Connecting voices

Sujata Sankranti on her debut novel In the Shadow of Legends

Although In the Shadow of Legends is her first novel, Sujata Sankranti is not new to the field of creative writing.

“I am a compulsive scribbler. My sons used to tease me about my ominous black diaries ‘full of Mummy's secrets,'” says Sujata, an academician and a well-known short story writer who published her first tale in 1997 in The Hindu Literary Review. Soon afterwards, in 1998, she won the Commonwealth Short Story Prize for her touching story The Warp and the Weft.

“When I write a short story I always have the beginning and the end in mind and then I follow my inner voice,” says Sujata. The author was in the city in connection with the release of her novel, when she sat down for a chat with MetroPlus.

Gradual progression

“Writing In the Shadow of Legends came naturally to me. It's been growing in me all these years,” muses the author, who says that writing a short story is actually more difficult than writing a novel, because “one needs to bring out the essence of the matter in relatively few words.”

Full report here Hindu