Celebrated children’s writer Subhadra Sen Gupta’s swansong, Let’s Go Time Travelling Again! Indians Through the Ages, is a remarkable addition to her already brilliant repertoire of publications. The second in the Time Travelling series, published posthumously, will alas also be the last of her many books aimed at making history fun and accessible to young people. She leaves behind a formidable legacy. Her non-fiction publications, especially on Indian history, continue to set a benchmark for introducing children to critical themes in an engaging way.
In this book, Sen Gupta explores history through the lives of ordinary people. Across seven chapters, she brings to life actors other than rulers and nobility who were instrumental in shaping Indian society, economy and politics. School level history has for decades been focused on significant events that usually involve states and warfare, foregrounding extraordinary events. This is a one-dimensional method of recording human life. It privileges the role of the elite decision making strata of society. It ignores the role of the rhythms of daily life, of the lakhs of ordinary individuals who shaped society. By doing so, it puts distance between the reader and the story, giving history a proverbial stiff upper lip, and alienating those who may otherwise be interested in understanding the past. The writer’s approach challenges this method.