Mystique of Mumbai

In her book City of Gold: The Biography of Bombay, Gillian Tindal evoked an image of a nascent city, a tangle of masonry, bazaar and tram lines forging into the swamp. In books set in more recent times (India: A Million Mutinies Now, Maximum City: Bombay Lost and Found, Shantaram, Bombay and Mumbai: The City In Transition), we see a proud metropolis hollowed out by desperation, violent self assertion and crime. For a sense of how ordinary people, rich, poor and middle class, negotiate this turbulent landscape, we have the writings of Salman Rushdie, Rohinton Mistry, Vikram Chandra, Anita Desai, Amit Chaudhuri, Manil Suri and a host of less widely celebrated but much beloved local authors and poets. This treasure trove notwithstanding, one feels, there is still much to be said, much more to be understood about this great and complex city. And it is with pleasant anticipation that one greets Gyan Prakash’s Mumbai Fables.

Prakash is the Dayton-Stockton professor of history at Princeton University whose previous books include weighty titles such as Bonded Histories: Genealogies of Labor Servitude in Colonial India (1990) and Another Reason: Science and the Imagination of Modern India (1999). But with Mumbai Fables, a subject he says has preoccupied him for much of the last decade, he seems to have tapped into a less theoretical and more personal register. Explaining his motivation early on in the book, he describes Mumbai, or Bombay, as it then was, as an object of immense fascination and longing for him as a young boy growing up in Patna.

Full report here Indian Express

Long-listed for literary award

Salma had one regret as a writer. Though she arrived on the Tamil literary scene with her poems, powerfully expressing the pain of sufferings of women treated as sexual objects by men, she feels that her debut novel ‘Irandam Jaamangalin Kathai' was “deliberately ignored.”

But, an English translation by Laksmi Holmstrom titled ‘The Hour Past Midnight' did the magic. The novel is now in the long list of the first DSC Prize for South Asian Literature along with the works of well-known writers such as Amit Chaudhuri and Upamanyu Chatterjee. The prize, whose long-list has 14 books, carries a cash award of $50,000.

“I am happy that my novel is getting world-wide attention,” said Salma. The novel narrated hitherto unknown world of Muslim women in a male-dominated society, besides capturing their aspirations in the absence of any link with women outside their world. “It is the politics in the literary world that ensured that the novel did not get its due,” said Salma, who was then the president of a panchayat in Tiruchi. She took a plunge into politics in 2004 by joining the DMK. She was also fielded as the party candidate in Marungapuri Assembly constituency, but failed to win the election. The government later appointed her chairperson of the Tamil Nadu Social Welfare Board.

Full report here Hindu

Midnight’s other children

In the spring of 1997, the literary quarterly Granta published an issue devoted to India’s Golden Jubilee. The tone was cautious but celebratory: on the cover, the country’s name was printed in bright red letters, followed by an exclamation point. Fifty years after partition, an independent India was rapidly establishing itself as an international power. The issue, which consisted largely of contributions from native Indians writing in English, was a testament both to the country’s extraordinary intellectual and artistic richness, and to one of the few legacies of British colonialism that could be unequivocally celebrated by readers in South Asia and the West: a common language. Seventeen years after Salman Rushdie’s shot across the bow with Midnight’s Children, a new generation of Indian writers was, in Granta’s words, “matching India’s new vibrancy with their own.”

In the ensuing years, the American appetite for Indian culture has only grown. Many of the writers who arrived on the scene in the 1980s and ’90s — Vikram Seth, Arundhati Roy (whose wildly successful novel The God of Small Things was first serialized in Granta), Amit Chaudhuri — continued to publish fiction and reportage, and a new wave of novelists, including Kiran Desai and Aravind Adiga, went on to write prize-winning, best-selling books. Readers of Roy, Desai or Adiga — not to mention the viewers who flocked to “Slumdog Millionaire” — have not been spared portraits of Indian life’s miseries (caste-based discrimination, horrific poverty). But the folkloric and redemptive aspects of the stories, already familiar thanks to Rushdie’s magic realism and the more romantic understandings of Hinduism associated with the Kama Sutra, have merely solidified Westerners’ rosy vision of India. These books and films have also complemented the work of writers like Jhumpa Lahiri, who was born in London and raised in Rhode Island and has written vividly about Indian-Americans. The Indian experience, however foreign, has become part of the American experience.

Full report here NYT

14 authors on South Asian literature prize long-list

Acknowledging the diversity of literature emanating from the region, the DSC Limited Tuesday announced a long-list of 14 works of fiction as also the five-member jury of the first DSC prize for South Asian literature.

The prize carries a purse of $50,000. The DSC Ltd organises the Jaipur Literature Festival in the pink city every year.

The long-list includes Way to Go by Upamanyu Chatterjee, The Middleman by Mani Sankar Mukherjee, The Immortals by Amit Chaudhuri, Arzee the Dwarf by Chandrahas Choudhury, The Story of a Widow by M.A. Farooqui, and The Immigrant by Manju Kapur, among others.

The names of the six short-list books will be announced by October-end at the DSC South Asian Literature Festival in London and the winner at the Jaipur Literature Festival in January 2010.

The titles are either set in South Asia or centre around south Asian protagonists and bring forth typical concerns upholding the socio-political and economic milieu of the region.

Full report here Sify

A city’s consciousness

Sharply etched portraits of Mumbai and its people trapped in a plot of contrived ends

On almost every page of Saraswati Park, Anjali Joseph’s debut novel, named for the block of flats in which the three central characters live, the calmness of the narrative appears to be a build-up to an explosive finale. Detailing with meticulous attention what each of the three does as they go about their daily lives, the storyline is so front-loaded with possibilities that a crisis, even a catastrophe, seems inevitable.

This is reinforced all the more by the choice of Mumbai as a setting. The placid prose—not as ultra slo-mo or as up close to the subject as Amit Chaudhuri’s, but definitely a reminder—is almost a set-up for the seemingly mundane lives of Mohan, his wife Lakshmi and his nephew Ashish to intersect with one of the many violent events to have befallen the city. So it is both a relief and a disappointment that nothing of the sort happens—despite the (unintentional?) red herrings in the form of Ashish wandering past Leopold Café and the Gateway of India late one evening.

Full report here Mint

I’m a nostalgic person: Anjali Joseph

Anjali Joseph’s Saraswati Park has been described by author Amit Chaudhuri as “the best debut novel I have read in a long time”, it has been selected as one of four  short listed titles for the third round of Rising Stars promotion for 2010 and it also landed the young author on Telegraph’s list of Britain’s top 20 authors under 40. In her debut novel, Joseph offers the reader with a piece of Mumbai that has slowly trickled away to oblivion.

She says that Saraswati Park was written in a flurry of homesickness, “I’m a nostalgic person. The house in the novel resembles my grandparents’ house in Mumbai, where I spent most of my childhood.” She recounts fondly, “We weren’t a very athletic family. Everybody read a lot. I was fascinated by this when I was four and couldn’t wait to start reading. Every time books diverted their attention away from me, I thought to myself, “even I want to do that!”

Anjali believes that her book portrays Mumbai as it really is, without the gloss, “For the average Mumbai-kar, his daily life takes precedence over shopping arcades. His life revolves around his early morning train ride to work and back. It is as simple as that.”

Full report here DNA

Challenging the stereotyped woman

Tamil fiction writer C.S. Lakshmi shares with S.S.KAVITHA tips on feminism

The reddish maroon sari, her silky grey hair and the quavering voice lends that unpretentious look to her exuding confidence. When she opens her mouth, she speaks her heart out much like the characters in her fiction. And, that is what sets her apart.

Popular under the pseudonym Ambai, C.S.Lakshmi is a distinguished fiction writer in Tamil. Her works are characterized by a passionate siding with the cause for women and humour. Her profound style is in touch with reality. She is the only Tamil writer to have been included in the recently published Picador Book of Modern Indian Literature edited by Amit Chaudhuri. She is also the founder-trustee and director of SPARROW (Sound and Picture Archives for Research on Women).

Full report here Hindu

Ties that bind

Amit Chaudhuri has earned acclaim for his novels about family and belonging. Helena Frith Powell visits him in his home base of Kolkata, the focus of his next work

Amit Chaudhuri does not much like travelling. He finds the day before he is set to leave particularly difficult. “I feel I am neither here nor there,” he says in an interview at the Kolkata home he shares with his wife, 11-year-old daughter and his octogenarian parents. “I am a soul in transit. You would think after 20 or 30 years of travelling it would get better, but it doesn’t.

Chaudhuri, a youthful-looking 47-year-old with a charming, boyish smile, is the author of five novels, all of which have won literary prizes, a musician in the Indian classical tradition and an academic.

He has been based in Kolkata since 1999 after a childhood spent in Bombay (he refuses to call Indian cities by their new names, “Why should I call it Mumbai just because someone says it is called Mumbai? They might change it again next year”) and student years in London.

Full report here National 

Four Indians nominated for Commonwealth Writers' Prize

Noted authors Keki N. Daruwalla and Amit Chaudhuri are among the four Indians nominated for the Commonwealth Writers' Prize 2010. Besides Daruwalla's For Pepper and Christ and Chaudhuri's The Immortals, authors Rana Dasgupta and Chandrahas Chowdhury have also been nominated for their books Solo and Arzee the Dwarf, respectively.

While Solo and Arzee The Dwarf  have been published by HarperCollins-India, For Pepper and Christ has been published by Penguin-Books India and The Immortals has been published by Picador-India.

For Pepper and Christ is a historic tale of sailors voyaging during the time of Vasco Da Gama that weaves itself around the legend of Prestor John and spice trade. The Immortals is the story of two families in Mumbai of the 'eighties bound by music.

Other nominees for best book in Europe and South Asia include The Beijing of Possibilities by Jonathan Tel (Britian), Heartland by Anthony Catwright (Britain) In Other Rooms, Other Wonders by Daniyal Mueenuddin (Pakistan) and Another Gulmohar Tree by Aamer Hussain (Pakistan), a communique issued by HarperCollins said on Friday.

Full report here Little About

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The regional winners shortlisted are:
Africa
The shortlisted writers for Africa's Best Book are:

Trespass by Dawn Garisch (South Africa)
The Double Crown by Marié Heese (South Africa)
The Thing Around Your Neck by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (Nigeria)
Eyo by Abidemi Sanusi (Nigeria)
Tsamma Season by Rosemund Handler (South Africa)
Refuge by Andrew Brown (South Africa)
Kings of the Water by Mark Behr (South Africa)

The shortlisted writers for Africa's Best First Book are:
I Do Not Come to You by Chance by Adaobi Tricia Nwaubani (Nigeria
The Shape of Him by Gill Schierhout (South Africa)
The Shadow of a Smile by Kachi Ozumba (Nigeria)
Come Sunday by Isla Morley (South Africa)
Sleepers Wake by Alistair Morgan (South Africa)
Jelly Dog Days by Erica Emdon (South Africa)
Harmattan Rain by Aysha Harunna Attah (Ghana)

Caribbean and Canada
The shortlisted writers or the Caribbean and Canada Best Book are:
The Winter Vault by Anne Michaels (Canada)
February by Lisa Moore (Canada)
Euphoria by Connie Gault (Canada)
Goya's Dog by Damian Tarnopolsky (Canada)
Galore by Michael Crummey (Canada)
The Golden Mean by Annabel Lyon (Canada)

The shortlisted writers for the Caribbean and Canada Best First Book are:
Under this Unbroken Sky by Shandi Mitchell (Canada)
Daniel O'Thunder by Ian Weir (Canada)
The Island Quintet: Five Stories by Raymond Ramchartiar (Trinidad)
Diary of Interrupted Days by Dragan Todorovic (Canada)
The Briss by Michael Tregebov (Canada)
Amphibian by Carla Gunn (Canada)

South Asia and Europe
The shortlisted writers for South Asia and Europe Best Book are:
Solo by Rana Dasgupta (Britain)
For Pepper and Christ: A Novel by Keki Daruwalla (India)
The Beijing of Possibilities by Jonathan Tel (Britain)
Heartland by Anthony Catwright (Britain)
Another Gulmohar Tree by Aamer Hussein (Pakistan)
The Immortals by Amit Chaudhuri (India)

The shortlisted writers for South Asia and Europe Best First Book are:
The Hungry Ghosts by Anne Berry (Britain)
Arzee the Dwarf by Chandrahas Choudhury (India)
In Other Rooms, Other Wonders by Daniyal Mueenuddin (Pakistan)
Among Thieves by Mez Packer (Britain)
An Equal Stillness by Francesca Kay (Britain)
Tail of the Blue Bird by Nii Parkes (Britain)

South East Asia and Pacific
The shortlisted writers for South East Asia and Pacific Best Book are:
Summertime by J.M Coetzee (Australia)
A Good Land by Nada Awar Jarrar (Australia)
The Adventures of Vela by Albert Wendt (Samoa)
Singularity by Charlotte Grimshaw (New Zealand)
The People's Train by Thomas Keneally (Australia)
Parrot and Oliver in America by Peter Carey (Australia)

The shortlisted writers for South East Asia and Pacific Best First Book are:
The Ice Age by Kirsten Reed (Australia)
After the fire, a still small voice by Evie Wyld (Australia)
Look Who's Morphing by Tom Cho (Australia)
Document Z by Andrew Croome (Australia)
Come Inside by Glenys Osborne (Australia)
Siddon Rock by Glenda Guest (Australia)

London Book Fair opens amid optimistic buzz

Earl's Court underground station was jam-packed this morning, as much of the UK's – and the world's – publishing industry attempts to make their way into the exhibition centre, clutching or dragging armloads of books, diaries weighed down with back-to-back appointments. It's the start of the yearly rights trading extravaganza which is the London Book Fair, and although the global downturn has affected exhibitor attendance somewhat, the crowds milling around the entrance and pouring into the aisles seem as busy as ever, and the flood of new book deals struck just before and during the fair as overwhelming. A Guardian report.

With India the focus country for the fair this year, a host of big names are scheduled to attend, from Vikram Seth to Amartya Sen, Amit Chaudhuri and Daljit Nagra. Fourteen of India's official languages are represented by the 50-plus authors in attendance, and around 90 Indian publishers will be showcasing their books to an international community – more than 54 countries are represented at the fair – keen to find the next bestseller from the subcontinent.

For full article, click here

In search of India

The theme of the London book fair this year is Indian writing, writes Amit Chaudhuri in the Guardian. Vikram Seth, Amartya Sen, William Dalrymple and other writers in frequent circulation in this country are going to be joined by writers - K Satchidanandan, Javed Akhtar - distinguished or popular on their own terrain but less known here, for five days of discussions and celebrations. Something like this happened in 2006 to the Frankfurt book fair, when planeloads of Indian novelists and poets descended on the Intercontinental Hotel, waved to each other over breakfast, and then read from their work to courteous audiences in the afternoons and evenings.

The theme then, too, was India; and the "idea of India" acted as a catalyst to a process that might have already begun, but received, at that moment, a recognisable impetus - the confluence, in one place, of literary and intellectual dialogue with what is basically business activity, each bringing magic and movement to the other. The India-themed Paris book fair followed swiftly.

For full story, clIck here

For a fresh look

For the publishing troubled, the focus on India seems to be an ongoing story. Frankfurt and Paris had the spotlight on India last year, and London follows is following it up with an ambitious line –up of India centric events at London this year.

The London Book Fair, on at the British capital’s Earls Court from April 20-22 this year, is focusing on India as an emerging market and literary hub. This trade fair will look at not only English writing from the south Asian nation but also other vernacular languages, Alistair Burtenshaw, group exhibition director of the event, says during a recent visit to India to promote the fair.

Burtenshaw admits that the global publishing industry is reeling at the moment. But he is confident of the rebound for the sector as well. “Publishing is a very forward looking industry,” he says. “Even in a challenging economic environment, they are going to look ahead. Out industry relies on great writing, and that is not going to stop.”

The London Book Fair, part of Reed Exhibitions, is one of the largest trade fairs in the world for the sector. While leading publishers, distributors, exporters, agents and writers are present, since 2004, each year, the fair has also selected a ‘market focus’ country. A major area where Burtenshaw hopes LBF will see activity is the sale of copyrights, especially for new authors. While Indian literature has already made deep inroads in the western markets, Burtenshaw feels the fair will help the industry look at India through fresh eyes.

The fair sees about 75-100 seminars over three days and usually draws about 25,000 attendees. Last year, there were about 1,800 exhibitors, from 36 countries and 413 companies. This year, publishers, booksellers and industry representatives from 67 countries will be present at the fair. The growth of the LBF in recent years has also meant the fair has a more international flavour, with about half the exhibitors coming from overseas.

About 45 writers, including major names like Vikram Seth, Amit Chaudhuri, Anita Nair, Javed Akhtar, Amartya Sen and Ramchandra Guha are among the writers scheduled to attend the fair. Already 78 Indian exhibitors have signed up, far exceeding expectations, says Burtenshaw. About 40 cultural events, including seminars and workshops, are planned. “It will help Indian publishers to sell rights of works by Indian authors to other markets,” he says.

The fair aims to focus on different aspects of Indian publishing. With India already the world’s third-largest producer of English language titles, and a still growing economy compared to negative growth rates in most of the OECD economies, the country offers considerable marketing opportunities.

“This will see writing not only from Indians writing in English, but also from the other languages spoken in the country,” says Burtenshaw. The British Council is putting together the programmes, and Sujata Sen, Director, East India, British Council, points out, there are 32 languages in India with over a million speakers, and there is great scope for translation. She points to Sahitya Akademi’s programme, and hopes more translation rights will be discussed.
And the events will not be limited to LBF alone but will also form part of the Edinburgh, hay, Norwich and Newcastle literature festivals. As part of the build up, the Kolkata Book Fair this had its spotlight on Scottish writers, and BCL organized about 50 events during the festival, points out Sen. “It is all about long term sustainability and engagement, adds Burtenshaw. “The rationale is to create greater business opportunities.

With a going rate of £254 per square metre to rent place at the fair, participation does not come chap. But Capexil is giving financial assistance to participants. LBF has also been helping out potential Indian exhibitors through workshops and seminars, conducting workshops for agents on how they can make a book successful, on participation guidelines, how to set up appointments, which titles to promote, how to present stands, preparing the right publicity material etc. While many of the subsidiaries of international publishing houses have been participating in their global stands, many have also taken stands in the India pavilion, Among the participants from India at the fair are Roli, Rupa, Macmillan India, Mapin, Niyogi, OUP India, Penguin India, Sterling, UBSPD, Zubaan, Wisdom Tree, Ratna Sagar, Research Press, Pearson Education, Palgrave Macmillan, McGraw Hill, IBH, Cambridge University Press India besides a host of printers.

Whether the fair is able to achieve its goals remains to be seen, but what already seems guaranteed is the greater visibility of the India in one of world’s global financial capitals desperately in need of some succour.

India focus at London Book Fair

More than 45 leading Indian writers, translators, critics, academics and industry professionals will be coming to the London Book Fair, to take part in a varied programme of events based on themes of cultural and linguistic diversity, designed to enable better market understanding through contemporary literature between India and the UK. This is the first time such a wide variety of authors has been showcased in this way, and the event will bring together the largest representation of Indian writers ever assembled at a publishing trade show.

Writers including Javed Akhtar, Amit Chaudhuri, Namdeo Dhasal, Ramachandra Guha, Jaishree Misra, Daljit Nagra, Anita Nair, Bhalchandra Nemade, Nandan Nilekani, K Satchidanandan, Shankar, Vikram Seth and Pavan K Varma will take part in a series of ten seminars and readings at the Fair, as well as additional events in London and around the UK. These events will highlight the richness and diversity of contemporary Indian literature, with over 15 Indian languages represented across a total of 40 events.

The British Council is hosting the following seminars:
- Imagining India: the world of fiction
- Home and the world
- Literature of identity
- Literature of conflict
- India writes
- India translated
- Literature of the cinema
- Bestsellers and popular writing
- Literature of ideas
- Battle for the Indian reader

Susie Nicklin, Director Literature, British Council, said: “Many people in the UK feel they know India and her writers, which is not surprising given their justified success in this country; many readers in India feel they are au fait with British contemporary literature. In fact, all of us will benefit hugely from this opportunity — a major part of an ongoing British Council programme – to discover more about each other’s literary cultures and societies.”