To prattle, the dictionary tells us, is to indulge in childish chatter, or in inconsequential talk. A Prattler’s Tale is mostly that. This is unfortunate, for its author, Ashok Mitra, has had a most distinguished life as an economist, activist, administrator,
This new collection of writings by Jawaharlal Nehru could not have been published at a more appropriate time. It is now 43 years since he left us and his achievements and failures, his explanations and exhortations can today be seen with detachment and understanding.
Books that attempt to present a balanced and comprehensive history of a period necessarily run the risk of slipping into banality. There are always too many things that demand a mention and there is never enough space to deal with them in depth or detail. Inevitably, the narrative becomes superficial, the analysis perfunctory and rushed, and the treatment at best a competent textbook summary of existing knowledge with little originality of approach or insight.
On the first page of City of Fear the author enquires, ‘Exactly what did Octavio Paz mean when he said, “We are condemned to kill time, so we die little by little”’. He never finds the answer even when an earthquake strikes and blood-thirsty mobs surround him.
Home Products, Amitava Kumar’s first novel, is a story of two stories, the story that the words on a page tell us and the other, often more interesting one, the story about the story; that is the way it reaches its readers, the traces of its scaffolding visible, made visible on purpose by the writer who almost in a late modernist gesture, takes us to that great workshop, the writer’s mind, his table and on it, an open exhibition of his wares.
With an opening reminiscent of the famous scene in Wuthering Heights where a ghost puts its icy hand through the window to the accompaniment of the howl of a hard-blowing winter wind, Brinda Charry’s novel grips you from line one: