This carefully selected collection of Vaikom Muhammad Basheer s short stories are characterised by a variety in theme and tone. He has enshrined in them every kind of experience from the pangs of hunger and sex to the rapture of mystic vision. Its range includes stark realistic pictures of the material world as well as the realm of fantasy haunted by ghosts and spirits. Basheer has written on love and hate, on politicians and pickpockets, on the fancies of childhood and on the disillusionments of adult life with an intense sense of the tragedy of life and at the same time an irrepressible sense of humour.

This Is The First Collection Of Translations In English Of Stories Originally Written In Malayalam By Kamala Das Under The Pen Name Madhavi Kutty. They Amply Demonstrate Kamala Das S Special Contribution To The Short Story In Malayalam. All The Major Attributes Of Her Writing Are Evident: Her Subtlety And Power In Dealing With Human Relationships And Intrigues Of Love, Life And Death And Her Earthiness, Sensuousness And Sensuality.

The rich and varied body of writing in the Indian languages has grown immeasurably in the last hundred years. This collection of short stories brings together some perennial favourites from this vast treasure trove, written by acknowledged masters of the art and sensitively translated. The twenty-three stories included deal with themes central to modern India: caste, gender politics and emerging changes in the traditional family structure. These are striking vignettes from all parts of the country, evocative of different lifestyles yet reflective of common issues and problems with which we can all identify.

The Train That Had Wings presents modern life in Kerala in terms of a shared but tragically compromised humanity. Mukundan dares to look beneath the routines and facades of everyday life in order to probe depth of sin, greed, and hypocrisy but also to rediscover what brings joy and hope. Sixteen short story translations and a critical introduction, offering examples of Mukundan's realistic, existentialist, psychedelic, and parabolic stories, show his range and talent for the very short story. If Hawthorne wrote “twice told tales,” Mukundan writes half-told tales, stories that jump in the middle, stomp around for just a minute, and leap away almost before the reader can settle in. Half-told, but a powerful and infectious half.

He Had Eventful Experiences In A Prison And An Asylum. He Travelled With Sufis And Sanyasis And Did Odd Jobs. At The End Of It, Basheer Has A Bagful Of Stories. Coming From The Man Who Alerted The Map Of Malayalam Fiction Five Decades Ago, This Volume Of Short Stories Is Bound To Be An Unforgettable Experience.