‘Nepal is an area on the political evolution of which not enough is known as yet,’ says the author; and to meet this gaping need he sets out to make his own contribution. What sort of treatment he renders to the subject is indicated in the title itself —Nepal: Year of Decision.
Bhagabati Charan Galpamala (Bhagabati Charans Short Stories) is not the first anthology of the short stories of Bhagabati Charan Panigrahi (190843), the founder of Nabajuga Sahitya Samsad (Literary Society of the New Era), the Odia version of the Progressive Writers Movement which had its first convention at Cuttack between 29 November and 6 December 1935…
Bhisham Sahni had once said, The only novel about Partition is Yashpals Jhootha Sach; everything else is merely a footnote. Surprisingly, however, it has taken almost fifty years for its English translation to come out. Jhootha Sach was originally published in Hindi in two volumes in 1958 and 1960…
In A Himalayan Tribe: From Cattle to Cash, a welcome sequel to Apa Tanis and Their Neighbours, Von Furer-Haimendorf describes his observations on the Apa Tanis whom he revisited after a gap of thirty-six years.
What does one make of pedestrian prose, a plot devoid of suspense and concerned mainly with the bric-a-brac of the lives of women in a Haveli? Add to this no subtlety to the characterization, no range, no depth and to think of it that it walked away with the Sahitya Akademi award!
There is a view supported by, among others, Salman Rushdie and Amit Chaudhuri that Indian Writing in English is superior to literature produced in regional languages. Obviously this opinion fails to take into account the variety, vigour and sincerity that marks writing in various Indian languages. Punjabi fiction being a case in point.