Farooz Rather

Farooz A. Rather (pen name: Feroz Rather) is the author of The Night of Broken Glass, a debut novel published by HarperCollins India and a finalist for the Tata Literature Live! First Book Award. About his novel, The Guardian said: "Feroz Rather's fierce and lyrical new book … tells of those everyday lives, forgotten by the west." Previously, Rather served as Visiting Teaching Faculty at the English Department at Florida State University, from where he also earned his PhD in creative writing with a focus on the history of the novel. Rather also holds an MFA in fiction writing from California State University Fresno, where he was awarded a William Saroyan Prize in fiction, a Susan O. Memorial Scholarship, a Benck Family Scholarship, and a Thesis Award for his dissertation, "The Last Candle and Other Stories," a collection of short stories about the war in Kashmir. Over the years, Rather has taught a wide array of creative writing (fiction and nonfiction), literature, and composition courses, including a course on critical thinking at Ashoka University's Young India Fellowship program in India where he briefly served as a Visiting Professor. He has also served as the editorial assistant of The Normal School and Interviews Editor of the Southeast Review, where he actively commissioned and featured the works of writers of color. Rather is an engaged reader of global fiction (especially works translated into English), which he reviews regularly for publications such as The Common, Ploughshares Blog, Michigan Quarterly Review, and the Kenyon Review.
 

Education

• PhD, Creative Writing, from Florida State University
• MFA, Creative Writing, from California State University
• MA, English Literature, from Jamia Millia Islamia
• BA, Psychology, from Aligarh Muslim University 

Courses

• LTWR 107 Introductory Fiction Workshop
• LTWR 105 Introductory Nonfiction Workshop
• LTWRR 207 Advanced Fiction Workshop
• LTWR 205 Memoir Writing Workshop
• LDR 101 Leadership through Storytelling
• LTWR 110 Invitation to Literature
• LTWR 229 Resist! Political Resistance in Literature and Film

Community Engagement

In 2022, Rather participated in Renewal, the symposium for the Faculty of Color Working Group, supported by Melon Foundation and New England Humanities Consortium.

He continued this conversation with other faculty of color in Boston by participating in 2023 symposium titled The Corporate University and Shrinking BIPOC: Where Do We Go From Here?

Research/Creative Activities

The Derby Shoe: A Novel-in-Progress

Rather is working on his second novel, The Derby Shoe, in which he follows a Kashmiri flâneur who is adrift in New Delhi. Traumatized by the recurring memories of being wounded in a fierce gunbattle, he hits it off with a struggling, ultraliberal poet from San Francisco at a publishing party. Later, he will travel to California with the hope of finding love. Through Rather's protagonist’s evolving world view, the author engages with the idea of the American dream, registering experiences of migration and provincialism in small town America. Rather was awarded Hazel Dick Leonard Faculty by Simmons University to support this project. He also attended Kenyon Review's Summer Workshop led by Mare-Helene Bertino.

Publications

Book

• The Night of Broken Glass. HarperCollins India, 2018.

Book Chapter

• "Poet in Srinagar." Mad Heart, Be Brave: Essays on the Poetry of Agha Shahid Ali. Ed. by Kazim Ali. Michigan University Press, 2017

Novel Excerpts, Short Stories, and Essays in Journals

• "A Rebel's Return." Granta, December, 2022.
• "My Father's Sawmill." World Literature Today, 20 July 2020
• "Reflections on an Ordinary Grief." Carve, 26 July 2020
• "The Cowherd." The Adroit Journal, 15 Nov. 2019
• "A Strange Call from the Mountain." Barrelhouse Magazine, 10 July 2019
• "The Old Man in the Cottage." The Common, 6 May 2019
• "The Throwaways." The Rumpus, 8 Oct. 2014

Interviews

• "Literature and the American Dream." Faculty Spotlight, Simmons University, Mar 08, 2022.
• The Tectonic Movement of Human Activity." The Adroit Journal, Nov 15, 2019.
• "Living Under Siege." The Common, 6 May 2019.
• "Writing About the Beauty and Violence of Kashmir." Chicago Review of Books, Mar 6, 2019.
• "Space for a Messy Meditation on Violence." The Millions, Oct 23 2018
• "I chose to be loyal." Indian Express, Aug 12, 2018.
• "A Fictional Weaving of Kashmir's Violent History." The Wire, Jul 1, 2018.

Professional Affiliations & Memberships

• 2023 – Summer Undergraduate Research Program, Simmons University
• 2022 – Ifill Scholarship Selection Committee, Ifill College, Simmons University
• 2020 – Voting Member of the National Book Critics Circle Award

Awards

Nominations

Short Stories

• 2023 – "To the Blazing Fields" was longlisted in fiction catagory by the DISQUIET Literary Prize
• 2022 – "The Reading Room" was nominated as the finalist in fiction catagory by the DISQUIET Literary Prize

Novel

• 2018 – The Night of Broken Glass shortlisted for First Book Award! Tata Literature Live by Mumbai International Literary Festival.