Atiya Fyzee

Fyzee was born in Constantinople in 1877 to an Ismaili Bohra family related to the Tyabjis.

She came to London to attend a teachers training college and she arranged for her diary to be published in India in 1907. Fyzee did not complete the course in London. Noted for her intellectualism, Fyzee's correspondences impressed contemporaries including Muhammad Iqbal, Shibli Naumani, Hafeez Jalandhari and Maulana Muhmmad Ali Jauhar.{{Cite web|url=https://tribune.com.pk/story/21037/from-royalty-to-oblivion/|title=From royalty to oblivion|date=2010-06-13|website=The Express Tribune|language=en-US|access-date=2019-02-19}}

Her letters to her sister Zehra Fyzee were published later with Zehra editing them to tone down references of her affectionate platonic relationship with Muhammad Iqbal{{Cite web|title=NON-FICTION: The man behind the poetry|url=https://www.dawn.com/2011/08/28/non-fiction-the-man-behind-the-poetry/|last=InpaperMagazine|first=From|date=2011-08-28|website=DAWN.COM|language=en|access-date=2020-05-13}}

There were contested gossips about her close friendships with the authors Shibli Nomani{{Cite web|title=Literary Notes: Atiya Fyzee, Shibli and Saheefa's special issue|url=http://www.dawn.com/news/1189574|last=Parekh|first=Rauf|date=2015-06-22|website=DAWN.COM|language=en|access-date=2020-05-13}} and Muhammad Iqbal before she married Samuel Fyzee-Rahamin.{{Cite web|url=http://www.open.ac.uk/researchprojects/makingbritain/content/atiya-fyzee|title=Atiya Fyzee {{!}} Making Britain|website=www.open.ac.uk|access-date=2019-02-18}}Shamsur Rahman Farooqi, Shibli Nomani Annual Extension Lecture 2011, Darul Musannefin Shibli AcademyAcademy, Azamgarh

In 1912 Atiya Rahamin-Fyzee married Samuel Fyzee-Rahamin a bene Israeli Jew artist who converted to Islam to formalize his love relationship with her. After her marriage with Rahamin she traveled back to Europe and USA to visit art galleries. The couple also arranged exhibition on women's craft. She also addressed a gathering in one her visits about women in Indian history, and co-authored a book on Indian music with Rahamin and also choreographed two of Rahamins plays in London in 1940s.

In 1926 at an educational conference at Aligarh, Fyzee defied expectations of Purdah seclusion and addressed the gathering unveiled (without Hijab) to demand equal rights with men to go about on God's earth freely and openly.A letter received by Sayyid Husain Bilgrami in [https://www.jstor.org/stable/23004613?seq=1 Coming out: decisions to leave Purdah, jstor.org] (Early 1926)

Fyzee being neighbor of Jinnah in Mumbai, also closely linked with Muhammad Iqbal, senior founder of Pakistan movement happened to shift to Karachi with her husband and sister in 1948 on invitation of Jinnah who also allotted a palatial residence to them in Karachi.

They created an art and literary space at their new home which was named after their Mumbai residence.{{fact|date=September 2024}}

Post Jinnah's death the couple Atiya and Samuel were evicted from their house property allotted by Jinnah, also faced financial difficulties and had to live on assistance from other relatives abroad.

Fyzee died in much reduced circumstances in Karachi in 1967. Her husband had died more than two years earlier in 1964. After they both died their home was open so that visitors could see their art collection. This continued until the 1990s when the collection was archived because the house was demolished.{{Cite ODNB|url=http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-102457|title=Fyzee, Atiya [married name Atiya Fyzee-Rahamin; known as Atiya Begum, and Shahinda] (1877–1967), author, social reformer, and patron of the arts|date=2004 |language=en|doi=10.1093/ref:odnb/102457|isbn=978-0-19-861412-8 |access-date=2019-02-18}}

An incomplete project of cultural center in Karachi at her later evicted property.{{Cite web|title=COLUMN: PORTRAIT OF A NATION|url=https://www.dawn.com/news/1505200|last=Khalique|first=Harris|date=2019-09-15|website=DAWN.COM|language=en|access-date=2020-05-13}}

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Lambert-Hurley, Siobhan and Sunil Sharma, Atiya's Journeys: A Muslim Woman from Colonial Bombay to Edwardian Britain. Oxford University Press.

• [https://catalogue.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/cb166172908 Details on] Bibliothèque nationale de France
• [http://www.open.ac.uk/researchprojects/makingbritain/content/atiya-fyzee Overview on] the Open University

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Category:1877 births

Category:1967 deaths

Category:Indian Ismailis

Category:Sulaymani Bohras

Category:Writers from Istanbul

Category:20th-century Indian women writers

Category:Pakistani women writers

Category:Tyabji family

Category:Expatriates from British India in the United Kingdom

Category:Expatriates in the Ottoman Empire

Category:Writers from British India

Category:Indian emigrants to Pakistan