Published by Vintage Books A plane is parked on a runway, and a group of men is walking towards it. They include General Zia ul-Haq, the President of Pakistan; Arnold Raphael, the American Ambassador to Pakistan; and General Akhtar Abdur Rahman, the head of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), Pakistan’s secret service. The date is 17 …
Continue reading A Case of Exploding Mangoes: Mohammed Hanif
Photo: Jerry Pinto Jerry Pinto is an Indian poet, writer and translator. His first novel, Em and the Big Hoom, won several awards, including The Hindu Literary Prize, the Sahitya Akademy Award, Crossword Book Award (Fiction) and the Windham-Campbell Literature Prizes (Fiction). His biography of the Bollywood actress, Helen: The Life and Times of an …
Continue reading Moving easily among different genres: An interview with Jerry Pinto
Published by Tarapress “Suraiya Hasan Bose is a name inscribed into the craft map of Andhra Pradesh. It speaks of a lifetime of passion and commitment to the cause of handloom from pre-Independence India to the present day.” This book pays tribute to Suraiya Hasan Bose and her lifelong association with Indian handlooms, especially those …
Continue reading Suraiya Hasan Bose—Weaving a Legacy: Radhika Singh
Published by Picador Shuggie Bain is a compelling story about addiction and its fallout, set in the working-class community in Glasgow. Shuggie Bain’s mother Agnes is an alcoholic. Shuggie’s father Big Shug, a taxi driver, is Agnes’s second husband. She has two children, Catherine and Leek, from her first husband. Agnes and the children live …
Translated from Polish by Jennifer CroftPublished by Fitzcarraldo Editions “Clearly I did not inherit whatever gene it is that makes it so that when you linger in a place you start to put down roots. I’ve tried, a number of times but my roots have always been shallow; the littlest breeze could always blow me …
Selected and translated by M. Asaduddin with additional translations by Ralph RussellPublished by Penguin “In my stories, I’ve put down everything with objectivity. Now, if people find them obscene, let them go to hell. It’s my belief that experiences can never be obscene if they are based on authentic realities of life.”[1] Ismat Chugtai is …
Continue reading Lifting the Veil: Selected Writings of Ismat Chugtai
Photo: Diccon Bewes Diccon Bewes is a writer who was born in the UK but has lived in Switzerland for many years, and is now a Swiss citizen. His books include Slow Train to Switzerland, where he retraces the journey of Jemima Morrell who was part of Thomas Cook’s first tour of the country in …
Continue reading Travels through Switzerland: An Interview with Diccon Bewes
Published by The Penguin English Library “There, in the middle of the broad, bright high-road—there, as if it had that moment sprung out of the earth or dropped from the heaven—stood the figure of a solitary Woman, dressed from head to foot in white garments; her face bent in grave inquiry on mine, her hand …
Published by Random House A performance of King Lear: the actor playing King Lear, Arthur Leander, is forgetting his lines and acting odd. He collapses with a heart attack. The curtain quickly comes down, Jeevan Chaudhary, a paramedic who happens to be in audience, rushes to help him. An ambulance is called, but Arthur dies. …
Published by Penguin If you’re looking for a light read with a bit of murder thrown in, then look no further. Richard Osman has written a delightful whodunit, set in an upscale retirement village in the UK. Septuagenarians Joyce, Elizabeth, Ibrahim and Ron live at Coopers Chase, a retirement village. They form the Thursday Murder …
