In 2011, on the 25th anniversary of the publication of Black British Literature: An Annotated Bibliography, I was invited by Newcastle University to give a lecture. Just imagine – in 200 years, no one had compiled even the most basic tool of research, a bibliography. That was why, despite all my limitations, I worked away […]
The Struggle for Black British Literature Read More »
Like most youngsters of my generation, I collected stamps, and found them hugely interesting as well as instructive in terms of geography and currencies. However, stamp-collecting did not lead me to any great appreciation of history. That was probably due to the fact that, as the family fortunes were then rather low, I could not
From a letter There’s a letter from Dad to our mother dated the 21st of September, 1938. He’s twenty-one, she’s eighteen. He’s impatient, impetuous and very much in love. Impatient: – “Those damned mails are late by 72 hours. It means that I won’t have any news from you till tomorrow evening.” Wondering: – “What do
Since the first translation of the Bhagavad Gita in 1789 by Charles Wilkins, there have been hundreds of translations into English. Some have translated the poetry of the Gita into prose, and some others have attempted metrical poetry. Whereas prose translations do not convey the delights of the original, good metrical translations have no choice
Michelle Mendonca Bambawale’s just-published book ‘Becoming Goan’ (Ebury-Penguin, 2023) is a story told at three levels. First, it is the story of a return to Goa by a daughter of the soil whose family has been out for generations. Secondly, it tells you about the rapid (sometimes destructive) changes Goa has been going through, as
Michelle’s Goa, a story told bluntly – a review by Frederick Noronha Read More »
Author(s): Michael Mitchell Publication date Pub: 22 December 2022 Journal: Journal of Indentureship and Its Legacies Publisher: Pluto Journals Though much has been made of the fact that Silent Winds, Dry Seas is the first Anglophone novel from Mauritius to have achieved wide circulation, readers of Caribbean fiction will be struck by an impression of familiarity. The reason is not hard to
Vinod Busjeet, Silent Winds, Dry Seas (New York: Doubleday, 2021), 288 pp Read More »
There’s an old platitude that does the rounds every Independence Day: though we won freedom from the British back in 1947, it goes, we continue to remain unfree in many ways to this day Book: Caged Tiger: How Too Much Government Is Holding Indians Back Author: Subhashish Bhadra Published by: Bloomsbury There’s an old platitude
Book review – Gilded cage Read More »
Salt & Pepper. Selected Poems. Sukrita. Paperwall Publishing. April 2023. 196 pages. The latest anthology of Sukrita’s poems Salt and Pepper traverses the poet’s momentous journey of nearly four decades. The poems bring us to a world not altogether unfamiliar— but a world imbued with a sensibility that is fine, complex and aesthetically profound at
AUTHOR: Sujan Dutta Professor Ali. Captain Ali. Whatever the name, the man was the same. Parimal Kumar Ghosh. He died in the national capital recently (July 6). He was 84 years old and was ailing. In his death, he has given life to Ushinor Majumdar’s just published book. The life of the book is not
Ushinor Majumdar’s ‘India’s Secret War’: BSF’s exploits in the run-up to 1971 war Read More »
