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Bengali pride
BENGALIS, PERHAPS the greatest food lovers in India, have developed a distinct cuisine by meticulously selecting certain local ingredients like rice, fish, meat, fruits, vegetables and a variety of spices. The agricultural year and the changing season almost always governed life in Bengal, besides the food that Bengalis eat, their rituals and festivals.
In this book, the author traces the months of the Bengali year, from the long, hot days of spring and summer through the joy of the first rains of the monsoon followed by the terror of ruinous floods on to the golden harvest of autumn and finally to the cool winter. Intimate and evocative, the work is a rich narrative full of anecdotes, folklore and imagery from Bengali literature, besides of course, a collection of time-tested recipes.
Life & Food in Bengal
Chitrita Banerji
Penguin; Rs. 295
Nation and narration
THE BOOK is a powerful challenge to the obsession with Otherness that is a trademark of colonial studies. Where other scholars tend to observe a strict separation between works by Western and non-Western writers and between ruling and subject races, the author reconstructs a narrative in which English and Indian idioms play with and against, each other. By studying a wide range of materials, from the writings of Burke to the travel logs of nineteenth century women such as Fanny Parkes and Harriet Tytler to the fiction of Kipling, Forster, Naipaul and Rushdie, the author deftly reveals the complicity that always operates in colonial literature.
The Rhetoric of English India
Sara Suleri
Penguin; Rs. 295
Love story
WRITTEN FROM within the skin of India, the novel is quite unlike any other, with a power and weight of feeling one almost never encounters in contemporary literature. It celebrates the manic spirit of a country in time of great change and also offers in searing lucid prose, a deeply sensual and moving meditation on the nature of desire, history, truth and art. It is the story of a young couple, penniless but gloriously in love. They buy an abandoned cottage and this house is a symbol of their love till things fall apart. The novel captures the polyphonic voices of India with an empathy and authenticity rarely achieved before.
The Alchemy of Desire
Tarun J. Tejpal
Harper Collins; Rs. 500
In times of siege
THIS IS the story of Rukmini who is married to the District Collector of a small town in Assam and teaches English Literature in the local college. On the surface her life is settled and safe living in the big beautiful bungalow, seemingly untouched by the toil and suffering outside. Yet each time there is an incident in the district, the fear and uncertainty that grips the town is reflected in her own life. The violent insurgency that grips Assam runs like a dark river through the novel and forms its backdrop.
The Collector's Wife
Mitra Phukan
Zubaan/Penguin; Rs. 295
A.A. Husain & Co
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