The Politics of Modern Indian Language Literature: Implicit and Symptomatic Readings

Dedication
Table of Contents
Acknowledgements
Introduction: Reading Modern Indian ‘Bhasha’ Literature
	Languages and Literature in Modern India
	Translations Into English
	The Literary Class and the Nation
	The Nation and Language
	Education, Language and the Production of Literature
	The Aims of the Book and Its Structure
	Notes
Section 1: The Nation and Its Ethnicities
	1 Literature for Performance: Girish Karnad: Three Historical Plays (1964–2019)
		Tughlaq (1964)
		Tale-Danda (1993)
		Crossing to Talikota (Rakshasa-Tangadi, 2019)
		Playwright as Thinker
		Notes
	2 Constructing a Syncretic History: Qurratulain Hyder’s River of Fire (1959)
		River of Fire (Aag Ka Darya, 1959)
		Modern India and Partition
		The Fortunes of a Coterie
		Notes
	3 The Meaning of Life: T Gopichand’s The Bungler: A Journey Through Life (1947)
		The Bungler: A Journey Through Life (Asamardhuni Jeevayatra, 1947)
		Contextualising the Novel’s Discourse
		Notes
	4 Failure and Middle-Class Life: Mohan Rakesh: Short Stories and a Play (1961–1973)
		The Short Stories
		Adhe Adhure (1969)
		The Trajectory of the Nehruvian Nation
		Notes
	5 Essentialising the Marginalised: Mahasweta Devi’s Chotti Munda and His Arrow (1980)
		Chotti Munda and His Arrow (Chotti Munda Ebong Tar Tir, 1980)
		A View From Above
		Notes
	6 The Private as Public: MK Binodini Devi’s The Princess and the Political Agent (1976)
		The Princess and the Political Agent (Boro Saheb Ongbi Sanatombi, 1976)
		Sanatombi’s Status and Manipur
		Notes
	7 The Polarisation of Social Experience: Akhtar Mohiuddin: A Novella and Short Stories (1960–)
		Enmeshed Life (Zuv Ti Zolaan)
			Short Stories
			The Depletion of Culture
		Notes
Section 2: Modernity and Its Effects
	8 Breaking Taboos: Suresh Joshi’s Short Stories (1957–)
		Ten Short Stories
		The Unacknowledged Self
		Notes
	9 Modernity and Interiority: UR Ananthamurthy’s Samskara (1965)
		Samskara (1965)
		Modernity as a Conceptual Category
		Notes
	10 Unstable Hybrid: Nirmal Verma’s A Rag Called Happiness (1979)
		A Rag Called Happiness (Chithda Sukh, 1979)
		The Unarticulated Self
		Notes
	11 Outward Profusion, Inward Silence: OV Vijayan’s The Legends of Khasak (1968)
		The Legends of Khasak (Khasakkinte Itihasam, 1968)
		Inward Retreat
		Notes
	12 Another Modernity: Paul Zacharia’s Bhaskara Pattelar and Other Stories (1983–)
		Bhaskara Pattelar and Other Stories
			Idiom and Milieu
		Notes
	13 Literary Modernism and the Community: Vilas Sarang’s Fair Tree of the Void: Short Stories (1974–1990)
		Fair Tree of the Void
			Cultural Gap
		Notes
	14 Living in the World: Vinod Kumar Shukla’s A Window Lived in the Wall (1997)
		A Window Lived in the Wall (Deewar Mein Ek Khirkee Rehti Thi, 1997)
		The Uses of Enchantment
		Notes
Section 3: Gender and the Position of Women
	15 Nation of Women: Amrita Pritam’s Pinjar (1950)
		Pinjar (1950)
		Humanism and the Dominant Ideology
		Notes
	16 Tradition, Privilege and Gender: Indira Goswami’s Short Stories (1986–)
		Relive Indira Goswami: The Rich Legacy of Her Stories
			Shackled By Privilege
		Notes
	17 ‘Eternal’ Womanhood: Shirshendu Mukhopadhyay’s The Aunt Who Wouldn’t Die (2017)
		The Aunt Who Wouldn’t Die (Goynar Baksho, 1992)
		Fulfilment Through Rebirth
		Notes
Section 4: The Experience of Caste
	18 Literature and Testimony: Bama’s Karukku (1992)
		Karukku (1992)
		Dalit Autobiographies: Literature Or Testimony
		Notes
	19 View From Under: Sharankumar Limbale’s The Dalit Brahmin and Other Stories (1984)
		The Dalit Brahmin and Other Stories
			The Stability of the System
		Notes
	20 The Nostalgia of the Small Farmer: Perumal Murugan’s One Part Woman (2010)
		One Part Woman (Madhurobhagan, 2010)
		Agriculture and Ideology
		Notes
	21 Lost Authority, Soft Power: Ashokamitran’s Short Stories (1961–1996)
		Still Bleeding From the Wound
			Modernity and Traditional Authority
		Notes
	22 The Myth of Varna: Vijay Tendulkar’s Ghasiram Kotwal (1972)
		Ghasiram Kotwal (1972)
		Ghasiram Kotwal and Modernism
		Notes
Section 5: Humanism and Authorial Discourse
	23 The Popular Writer and Literature: Vaikom Muhammad Basheer: Two Novellas (1947–1965)
		Voices (Shabdangal, 1947)
		Walls (Mathilukal, 1965)
		Popular Literature and Democracy
		Notes
	24 Humanism Without Politics: Gopinath Mohanty: Hidden Ganga and Other Stories (1950–)
		Hidden Ganga and Other Stories
			‘Family Discord’
		Notes
	25 A Tapestry Called Humanity: Jayant Kaikini’s Short Stories (1986–2006)
		No Presents Please: Mumbai Stories
			Sisyphean Universe
		Notes
Afterword: Patterns in Bhasha Writing
	The National, the Local and Conflict
	Modernity and Tradition
	The Shape of Literary Modernism
	Interiority and the Self
	Caste and Hierarchy
	Gender and Sexuality
	Conclusion
	Notes
Bibliography
Index