A province far removed from the national main stream of a poor country has its customs and daily life, however onerous and unrewarding. The births, maA province far removed from the national main stream of a poor country has its customs and daily life, however onerous and unrewarding. The births, marriages and deaths are celebrated and mourned by everyone around who gets the news, unlike in an urban area. The people interact to carry out businesses to make a living. They survive hunger but fear it all the time, even when they have enough to eat. But there are the ones, mostly children and old, who fall victim and die of hunger, even if their kins have enough to eat but are not kind enough to share it. The fear of failure of future crops always looms large in the minds of the people. This makes them full of rage and callous. They at times behave very unkindly to the people who are not their immediately family. It is all reported only occasionally in fiction, such as in this book, only when someone surviving it all writes it and publishes. It may be a great discipline and tenacity of a life time that one lives such a life and comes out with coherent stories about it. The newspapers often turn their back to these areas and are busy reporting petty political intrigues of the urban areas. They have their own interests in the politics of the day. People from these areas migrate to the areas in the country or outside it, where jobs are available, however menial, that pay in cash. For there are none in those villages. The vicissitudes continue when insurgency emerges as a consequence of it all. The story gets uglier when innocent people in this area suffer the violence and at times are killed, often falling by chance in the path of the ruthless force of politics of the day. These fascinating stories by Ammaraj joshi present a world so far unexplored even within the country. At a time when people live under the assumption that their country was great previously and used to export grain in its heyday, this book contradicts such a perception of the past as a delusion. When things get better people want to forget a past which was so ridden with various problems. They invent then the stories of the glories of the past which they want to believe besides the ones whom they tell these stories. This book but objectively reports the things people want to erase from their memories, collective or individual. Understanding history is a way to escape its comeuppance, for a person or a nation....more
The first book of Prawin has some fascinating stories which often end either in a death or a separation. The feeling of loss and longing makes the heaThe first book of Prawin has some fascinating stories which often end either in a death or a separation. The feeling of loss and longing makes the heart ache long after one has read a story. He maps the world from Nepal to the USA, to find his stories. The descriptions of a rural Nepali village or an American city has been done so well. The narrator in a story once has a relationship with an elderly woman who changes often her face through plastic surgery. More so when she gets a divorce or ends a relationship. Her body is much younger than her age through exercise though. The writer explores well her psychology, who has a face which changes its appearance many times in a day, and that of her young lover, who tries to recognise the one he knows. Once he ends up wrongly chasing his former lover in a street, who turned out to be some one else. It was about time he returned to his native country with all his confusion intact. The book has stories with similar themes where something seem to elude or delude one. One feels as if one has caught hold of something solid out of a story at times but soon it seem to leak away from his hand. And the effect is longing and pain. A wonderful debut book from a young writer....more
Maupassant's genius at short story writing is on display here. In about twenty five pages he portrays a complete world eclipsed by war and German occuMaupassant's genius at short story writing is on display here. In about twenty five pages he portrays a complete world eclipsed by war and German occupation of France, which is creeping deeper into the country by the day. The characters are universal, for their political, professional and other belongings. While fleeing towards away from the occupying forces, the circumstances bring out the best and the worst in them. The fascinating description of the early cold morning they leave and the events in the countryside, which the natives are deserting likewise, is all there in very few words. One's heart goes to Boule De suif, who, though a prostitute, has more honor than her companions. The spirit of resistance is lacking in all the rest: the businessmen, politicians and the rest, who have either shifted their business interests and money to England or in the deeper country side. For honor only a prostitute is fleeing. It is one of the greatest short stories of all times. The translator really has done well. Maupassant once again does so much in so few pages that you wonder the over descriptiveness of the prose written during his time was outdated, even in other languages. A great writer values the time of his readers. He was way ahead of his contemporaries at story telling. In a short life he achieved more than most of them, no wonder. For his writing also entertains to even a new reader. So it is universal....more
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