Acknowledgements

Our warmest thanks go to all those who have made this volume possible. First and foremost, we want to extend our thanks to the authors of the stories. Without your creativity and artistic skill, there would not have been any stories to publish. We are honoured that you have allowed us to publish your stories in this anthology. We are also thankful for your permission to edit the stories to conform to the standard Balochi language and orthography promoted by the Balochi Language Project. Special thanks go to A. R. Dad and Fazal Baloch for helping us find suitable stories and providing us with original manuscripts of them. We also wish to extend our sincere thanks to the publishers and managers of websites who have given us permission to republish stories and translations that have already been published elsewhere.

We also extend our thanks to the translators of the stories for undertaking the difficult task of translating them into English and for allowing us to edit your translations for English accuracy and fluency. As noted by Sajid Hussain in his story, translation is no easy task. It is challenging to try to transfer concepts and ideas between Balochistan and the Anglophone world because of the considerable cultural differences between these two worlds, and there are additional challenges in translating from the Balochi language into English. One problem is that there are no comprehensive Balochi-English dictionaries to rely on. Another is that no form of standard written Balochi is accepted by a majority of Baloch authors, who often write in their own dialect and their own preferred script.

Writing the authors' introductions was a rather challenging task, as often very little information about the authors could be found in books or on websites. We are thankful to several of the authors, who themselves provided the information we were looking for, and also to Fazal Baloch, Akhtar Qazi, Yar Jan Badini, and Rُahim Mehr, who gave us valuable information about some of the authors. Regarding the translations, all of which were made by non-native speakers of English, our particular thanks go to Everett Thiele, who has done a wonderful job of editing the English to reflect some of the literary qualities of the original stories.

We are much indebted to the two sponsors of this publication, the Editorial Committee of Acta Universitatis Upsaliensis and the Department of Linguistics and Philology, Uppsala University. We are also thankful to The Royal Society of Humanities at Uppsala for sponsoring a workshop in January 2022 where the final polishing of the manuscript was carried out. The Society has also financed part of the English editing of this book.

Our sincere thanks go to our co-workers in the Balochi language project, particularly to Mehlab Nasir and Noroz Hayat, who have helped in various ways, e.g. by finding translators for some of the texts, writing introductions of some of the authors, and helping with proofreading. We also wish to thank our families for all their support and encouragement throughout the process of editing this volume.

Last but not least our best wishes go to Sajid Hussain's family, his wife Shahnaz Sajid, his two children Taheer and Shahan, his parents, brothers and sisters, and his extended family, as well as to all of Sajid's friends. There are many of us who miss Sajid very much. Let us take care of each other, help carry each other's burdens, and never take each other for granted. Life sometimes ends far sooner than anyone had expected.