When he’s not busy directing and acting, looking after his four daughters, working out at the gym and keeping up with many of his other commitments, Armaghan Shahid (popularly known as Shaan) likes to read. These days he is reading Diaries of Field Marshal Mohammad Ayub Khan, 1966-1972, edited and annotated by Craig Baxter.
 With the country caught up in the present political turmoil, Shaan says he wanted to see how a general would do or feel in such circumstances. “They all come from the same school of thought. Personally, they might be different but they have the same backbone. I wasn’t born then, in Ayub’s time, so reading his diaries with the exact dates and the events that made history is all very interesting. For example, how he felt when Dhaka was falling and his views about Bhutto, a person who has been praised by so many people, really gives a different perspective to the reader. You get to see a different Bhutto from Ayub Khan’s point of view,” says Shaan.
Paulo Coelho is Shaan’s favourite writer and Shaan has read all of his books. He says, “I really liked The Alchemist because the ending surprised me, which was a lot of fun because I hardly get to read anything that surprises me anymore. When you’ve done so many characters, read so many scripts and screenplays and you basically know all the twists and turns, it’s good to get an unexpected ending! I truly believed in a lot of things he said.”
Shaan says he also enjoyed reading about Chairman Mao. “Being a Pakistani and having heard nothing but praise for Mao, I found out he was a very different man after reading his autobiography – a hero and a villain at the same time. That really helped me as an actor because it created a third dimension into acting for me and made me realize that even while being portrayed as a hero, the negative traits should also come out.” — Mariam Shah
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