poetry and Poetics of Shirley Geok-lin Lim, ed. Mohammad A. Quayum. The Journal of Transnational American Studies, Vol. 10, No. 2 (2019). [1].