By Manoj Kuroor. Tanslated from the original Malayalam by J Devika

The poor, itinerant lives of the bards are a literal metaphor for the intimacy and alienation that characterizes human lives, of especially those who are dependent on others for their own survival. For Kolumban’s family, the conflict between sharing a life of poverty with loved ones and leading a lonely life of relative comfort in a foreign land is partially resolved by their passing intimacies with other communities they encounter on their journey.


Reviewed by: Kiran Keshavamurthy
Translated from the original Bengali by Arundathi Nath

The title story, ‘The Phantom’s Howl’ is in a different sub-genre of ghostly tales. In the trope of a lost traveller being given night shelter in a haunted mansion, certain hair-raising details may be expected but here the violence is blood curdling and almost kills the protagonist. The savage ghouls, denied rightful revenge, continue their search for victims and some living beings succumb to their macabre attack.


Reviewed by: Malashri Lal
By Sandipan Chattopadhyay. Translated from the original Bengali by Arunava Sinha

Sandipan’s roots reach into the avant-garde, cultural-literary Hungryalist Movement of Bengal initiated in the early decades of the 1960s. This was a distinct impetus to uproot conventional ways of looking at themes, especially those of love and desire. The opening story, ‘With Ruby in Diamond Harbour’, engages with Arun’s extra-marital affair summarized by himself for his wife, Ranu, whose face turns ‘pale as a seashell’, her expression frozen. Yet the one-night stint happens thereafter and ‘Ruby keeps talking.


Reviewed by: Jayati Gupta
By Ghanshyam Desai. Translated from the original Gujarati by Aban Mukherji and Tulsi Vatsal

The most common thread in this collection is of the highly suspicious nature of men regarding their wives or girlfriends, of whom they are never sure, sometimes rightfully, many times because of their lack of confidence in their own attractiveness. ‘Yet Again’, ‘Chance’ and ‘God’s Good Man’ are three such illustrative stories. Destroying domestic harmony, fragile male ego plays havoc in couples’ relationships. ‘You have poison in your gaze,’ (p. 17) aptly summarizes Leena, the wife in ‘Yet Again’.


Editorial
By Devesh Verma

It is daunting to tell a multilayered story through the thinly disguised characters drawn from a middle-class family headed by an avowed patriarch of his time, Ram Mohan, who is essentially a man of consequence. In the mid-seventies, India was rocked by issues such as popular unrest in Gujarat, the JP Movement, the imposition of Emergency, the defeat of Indira Gandhi, Operation Blue Star, the assassination of Indira Gandhi, the spurt in caste policies and the emergence of Kanshi Ram, and the bloodstained agitation for reservation. They created an air of unease, desperation, moral outrage and reprobation.


Reviewed by: Shafey Kidwai
By Radhika Oberoi

At the centre of Oberoi’s novel is the voice of a dead young mother, for the most part housed on an old torn suitcase in a dusty little storeroom containing cupboards full of her now unused things: fine saris, jewellery, knickknacks and baby clothes. Her narration of small events, tidbits about her two adorable daughters’ infancy and childhood is interrupted by mournful visits from the now grown-up elder daughter whose grief is compounded by a falling out with her younger sister.


Reviewed by: Rohini Mokashi-Punekar