SM Ali’s World SM Ali Publisher: Southbound ISBN 983-9054-15-5 227 pages. 14 x 21.5 cm. US$14.00 Click here to order with Visa and MasterCard credit cards

We celebrate the writings of SM Ali, a pioneering Asian journalist, in this compilation of his final work. His career spanned some of the most momentous decades of the region and touched the pages of many of Asia’s premier publications.

A "must" for all members of the development community and media practitioners . . . also ideal as a text in journalism courses.

SM Ali was the Publisher and Editor of the Daily Star, and immediately prior to that, UNESCO’s Regional Communication Advisor for Asia and the Pacific.

This book is a collection of the column which he wrote at the Daily Star which was entitled "My World". In the first piece which he wrote for the column, S.M. Ali had this to say about his task as a columist:

"One starts a new piece of writing, with mild trepidation and ends it with a sense of relief, said a friend at a writer’s workshop we attended years ago. Another countered, no one starts it with a feeling of excitement, but ends it in a mood of shattering disappointment.

I do not know who is right as I work on a column, under a title that I find rather nice, almost fascinating, but without the slightest idea as to what it should be about. Of course, I would like it to be about those fleeting moments of unspoken happiness or about suffering and pain, all linked together in disjointed memories and hazy recollections. I feel a little thrilled with the idea, then somewhat nervous about carrying it out . . . ."