Arundhati Roy’s eagerly-awaited second novel goes on sale worldwide on Tuesday, two decades after her prize-winning debut The […]
Author: Zafar Anjum
Let’s get down to brass tacks. Why do you write?
To be honest, I haven’t enjoyed writing for a long time now for reasons beyond my control. I enjoy reading mainly contemporary texts in English. I also read a lot of Urdu poetry, mainly classical poets and poets of modern sensibility, including the modernist poets of the Progressive Writers Movement.
Tell us about your most recent book or writing project. What were you trying to say or achieve with it?
My latest translation is of The Life and Poetry of Bahdaur Shah Zafar written by Aslam Parvez. My endeavour was to make a wonderful book that has for long been confined to a narrow Urdu readership available to the wider English-speaking world.
As the British poet-novelist CS Lewis once famously said, “Literature adds to reality, it does not simply describe […]
FT has described Arundhati Roy’s second novel, The Ministry of Utmost Happiness, as “Compelling”.
“Ultimately, Roy’s admirers will not be disappointed,” writes Claire Messud in her FT review. “This ambitious new novel, like its predecessor, addresses weighty themes in an intermittently playful narrative voice. Whereas The God of Small Things — the tale of Rahel and Esthappen, a pair of twins, and their family’s tragedies in Kerala, southern India — approaches big issues such as caste divisions and molestation through the personal and domestic, The Ministry of Utmost Happiness embarks from the outset with a broader societal perspective.”
“Now, finally, the second novel has come out, and it is clear that her politics have been part of its gestation,” writes Joan Acocella in the New Yorker. ““The God of Small Things” was about one family, primarily in the nineteen-sixties, and though it included some terrible events, its sorrows were private, muffled, personal. By contrast, “The Ministry of the Utmost Happiness” is about India, the polity, during the past half century or so, and its griefs are national. This does not mean that Roy’s powers are stretched thin, or even that their character has changed. In the new book, as in the earlier one, what is so remarkable is her combinatory genius.”
Tarar is perhaps the most popular of contemporary fiction and travelogue writers in Urdu. He claims he has […]
Sequoia Capital China, and Perfect World co-led a new round of financing in Zongheng, a Chinese literature site […]
Well-known Indian poet and author Sudeep Sen has joined Kitaab’s Editorial Advisory Board. Sudeep Sen’s prize-winning books include Postmarked […]
On 8 November 2016, P N Balji had reviewed “Singapore, My Country: Biography of M Bala Subramanion” by Nilanjana Sengupta […]
Literary festivals of various hues have been creating a revolution of ideas across India in the last few years. However, most literary festivals take place in metro cities and resort towns. This is going to change with a new literary festival being launched in India by the people of the Seemanchal region of Bihar.
The Seemanchal International Literary Festival (SILF) is an international literary event organized by Kitaab International, Singapore, in collaboration with Insan School, Kishanganj, Bihar.The first edition of SILF is scheduled to be held on 17-18 November, 2016 at Insan School campus in Kishanganj to coincide with the golden jubilee celebration of the Insan School, one of the well-known educational institutions in the region.
SILF is the brainchild of Singapore-based journalist, writer, publisher, and founder of Kitaab, Zafar Anjum, who hails from Kishanganj.
