Salman Rushdie and VS Naipaul in some mysterious way, have turned into mirror images of each other, writes Namita Bhandare. HT Image In the Eighties, Indians regarded the emergence of Salman Rushdie with a special sort of pride. Admittedly, he hadn’t lived in India for a long time. His parents had migrated to Pakistan and he was sent off to school at Rugby. The young Salman had gone on to Cambridge, to advertising, to one poorly received science fiction parable (Grimus) which sank, and then, suddenly, to the Booker Prize success of Midnight’s Children. Even though he held a British passport,…

Though the Jaipur Heritage Fest brought leading writers together, many were dissatisfied with the proceedings. HT Image Salman Rushdie is busy signing autographs on scraps of paper. Suketu Mehta is less than thrilled with the hygiene standards in his hotel and Jerry Pinto is busy exhorting people to read his Helen: The Life and Times of an H Bomb. Outside, basking in the afternoon sun is Delhi‘s A-list culturati — Bim Bissell, Shireen Paul, and Lady Plaxy Arthur. Literary agent David Godwin, whose clients include Arundhati Roy and Kiran Desai, is there too, adding to the firmament of stars at the…

Economic power brings literary power & there is a big boom in Indian non-fiction & fiction, reports Namita Bhandare. HT Image India everywhere was the theme at the World Economic Forum in Davos last year. It has now found a resonance in the literary world — as was evident at the ongoing second Jaipur Literature Festival. “Economically, India is flabbergasting,” says Marc Parent, editor of Buchet Chastel, which will publish French translations of Sadat Hasan Manto’s short stories and a collection of essays by Mahatma Gandhi to commemorate 60 years of Indian independence. Parent last year published French translations of…

The fatwa for The Satanic Verses has failed to silence writer, Salman Rushdie. HT Image The fatwa for The Satanic Verses has failed to silence writer Salman Rushdie. He has unequivocally condemned the Indian army’s role in Kashmir. “You cannot escape the fact that the army has behaved absolutely dreadfully,” he said. Insurgency, he said, began in 1989, but the army’s atrocities in Kashmir had begun well before that. Rushdie, in India for the Jaipur Literature Festival, spoke at length about Shalimar the Clown, his 2005 release set against the backdrop of Kashmir. He argued the army could not escape…

Insurgency, he says, began in 1989, but the army?s atrocities in Kashmir had begun well before that, reports Namita Bhandare. HT Image The fatwa for The Satanic Verses has failed to silence writer Salman Rushdie. He has unequivocally condemned the Indian army’s role in Kashmir. “You cannot escape the fact that the army has behaved absolutely dreadfully,” he said. Insurgency, he said, began in 1989, but the army’s atrocities in Kashmir had begun well before that. Rushdie, in India for the Jaipur Literature Festival, spoke at length about Shalimar the Clown, his 2005 release set against the backdrop of Kashmir. He argued the…

Rushdie wishes Shetty to come home with the prize, writes Namita Bhandare. HT Image The fatwa against him for The Satanic Verses has neither silenced him nor made him bitter, said author Salman Rushdie. “If you’re going to censor yourself, you should shut up and never speak again in public,” he said.  Rushdie who is in India for the Jaipur Literature Festival spoke at length in a standing-room-only hall about his latest book, Shalimar the Clown, which is set against the backdrop of Kashmir. “I needed to get out of the city, not just as a setting but as a sensibility,” he said.  He was…

Authors as Tarun Tejpal and Pankaj Mishra are there too, adding to the firmament of stars at the Festival, reports Namita Bhandare. HT Image Salman Rushdie is busy signing autographs on scraps of paper. Suketu Mehta is less than thrilled with the hygiene standards in his hotel and Jerry Pinto is busy exhorting people to read his Helen: The Life and Times of an H Bomb.  Outside, basking in the afternoon sun is Delhi’s A-list culturati — Bim Bissell, Shireen Paul, and Lady Plaxy Arthur. Literary agent David Godwin whose clients include Arundhati Roy and Kiran Desai and editor Marc Parent whose…

An interaction with NDTV’s Barkha Dutt had a varied audience get-together at Diggi Palace, the festival venue, reports Namita Bhandare. HT Image It took a while for Kiran Desai to get the mike going. Part of the problem was technical. The other, she is simply too soft-spoken.  “It’s like I’m kissing the mike,” she protested when asked to hold the mike closer to her mouth. “This is too close for comfort.”  The winner of the Man Booker prize for The Inheritance of Loss is clearly the star of the ongoing three-day Jaipur Literature Festival. An interaction with NDTV’s Barkha Dutt had an audience…

Africa is all about adventure, even when you are stuck in slush waiting for the rescue jeep, writes Namita Bhandare. HT Image I have an uncanny feeling that I’ve been caught slap bang in a B-grade Hollywood film. This is Out of Africa II, or should the title be Stuck in Africa? Consider the scene. I am waiting, bags on tarmac on the tiny airstrip in Masai Mara waiting for the Safarilink aeroplane that will fly us back to Nairobi. We’ve managed to arrive in time to catch our 11 am flight, despite having to push our jeep through slush…

MTV?s irreverent humour and Kandagaon?s traditional iron craft come together in an exhibition that takes contemporary art to the edge of desire, Namita Bhandare. HT Image MTV makes its debut at the National Gallery of Modern Art. A sweeping exhibition that captures a decade-long perspective on ‘contemporary visual practices’ in India runs the gamut from desi cool to folk traditions. Through 80 exhibits, including photographs, videos, installations and paintings by 34 artists and two collectives, Edge of Desire: Recent Art in India comes to the NGMA after having travelled to Australia, the United States and Mexico. In India, it marks the launch…

As the art season gets going in the city, gallery owners begin scouting around for new locations, reports Namita Bhandare. HT Image Less than 12 hours after its wine and cheese opening of artist Aditya Basak’s exhibition, the walls at Anant Art Gallery in Defence Colony had been stripped bare, the paintings sent into storage. The culprit? The ongoing sealing drive. “We persuaded the landlord to allow the preview but took the paintings down the next morning,” said gallery owner Mamta Singhania. The art boom in the city has seen a mushrooming of art galleries—an estimated 100 with a vast…

Despite the harsh terrain, the Rann of Kutch is a stretch of spectacular beauty, writes Namita Bhandare. HT Image I am connected to Kutch in a strange and roundabout way. I grew up in a rented apartment in Bombay in a building owned by Pragmalji Madansinhji, the former maharaja of Kutch. The building, on busy Napean Sea Road was called Symphony; though it was anything but symphonic. Every time the double decker BEST 122 rumbled down the street, the building would shake, rattle and roll. But the landlord was a nice enough man given to maharaja-style eccentricities: every evening his numerous…