Shihabuddin Poithumkadavu was born in 1963 in Kannur, north Kerala. He is one of Malayalam’s leading fiction writers. He has been awarded the most prestigious prizes for literature in Malayalam: the Kerala Sahitya Akademi Award, the P. Padmarajan prize, the V.T. Bhattatiripad prize and the Abudhabi Malayali Samajam Award, among others.

Shihabuddin’s working life began at the age of fifteen when he dropped out of school and began to work as a cleaner in a hotel. Since then he worked multiple jobs—as a helper in wedding feasts, a waiter in a restaurant, an ironing boy, a cleaner in a lorry, subscription-collector for the local merchants’ association, by-stander in a hospital, proofreader, timber loader, house painter, wood polisher, sand loader, cashier in a restaurant, nightwatchman in a saw mill, and so on. However, he continued his school education and went on to earn a college degree, after which he worked in different capacities in the media as journalist, script-writer, and editor in Dubai and Kerala. He has published thirty-eight books in Malayalam and his oeuvre includes short stories, novels, poetry, essays and memoirs. His work has been translated into Hindi, Tamil, English and Arabic.

His first story appeared in print in 1982, after which he was widely recognised to be a new and electrifying voice that challenged accepted aesthetic practices in writing. His first collection of short stories appeared soon after and received much praise from the doyens of Malayalam literature, including Kamala Das and T. Padmanabhan. Most of his books have run into multiple editions, with the sales of each one crossing 10,000 copies. His stories have been prescribed by the Kerala State Education Board, the University of Calicut, the Mahatma Gandhi University and the University of Kerala, in their syllabi.

J. Devika is a researcher and teacher at the Centre for Development Studies, Thiruvananthapuram. She has translated the works of many literary authors including K.R. Meera, Sara Joseph, Unni R. and several others from Malayalam to English.