Lahore: A Sentimental Journey

Have you ever heard your grandparents speak of a Lahore you don't recognize? A Lahore where Hindus, Muslims, and Sikhs celebrated Basant together from neighboring rooftops? Where the air carried the sound of temple bells and the azaan, and no one thought twice?

That Lahore lives in these pages.

Pran Nevile was born in Lahore in 1922. He studied at Government College, shopped in Anarkali, and fell in love with a city he was forced to leave in 1947. Decades later, settled in India, he wrote this book—not as a historian, but as a man carrying a city in his heart .

Lahore: A Sentimental Journey doesn't read like a textbook. It reads like an elder sitting with you, cup of tea in hand, taking you back.

You'll walk with him through:

• Anarkali Bazaar — not as it is today, but as it was: narrow, buzzing, filled with fabric sellers and the smell of jalebis fresh from the karahi 
• The Mall Road on a slow tonga ride, passing the High Court and the Museum 
• Heera Mandi at twilight, where dancing girls and musicians held court, their art respected and celebrated 
• Government College classrooms, where future leaders of two nations sat side by side 
• Rooftops on Basant night — the flutter of kites, the chant of "Bo-kata!" and romances that bloomed under the stars 

But what makes this book unforgettable is what lies beneath the nostalgia: the ache of loss. Nevile returned to Lahore forty years after Partition, walking the same streets, searching for faces that were no longer there. His epilogue, "Lahore Revisited," is enough to move any Pakistani to tears .

For the Lahori reader, this book is personal. It's your city frozen in time. For anyone interested in books on history, it's essential reading - a view from the other side of the border that feels surprisingly like home.

Pran Nevile passed away in 2018, but through this book, he still walks the streets of his first love . Let him walk you through them too.

Lahore: A Sentimental Journey is available now at Kitab Markaz. We deliver across Pakistan - from Gulberg to DHA, from Model Town to Bahria Town, and everywhere in between.

Format: Paperback