Amina Shah (31 October 1918 – 19 January 2014), later known as Amina Maxwell-Hudson, was a British anthologiser of Sufi stories and folk tales, and was for many years the Chairperson of the

College of Storytellers A college (Latin: ''collegium'') is an educational institution or a constituent part of one. A college may be a degree-awarding tertiary educational institution, a part of a collegiate or federal university, an institution offering v ...

. She was the sister of the Sufi writers

Idries Shah Idries Shah (; hi, इदरीस शाह, ps, ادريس شاه, ur, ; 16 June 1924 – 23 November 1996), also known as Idris Shah, né Sayed Idries el-Hashimi (Arabic: سيد إدريس هاشمي) and by the pen name Ark ...

and

Omar Ali-Shah Omar Ali-Shah ( hi, ओमर अली शाह, ur, عمر علی شاہ, nq; 19227 September 2005) was a prominent exponent of modern Naqshbandi Sufism. He wrote a number of books on the subject, and was head of a large number of Sufi groups ...

, and the daughter of

Sirdar Ikbal Ali Shah Sirdar Ikbal Ali Shah ( hi, सरदार इक़बाल अली शाह, ur, ; 1894 in Sardhana, India – 4 November 1969 in Tangier, Morocco) was an Indian-Afghan author and diplomat descended from the Sadaat of Paghman. Born and e ...

and Saira Elizabeth Luiza Shah

Scottish Scottish usually refers to something of, from, or related to Scotland, including: *Scottish Gaelic, a Celtic Goidelic language of the Indo-European language family native to Scotland *Scottish English *Scottish national identity, the Scottish ide ...

woman. Her nephew is the travel writer and documentary filmmaker

Tahir Shah Tahir Shah ( fa, طاهر شاه, gu, તાહિર શાહ; ''né'' Sayyid Tahir al-Hashimi (Arabic: سيد طاهر الهاشمي); born 16 November 1966) is a British author, journalist and documentary maker of Afghan-Indian descent. ...

; her nieces,

Safia Shah Safia Nafisa Shah ( fa, سفیا شاه, gu, સફિયા શાહ; born 16 November 1966), now Safia Thomas, is a British writer, editor, television news producer and member of the Afghan-Indian Shah family. She and her husband Ian also ...

and the writer and documentary filmmaker

Saira Shah Saira Shah (born 5 October 1964) is a British author, reporter and documentary filmmaker. She produces, writes and narrates current affairs films. Life Shah was born in London and raised in Kent, England. She was educated at Bryanston School ...

Family origins and life

Shah was born into a distinguished family of Saadat (=

Arabic Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C. E.Watson; Walte ...

plural of

Sayyid ''Sayyid'' (, ; ar, سيد ; ; meaning 'sir', 'Lord', 'Master'; Arabic plural: ; feminine: ; ) is a surname of people descending from the Prophets in Islam, Islamic prophet Muhammad through his grandsons, Hasan ibn Ali and Husayn ibn Ali ...

) who had their ancestral home at

Paghman Paghman ( Persian/Pashto: پغمان) is a town in the hills near Afghanistan's capital of Kabul. It is the seat of the Paghman District (in the western part of Kabul Province) which has a population of about 120,000 (2002 official UNHCR est.), ...

, not far from

Kabul Kabul (; ps, , ; , ) is the capital and largest city of Afghanistan. Located in the eastern half of the country, it is also a municipality, forming part of the Kabul Province; it is administratively divided into 22 municipal districts. Ac ...

. Her paternal grandfather, Sayyid Amjad Ali Shah, was the

nawab Nawab (Balochi: نواب; ar, نواب; bn, নবাব/নওয়াব; hi, नवाब; Punjabi : ਨਵਾਬ; Persian, Punjabi , Sindhi, Urdu: ), also spelled Nawaab, Navaab, Navab, Nowab, Nabob, Nawaabshah, Nawabshah or Nobab, ...

Sardhana Sardhana is a city and a municipal board in Meerut district in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. It is northeast of New Delhi and 13 mi from Meerut. It is 5 km from Meerut Karnal National Highway and 12 km from National Highway 5 ...

, in the North-Indian state of

Uttar Pradesh Uttar Pradesh (; , 'Northern Province') is a state in northern India. With over 200 million inhabitants, it is the most populated state in India as well as the most populous country subdivision in the world. It was established in 1950 ...

. The principality was awarded to his ancestor

Jan-Fishan Khan Saiyed Muhammed Shah, better known by his title as Jan-Fishan Khan, was a 19th-century Afghan warlord.Obituary of Idries Shah, The Independent (London) of 26 November 1996., pp. 19–26 He participated in the First Anglo-Afghan War (1839–42) ...

during the

British Raj The British Raj (; from Hindi language, Hindi ''rāj'': kingdom, realm, state, or empire) was the rule of the British The Crown, Crown on the Indian subcontinent; * * it is also called Crown rule in India, * * * * or Direct rule in India, * Q ...

, and had been ruled formerly by the Kashmiri-born warrior-princess, the

Begum Samru Joanna Nobilis Sombre (– 27 January 1836), popularly known as Begum Samru (née Farzana Zeb un-Nissa),. a convert Catholic Christian started her career as a nautch (dancing) girl in 18th century India, and eventually became the ruler of Sard ...

. Her career as a folklorist and author spanned seventy years.First book 1938, most recent due out with I. B. Tauris in 2009 In that time she travelled widely, collecting stories and studying folklore. Her travels took her through

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...

and the

Middle East The Middle East ( ar, الشرق الأوسط, ISO 233: ) is a geopolitical region commonly encompassing Arabia (including the Arabian Peninsula and Bahrain), Asia Minor (Asian part of Turkey except Hatay Province), East Thrace (Europ ...

, through the jungles of

Sarawak Sarawak (; ) is a state of Malaysia. The largest among the 13 states, with an area almost equal to that of Peninsular Malaysia, Sarawak is located in northwest Borneo Island, and is bordered by the Malaysian state of Sabah to the northeast, ...

, across the Australian

Outback The Outback is a remote, vast, sparsely populated area of Australia. The Outback is more remote than the bush. While often envisaged as being arid, the Outback regions extend from the northern to southern Australian coastlines and encompass a ...

Afghanistan Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan,; prs, امارت اسلامی افغانستان is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. Referred to as the Heart of Asia, it is bord ...

, and beyond. Doris Lessing, who became a student of Idries Shah's Sufism in the 1960s, championed the Shah family's efforts to disseminate such

teaching stories A teaching story is a narrative that has been deliberately created as a vehicle for the transmission of wisdom. The practice has been used in a number of religious and other traditions, though writer Idries Shah's use of it was in the context of Su ...

in the West, and penned an introduction for Amina Shah's ''The Tale of the Four Dervishes''. Amina Shah married and became Amina Maxwell-Hudson. She died at Golders Green, London on 19 January 2014 at the age of 95.

Books

*''Tiger of the Frontier'' (1938) (as A.A.Shah) *''Folk Tales of Central Asia'' (1970) *''The Tale of the Four Dervishes'' (1979) *''The Assemblies of Al-Hariri'' (1980) *''Tales of Afghanistan'' (1982) *''Arabian Fairy Tales'' (1989) *''Tales From the Bazaars'' (2002), re-published as ''Tales from the Bazaars of Arabia: Folk Stories from the Middle East'' (2009)

References

External links

Amina Shah's profile at Octagon Press
{{DEFAULTSORT:Shah, Amina 1918 births 2014 deaths British storytellers Women storytellers British writers British people of Afghan descent British people of Indian descent British people of Scottish descent Amina Shah Sufi literature