Indian literature

[wba]

I'm currently reading Buddhadeva Bose's WHEN THE TIME IS RIGHT (called "Tithi Dore" in Bengali and published in 1949), and was wondering if some of you can recommend some Indian literature to me?

Would also be interested in recommendations or information regarding english translations (good or bad), cause I don't understand any of the many Indian languages, and have to read the stuff in English (or German or Slovene).

[nrh]

i've only read buddhadeva bose's my kind of girl which i found lovely but slight, but i do have to admit it's a book i keep thinking of coming back to, as if i've missed something significant.

really haven't read much at all, so it's probably presumptuous to even make recommendations, but i do think i've read reasonably well only because i've been guided by people with better knowledge and taste than mine. few things i've liked a lot -

various by rk narayan - an ironist with a deceptively light touch, i especially like guide (the film adaptation is a masterpiece but very different), painter of signs, and his three early autobiographical novels (teacher of english, swami and friends, bachelor of arts). he wrote in a very clear, spare english, so no need to worry about translation

o.v. viyayan, selected fiction collection from penguin in either '99 or '03 printing - short novels and stories by a very odd, fractious writer from kerala.

oxford collection of twelve english poets edited by arvind krishna malhotra - very good collection of 20th century english poets edited by malhotra, also a very strong poet himself (the nyrb collection published last year is very good).

the collected essays of ak ramanujan - ramanujan was a very good poet (he is in the malhotra edited collection) but one of my favorite essayists. his collection of kannada folk stories is wonderful too. also recommend his translation of the great kannada novel samskara: a rite for a dead man by u.r. ananthamurthy.

not sure how you feel about reading plays but would recommend the three plays: naga-mandala, hayavadana, and tughlaq collection by girish karnad (also a major director and actor in film and theater).

loved both the books by kiran nagarkar (who did get tarnished with me-too allegations right around his death a few years ago), the murky and discordant (translated from marathi) seven sixes are forty-three and the more outwardly comic (but still very troubling) written in english ravan & eddie. haven't read it yet but his very long written in english historical novel cuckold is one of seema's favorites.

have been told many times that the tagore poetry translations are more or less a lost cause, but the penguin short story collection (which has some poetry and more interestingly some of his letters and diaries) is very good at least in terms of selection. have been fully warned off of any of the english translations of his novels.

will recommend two novels that i loved but wondered about translations - chemmeen, a very famous malayalam novel about a fishing village, made into a very famous film in '65, by thakazhi sivasankara pillai and vekkai (translated as heat) by poomani, a famous 1982 tamil novel also adapted into a film (vetrimaaran's asuran, which has major differences from the book). both are translated from a more vernacular language to a more clean, modern english but i think both are strong books even after violence of translation.

and lastly try to stay away from modern event novels but i really liked vikram chandra's 2006 book sacred games, which was supposed to be some kind of giant airport book bestseller but turned into an enormous, grafian web of patterned history, pulp gestures and structural failure. the netflix tv series was a total mess despite some good action directing by motwane on a small budget.

[wba]

Thank you very much, nrh!!!

I picked up Bose's MY KIND OF GIRL by chance at a booth with discarded books from the hospital library where my daughter was born a few years ago, which were all for sale for 1€ each (though most of them looked like new, so I guess those were probably titles nobody borrowed there - at all), and though some of them were shitty (beware of those intriguing-sounding "bestsellers"...) some I bought were very good as well. I read MY KIND OF GIRL in a German translation, and though it seemed to belong to that "shitty" pile at first and I already wanted to quit reading it, I persevered through the first 20 pages and the book got better and better as it progressed (and I tried to look beneath the shortcomings of the translation). I agree that it seems very slight at first, but somehow it grew on me, and I wanted to check out something else (and something better!) by Bose and ordered the English translation of WHEN THE TIME IS RIGHT shortly thereafter (some 30+ Euros and quite expensive to import to Germany for a soft cover book) and I'm so glad I did it! Though I had been reluctant to read it at first (500+ pages and being totally unfamiliar with Indian fiction and being afraid of modern translation jobs...) I finally picked it up last weekend as an Hors d'oeuvre for my 2021 project of reading various 1000+ page novels this year, and it's magnificent. Though I have many problems with the translation by Arunava Sinha (and can't possibly imagine how this book must read in Bengali), I have read far worse translations of some great Asian books in recent years (from Gao Xingjian and Edogawa Ranpo to name but 2 very fine authors), so I'll definitely check out more that has been translated by Mr. Sinha (he also won the Muse India translation award in 2013 for translating WHEN THE TIME IS RIGHT, so I guess he's one of the better translators currently active). So if you want to check out more by Bose I can wholeheartedly recommend this book and translation to you (which is probably as good as it gets at the moment).

I have tried to sift through some 20th century Indian literature yesterday, but it's been difficult if you don't know shit about India, like me. Wanted to check out some Rabindranath Tagore first, but am not so sure now (as you mention, that translation issue...), but maybe I can find some old German translations from the 1910s and 1920s, so I might check them out.

All your recommendations have been duly noted and I will try to seek them all out!!! I will report back when successful, though my budget for buying books in 2021 is very meager (but I might order me some for my birthday ).

[kanafani]

I’ve read close to nothing, but I would highly recommend Vivek shanbhag’s ghachar ghochar, a lovely modern short novel.

[wba]

Thanks kanafani!

EDIT: Looking at my amazon wishlist, there's more than 2 dozen Indian titles on it now.

[brian d]

all about h. hatterr!, by g.v. desani (originally in english)

kanthapura, by raja rao

i've liked a few things by mahasweta devi: the queen of jhansi, chotti munda and his arrow, and the book of the hunter were the best. at least some of these were translated by gayatri spivak, but they're actually readable.

i also liked the guide, but couldn't get through many of narayan's stories

i liked vinod kumar shukla's the servant's shirt a lot, and there's a movie version of it by mani kaul

stories by vijayadan detha are also really, really good and some have film adaptations

[nrh]

completely forgot the ghachar ghochar mentioned by kanafani, which is definitely a great novel, and the vijaydan detha stories mentioned by brian d, which are also excellent - we have the chouboli and other stories vol 1 and 2 translated by christi merill and kailash kabir which are pretty much perfect books.

and also forgot another great book recently translated - scene: 75 by rahi masoom raza, a darkly funny, fractured novel set in the '70s hindi film industry written by one of the many poets and authors who wrote plots and dialogue during that time.

[wba]

Thanks Brian, I added your recommendations to my list!
And a book on the 1970s Hindi film industry? Sounds delicious, nrh!