“One of the most riveting war stories I have ever read….Huffman’s smooth, intimate prose ushers you through this nightmare as if you were living it yourself.” —Sebastian Junger, author of The Perfect Storm The dramatic true story of the worst maritime disaster in U.S. history, Alan Huffman’s Sultana brings to breathtaking life a tragic, long forgotten event in America’s Civil War—the sinking of the steamship Sultana and the loss of 1,700 lives, mostly Union soldiers returning home from Confederate prison camps. A gripping account that reads like a nonfiction Cold Mountain, Sultana is powerful, moving, rich in irony and fascinating historical detail—a story no history aficionado or Civil War buff will want to miss.

Includes chapters written by Gianluca Longo [and three others].

This book paints a horrifying reality for women of the desert kingdom. It is a haunting look at the danger of Saudi male dominance and the desperate lives of the women they rule.

"A Study Guide for Begum Rokeya's ""Sultana's Dream"", excerpted from Gale's acclaimed Short Stories for Students. This concise study guide includes plot summary; character analysis; author biography; study questions; historical context; suggestions for further reading; and much more. For any literature project, trust Short Stories for Students for all of your research needs."

One of the first science-fiction utopian stories and one of the first feminist utopias by India’s widely celebrated, pioneering feminist, educator, writer, and activist Rokeya Hossain A Penguin Classics Edition Sultana, a Muslim woman living in contemporary India, falls asleep and wakes up in a transformed future world: a utopia in which men rather than women are relegated to the domestic sphere. Women, now free to explore the outside world at will and pursue an education, run a peaceful and just society, using scientific principles to harvest energy from the sun and live in harmony with nature. Sultana’s Dream was published in 1905 in the Indian Ladies Magazine, the first English language periodical edited by, and targeted at, Indian women. Like the periodical, the story broke new ground. As a pioneering work of science fiction and feminist utopian literature at the turn of the century, Sultana’s Dream is strikingly advanced in its critique of patriarchy, war, industrialization, and the exploitation of the natural world, speaking to the concerns of our contemporary world as much as its own. At a time when British colonialism was using the treatment of women in India as justification for colonial intervention there, Hossain’s story, in imagining a world in which men rather than women are kept inside, positions her protest against Islamic patriarchy within a larger feminist vision that takes on Western as well as Islamic forms of gender hierarchy. Her novella Padmarag is similarly utopian in its depiction of a women-run school and welfare center, and is both feminist and anti-colonial in its outlook. In both these works, Hossain seizes the critique of gender roles in India away from Western commentators and turns it against British interference, while also enlarging the critique to take on the problem of gender more broadly.

Tells the story of a feminist utopia and discusses the Muslim custom of purdah, the seclusion and segregation of women.

Rajmohan’s Wife and Sultana’s Dream (1864/1908) features the debut novel of Indian writer Bankim Chandra Chatterjee and a story by Bengali writer, feminist, and educator Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain. Rajmohan’s Wife, Chattopadhyay’s only work in English, launched his career as a leading Bengali intellectual and political figure. Written in English, Sultana’s Dream originated as a way of passing time for its young author while her husband was away on work. Initially published in The Indian Ladies Magazine, Sultana’s Dream helped establish Rokeya’s reputation as a leading figure in Bengali arts and culture. Rajmohan’s Wife is the story of Matangini, a beautiful woman married to a violent, jealous man. Unable to marry the man she loves—who happens to be her own sister’s husband—she settles for the villainous Rajmohan, an abusive man who rules his middle-class Bengali household with an iron fist. With the help of her friend Kanak, Matangini does her best to avoid her husband’s wrath, illuminating the importance of solidarity among women faced with oppression. Vindictive and cruel, Rajmohan secretly enacts a plan to rob Madhav, his brother-in-law, in order to obtain and invalidate a will. Sultana’s Dream is set in Ladyland is a feminist utopia ruled by women, a perfect civilization with no need for men, who remain secluded and without power. Free to develop their own society, women have invented flying cars, perfected farming to the point where no one must work, and harnessed the energy of the sun. With men under control, there is no longer fear, crime, or violence. Ultimately, Ladyland is a world made to mirror our own, a satirical exploration of the absolute power wielded by men over women, and a political critique of Bengali society at large. Sultana’s Dream is more than a science fiction story; it is an act of resistance made by a woman who would shape the lives of her people through advocacy, education, and activism for generations to come. With a beautifully designed cover and professionally typeset manuscript, this edition of Bankim Chandra Chatterjee and Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain’s Rajmohan’s Wife and Sultana’s Dream is a classic of Bengali literature and utopian science fiction reimagined for modern readers.