Books
BOOK REVIEW: POETRY AND NONFICTION / Poetry for our times and a poet’s new frontier
Inevitably, Kaiser Haq’s The New Frontier and Other Odds and Ends in Verse and Prose is about the poet, his poetic predilections, and situatedness at this time of human existence. In many ways it is typical of the verse we have come to expect from our leading poet in English for a long time now, but in other ways it articulates his present-day concerns in new and striking poetic measures.
BOOK REVIEW: FICTION / The saga of a mother’s sacrifice and resilience
Anisul Hoque’s Kokhono Amar Maa-ke is the story of appalling sacrifices made by a mother and her unwavering determination to secure a bright future for her children.
Alice Munro, Canadian Nobel Prize-winning author, dies at 92
Nobel Prize-winning Canadian writer Alice Munro, whose exquisitely crafted tales of the loves, ambitions and travails of small-town women in her native land made her a globally acclaimed master of the short story, has died at the age of 92, her publisher said on Tuesday
INTERVIEW / A perfect cup of literary ‘saa’
Priyanka Taslim greets me with a gentle smile as we meet over Zoom. She is eloquent and our conversation flows organically, akin to an adda over a cup of saa (cha).
BOOK REVIEW: FICTION / Should this lost novel have been found?
Articles on Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s last novel to be published by his sons against the author’s wishes built up my anticipation and I couldn’t wait for April to arrive. Thanks to Bookworm, I got my copy the moment they had it in store and I read it twice. It didn’t impress me the first time as it was just a string of chapters describing how a promiscuous woman drove herself into the arms of different men on her annual August 16 visits to a Caribbean island.
BOOK REVIEW: NONFICTION / A peripatetic poet’s pleasing musings
The title of this book suggests that it is based in Bengal but it really meanders deftly across time and space, more often than not in “mazy motion”.
BOOK REVIEW: FICTION / A mesmerising journey of life’s twists and turn
The Covenant of Water by physician and author Abraham Verghese tells the story of three generations of an Orthodox Saint Thomas Christian family in Kerala. Through suffering and loss, triumphs and victories, the importance of familial ties is examined and supported. In the Kerala of the 1940s, blood ties were sacred, but “family” also meant helpers who worked for you. Members of the three-generational family seem to be under a curse which causes its members to drown in water. The mystical power of water in our lives is explored with precision and sensitivity in the novel.
REFLECTIONS / The first American months
The sun was up. The sky was a perfect cerulean blue, the neighbourhood blissfully quiet. Through my window, I relished the sunny first day of 2020, with a cup of tea in my hand.
Tucked between moving trains and elegiac dead-ends
Some among us might have wondered what it feels like to hold a lit bomb between our palms. One that will go off inevitably yet its spark, heat, force, weight, and pulsating nature are so fascinating that we are unable to put it down or look away, all the while knowing at the end of the wick we too will be destroyed—a chosen death, a voluntary annihilation.
Rehman Sobhan’s recollections of the road he took towards December 16, 1971
The title of the first of Professor Rehman Sobhan’s two-part memoir suggests that it is about his “years of fulfilment”; the subject matter of its sequel therefore would be about the “untranquil” years that followed.
Aimless in Morisaki bookshop
My introduction to the Bangla translation of Japanese books happened during my visit to Baatighar Chittagong. It was there that I encountered the Bangla translations of works by one of my favourite Japanese writers, Haruki Murakami, back in 2021. Then last year, I found myself enchanted with the promise of Morisaki Boighorer Dinguli (Abosar Prokashona, 2023); the allure of the black edition of the book boasting ebony pages and stunning artwork had me yearning for the book months before its scheduled release.
Sad girl lit and trivialising women’s writing
When I read the title of Charlotte Stroud’s article “The curse of the cool girl novelist” and the accompanying description of said type of novelist, I had a solid image of what she was referring to. Stroud describes “cool girl novelists” as “depressed and alienated”, “incurably downcast”, and “terminally sad”. It had similarities with “sad girl” literature, a supposedly new genre captivating readers and publishers alike.
Jhumpa Lahiri’s Italian renovations
Jhumpa Lahiri has always been the rare author whose prowess in the art of the short-story far surpassed her novelistic talents.
Ludic space for Tagore’s fictive children
An interesting concern in contemporary children’s literature criticism is the discussion of power. Do the fictive children in children’s books, conceived and delivered by the adult author, have the ability to exercise their will and possess a voice?
Love, loss, and hope in Tehran
Overnight, the saffron summer afternoons and evenings of dreamy stargazing tumble into a tale of grief, guilt, and pain.
A multidimensional look at the impacts of Islamophobia around the world
This book is an incredibly informative and well-researched introductory book for understanding the construction of Islamophobia in the West and its impacts on Muslims across the globe.
