We aim to showcase the rich cultural heritage of Pakistan and Afghanistan

through print, digital and audio materials

The InterLit Foundation is a small, private educational organisation founded in 1992 that seeks to serve the people of South Asia through its translation and publishing services.

Our Mission

We would like to see a world that has a greater interest in the Pashto and Persian speaking worlds on an academic, business and NGO level.

A bridge between South Asia and the West

InterLit works to bring the languages and cultures of South Asia (primarily Pashtun and Persian) to a Western audience. This enables individuals and organisations to appreciate the depth and breadth of cultures in a way not captured in the 30-second soundbites of most news bulletins.

A bridge between the West and South Asia

There are materials in English that can be translated for South Asian audiences with little need for adaptation, and introduce Pashto and Persian speaking audiences to some of the riches of Western culture.

Our Story

InterLit works together with national educational institutions and individual authors to facilitate and promote cultural and linguistic research, and to translate and publish selected literature into English and other international languages.

In Pakistan, the InterLit Foundation has sought to open up Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, formerly the North West Frontier Province, to visitors and scholars alike through its cultural materials.

Founded in 1992

We have produced tourist maps to such places as the famous Khyber Pass and Peshawar’s scenic Old City, and a wonderful guide to the history of Peshawar by Amjad Hussain.

More details about The Frontier Town of Peshawar

Writers' Workshops (2000 - 2004)

A part of our journey included workshops for aspiring writers in Pashto, Urdu and other regional languages. InterLit continues to participate in international conferences focused on South Asia, providing training for those interested in learning more about language and culture.

Pashto poetry made accessible (2008)

InterLit provides windows into the deeply spiritual and expressive oral culture of the Pashtuns for English-speaking readers. Visions of Love: Sufi Poetry of the Pashtuns gives a free translation of a selection of poems by the seventeenth century Sufi poet, Abdul Rahman Baba, the ‘Shakespeare’ of this region.

More details about Visions of Love

Launch of Rohi Mataluna (2010)

We worked alongside the Pashto Academy, University of Peshawar, to produce the 2nd edition of Rohi Mataluna: Pashto Proverbs, a book of 1,350 local proverbs. First published in 2010, this continues to be a popular book because of its insights into Pashto culture.

More details about Rohi Mataluna: Pashto Proverbs

Support of linguistic research (2014)

Learning language is a joy, but also a challenge, especially when it comes to proper grammar. InterLit spends hundreds of hours working with individual authors in support of their linguistic research. Just one example, is Growing in Pukhto: Verbs, first published in 2014. The over 400 conjugated verbs in this book are designed to help language students become proficient in the Pashto language.

More details about Growing in Pukhto: Verbs

Sharing a vision (2020)

InterLit shares in the vision of national institutions, such as the Pashto Academy, University of Peshawar, to enhance the development and promotion of Pashto materials for peoples of all generations, in Pakistan and internationally. In 2020, together with the Pashto Academy, we published Grandpa’s Stories, the first in a series of story books in Pashto and English, this time designed for the enjoyment of children at school and at home.

More details about Grandpa's Stories

Since 2001

many hundreds of expatriate workers have come to Afghanistan to assist in the reconstruction of the country

Learning

A great many of these workers have used Conversational Dari by Eugene Glassman or Speaking Afghan Pashto by Randall Olson to learn Dari and Pashto. Enjoy Afghanistan has provided cultural orientation.

Teaching

NGOs have taught adult literacy in Dari through a basic primer and set of easy readers especially written for Afghans.

Caring

Medical workers are using Pocket Medical Dari and Pocket Medical Pashto.

Selections from Enjoy Afghanistan are being translated into Spanish and Portuguese.

One Hundred Afghan Persian Proverbs is being translated into Italian.

All of these materials (and many others) have been prepared and published by the InterLit Foundation. Much of our work is funded by donations, as sales raise only a small portion of the amount needed to go on producing materials for this region of the world.