|
Studying electoral
politics
Abhijit Dasgupta
The Grassroots of
Democracy: Field Studies of Indian Election
conceived by M. N.
Srinivas and A. M. Shah.
Ed. A. M. Shah. Permanent
Black, Delhi. Pages 380. $39.
IN the 1960s and 1970s,
sociologists at the Delhi School of Economics were engaged in exploring
new areas of research under the guidance of M.N. Srinivas. The study of
electoral politics was one such new area. The findings of the scholars
have come out in a book edited by A. M. Shah which is being reviewed.
Fantasy islands
Aditi Garg
The Remix of Orchid
by A.N. Nanda. Pages 350. Rs 250.
IT is no easy job to tread
the unknown path. And it is that element of unknown that lends it the
mystical spark. A story can be made or marred by the very setting or the
locales and the surroundings. The Andaman Islands have only recently
come to be associated with beautiful scenic landscapes and multi-starred
resorts.
A slice of rural life
Shalini Rawat
Six Acres and a Third
by Fakir Mohan Senapati. Translated from Oriya byRabi Shankar Mishra, Satya
P. Mohanty, Jatindra K. Nayak and Paul
St.-Pierre. Penguin. Pages 222. Rs
250.
Chandrahas Choudhary
writing about Six Acres and a Third in a Nepali journal, ‘Himal,’
had remarked that, "the 19th-century Oriya novelist,
Fakir Mohan Senapati, was a most oblique writer; he never said or meant
anything in a straightforward manner." That in effect captures the
genius of Senapati’s writings, also known as the father of modern
Oriya literature.
Women-centric narratives
Amar Nath Wadehra
Tujhe Hum Vali Samajhte
by Kashmiri Lal Zakir. Educational Publishing
House, Delhi. Pages 147. Rs 125.
Doormat, temptress and
vamp have been the three stereotypical portrayals of female characters
in popular Indian literature, including Urdu. Zakir, in his introduction
to this volume, adds another one—bewafa or disloyal/unreliable
lover to the list. His stories, however, endeavour to break the mould.
The women characters are neither all black nor all white. Shades of grey
predominate.
Times we live in
Manmeet Sodhi
The Terrorist at my Table
by Imtiaz Dharker. Penguin
Books. Pages 158. Rs 200.
Imtiaz Dharker’s
new
collection The Terrorist at my Table is a bold attempt to present
the true pulse of the new Indian English poetry. This sensitive
compilation strips off all the hypocrisies and puts forward the facts
objectively: "Here are the facts, fine / as onion rings / the same
ones can come chopped / or sliced."
Letters of love
The unique bond that
Amrita and Imroze shared was the stuff of legend. Arvinder, whose
translation into English of the collection of intimate letters exchanged
between the lovers is under publication, shares a selection with The
Tribune
Amrita
Pritam, the
renowned Punjabi writer used, to lovingly call her companion Imroze, an
artist ‘Imma’ ‘Immva’ ‘Bulle Shah’. And for him she was ‘Maja’,
Zorbi’, Barkate’, `85. (my abundance), in fact anything that was
beautiful and anything that denoted strength. "When I read Zorba,
the Greek, I kept calling her Zorbi and Maja was the protagonist of
a novel based on the life of a Spanish artist.
Bhopal retold with
sentiment and savagery
Boyd Tonkin
Animal’s People
by Indra Sinha Simon & Schuster. £11.99
August sees a seasonal
outbreak of head-scratching and site-searching as panicky critics,
editors, retailers and bookies rush to discover more about the
lesser-known novels on the Man Booker long-list. Yet these surprises
offer readers, as well as authors, a precious second chance.
Twists and U-turns
Vikramdeep Johal
The Oxford Murders
by Guillermo Martinez trans. Sonia Soto, Abacus. Pages 197. £6.50
A labyrinth in the form of
a straight line, along which "so many philosophers have lost
themselves..." This paradox figures in Death and the Compass,
a mock-intellectual murder mystery crafted by Argentinian master Jorge
Luis Borges over half a century ago. From the literary icon’s homeland
comes Guillermo Martinez, whose novel follows the tricky path laid out
in the classic short story.
Life of a dancer
Rudolf
Nureyev, one of the
greatest male ballet dancers of the 20th century, not only flirted with
Jackie Kennedy, but went a step further with her sister Lee Radziwill,
reveals a new biography. In Rudolf Nureyev: The Life, biographer
Julie Kavanagh tells how Jackie Kennedy ordered a private plane to ferry
the dancer to the White House after watching him perform with Margot
Fonteyn on his first tour of America with the Royal Ballet in 1963.
Back of the book
|
