In his own hand...

A facsimile copy of the original notebook of Rabindranath Tagore in which he translated Gitanjali into English has been printed by Sahitya Samsad, Kolkata. This was one of two that he made between 1910 and 1912, and the one that he gave William Rothenstein. Which Rothenstein gave to Yeats, and which Yeats, in some sense, gave to the world...

The notebook, like the Gitanjali itself, is a slender volume, most of the writing being on one side of the page. Most of it was, for a non-Bengali like me, unfamiliar, both in translation, and in the original... But there was a special thrill in seeing the hand of Tagore, trying different words, scratching out entire phrases... seeing the beginnings of his distinctive style of writing and drawing on the same page...

And also to see the evolution of his own translation.

For instance, the famous lines,

WHERE the mind is without fear and the head is held high

Where knowledge is free

Where the world has not been broken up into fragments

By narrow domestic walls

Where words come out from the depth of truth

Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection

Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way

Into the dreary desert sand of dead habit

Where the mind is led forward by thee

Into ever-widening thought and action

Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.

appear in the notebook, before more editing, before more polishing as

WHERE the mind is without fear and the head is held high
Where knowledge is free
Where the world has not been frittered into fragments partitioned
By narrow domestic walls
Where words come out from the depth of truth
Where sleepless striving stretches its strenuous arms towards perfection
Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way
Into the dreary desert sand of dead habi, and
Where the mind is led forward by thee
Into everwidening thought and action
- there waken up my country into
that heaven of freedom, my Father!

(The differences are marked in red, and the italicised word above was scratched out).

A wonderful edition to have and to hold. New in our Poetry section, in hardcover, 192 pages, Rs 140. ISBN: 8179551830

Refreshingly different

Bilal is a young boy growing up in Kolkata, in poverty, and with parents who are blind. He is the subject of a remarkable documentary film by Sourav Sarangi, an independent filmmaker.

"Bilal can see but his parents cannot. He is only three years old and hardly understands what blindness is. Bilal also has a little brother, Hamza. And inside a tiny dark and dank room together they live in a curious game of seeing and not seeing. Neighbors and relatives surround them. The film tells this unusual story by observing the little boy over a year by capturing rare moments of sharing love, fun, cruelty and hope… the wonder world of Bilal."

The film is 88 minutes long, and in English (with subtitles), and in the year or so that it has been on the circuit, has attracted considerable attention and recognition. It showed at MOMA in New York, and won a slew of prizes, including the Golden Award Al Jazeera International Documentary Film Festival, 2009, Best Documentary (Horizons) DOK.FEST, Munich, Best Documentary We Care Film Festival, India, Best Documentary IDSFFK, India, Best Documentary ZIFF, Zanzibar, Silver Ace Las Vegas International Film Festival, Jury Special Award Festival Internacional del Cine Pobre de Humberto Solás, Cuba, and got the Silver Palm at the Mexico International Film Festival.

The latest addition to our list of documentaries distributed by Under Construction, the film is available in VCD and DVD format on this page.

Bilal in Arabic means refreshing. For a film like this, a very appropriate title.

The Jungle Books

The Bombay Natural History Society (BNHS) is a venerable institution. Through their various books and journals, they have done much to encourage enthusiasts and scholars to study Indian fauna. Started in 1883 by a group of eight members who met occasionally to exchange notes and "exhibit interesting specimens", the decision to "otherwise encourage one another" has borne spectacular fruit!

One of the main objectives of the BNHS is conservation, and in the "125 years of its existence, its commitment has been, and continues to be, the conservation of India's natural wealth, protection of the environment and sustainable use of natural resources for a balanced and healthy development for future generations. The Society's guiding principle has always been that conservation must be based on scientific research - a tradition exemplified by its late president, Dr. Sálim Ali."

They have a vibrant publication program, with a range of books that are both useful and important. Many of these are already listed on the Scholars websit, as for instance the Book of Indian Butterflies by Isaac Kehimkar, Salim Ali's Book of Indian Birds and so on...

Next month will see the launch of Living Jewels from the Indian Jungle by Ashok Kothari and Boman Chhapgar. The book of 204 pages includes 90 rare paintings and sketches of Indian flora and fauna and descriptions of India's wildlife heritage published during the early 19th century. This a compilation of articles on topics like tigers in Mumbai, in localities like Malabar Hill, Mahim, Byculla, Kurla and Mazgaon, lions near Delhi in Haryana and elephants in the forests of south Gujarat.

The Mumbai newspaper DNA had this to report:

Speaking about the book, Dr Kothari said, "This book is dedicated to the memory of the many beautiful animals of India like pink-headed duck that are now extinct. It is important that at least the remaining wildlife is preserved." In one of the articles, Valley of Deyra Doon, Captain Mundy describes the valley and the denizens of an unspoiled forest in 1822.

Among other articles and real life adventures are discovery of Amhertia Nobilis by N Wallich, article on glory lily by Lt Col Kanhoba Ranchhoddas Kirtikar, man-eating tigers of Nagpore, Vansda and Toongareshwer and wildlife around Mumbai. The book also talks about the traditional green culture of India wherein there are temples dedicated to deities like Tiger God. The pictorial book also reveals the pristine beauty of Bhor (Khandala) Ghat and Mount Abu 200 years ago. The prints are from Plantae Asiatic Rariores by Nathaniel Wallich (1786-1854), Illustrations of Botany by Forbes Royle (1799-1858), Illustrations of Himalayan Plants by J D Hooker (1817-1911), Illustrations of Indian Ornithology by T C Jerdon (1811-1872), Oriental Memoirs by James Forbes (1812-13), Scenery Costumes and Architecture on the Western Side of India by Captain Robert Melville Grindlay (1826), Oriental Field Sports by Thomas Williamson (1808), Curry and Rice by Captain George Atkinson and from old issues of BNHS journals.

The rare paintings and sketches, whose colours are still intact, are the work of nearly thirty artists including J P Irani, Gorachand, Vishnupersaud, Rungiah, Captain Grindlay, John Clark, J F Cathcart, J B Hogarth, James Forbes, Captain Mundy, William Griffith, William Kuhnert, William Westall and O F Tassart. The oldest painting is from Oriental Memoires and was painted in 1779.

Kothari and Chhapgar's earlier historical book of Natural History is Treasures of Indian Wildlife. "This book brings together articles, drawings, and paintings from valuable old books, journals, and gazetteers in the collection of the Bombay Natural History Society. The historical writings of wildlife and bird enthusiasts of the past paint a vivid picture of India's rich flora and fauna, in urgent need of protection today. Paintings, mostly of birds, and lithographs and sketches of animals and trees, scenery and monuments, many of which are recognized as classics of their type, are mainly the work of eminent European wildlife artists of the 19th and early 20th centuries. In a substantial section at the end of the book, gleanings from theh miscellaneous notes section of early issues of the Journal of the BNHS provide lively snippets of information on species as wide-ranging as red ants, mongoose, minitor lizard, python, cobra, cheetah, and darter. With the descriptive text and stunning visuals, this volume, like its predecessor Sálim Ali's India, will be a prized possession for anyone with an interest in India and its natural history."

In our Natural History section. In hardcover, 216 pages, Rs 1900. ISBN: 978019567728.

Inner Light

Varanasi's Indica Books occupy a niche- and do well by it. Specialists in books on Indology and on the city of Banaras, they have an eclectic backlist... And great production value, which comes to view when one sees the superb quality of their wonderful book of photographs by Richard Lannoy.

Benares seen from within (and as it happens, over decades) is "a rare combination of creative photography and cultural history put together by one man, this book both visually and textually is the most massive presentation of this extraordinary city ever attempted. It is the fruit of a lifelong interest in Benares from 1953 until the present day.

Lannoy's Benares is no tourist's idyll, nor yet is it an exercise in peddling a 'Third World' mythology of exotica garnished with grunge. Unflinching in his observations, yet enormously sensitive to his subject, Lannoy records the everyday life of Hinduism's most sacred city. And it is not through the formal acts of ritual, but through the most ordinary gestures of river-side and marketplace that the charged, heightened drama of life in Benares unfolds."

This major contribution to the study of urban culture was first published in 1999, and has now been issued in a more accessible format and a reduced price, its text substantially revised, as Benares: A world within a world. "Though now beset with all the characteristic urban ills of the age, Benares is arguably the oldest living city in the world to retain its original cosmic orientation. A center of learning since antiquity, its way of life has not essentially changed until the last few years.

Among other themes, Lannoy writes about the metaphysical substructure of the city, the ancient cults of the pillar and the sun-wheel, the Buddha, yoga, commerce and weaving, pilgrimage, and extends its survey up to the present, with Hindu-Muslim conflicts, the tension between religion and secularism, and a lively account of the great woman-saint Anandamayi Ma. Illustrated with many photographs by the author."

Another view of the eternal city. From the inside, from the outside...

In various sections on our site, Urban Studies, Art, and so on.
Benares, the view from within, in hardcover, 640 pages, Rs 3500, ISBN: 1902716000
Benares, a world within a world, in paperback, 420 pages, Rs 375, ISBN: 8186569251

A passion for history

Upinder Singh teaches in the History department at Delhi University. Her History of Ancient and Early Medieval India, brought out last year in hardcover, and this year in paperback, by Pearson is comprehensive...

Her wide range of research interests and expertise include the analysis of ancient and early medieval inscriptions; social and economic history; religious institutions and patronage; history of archaeology; and modern history of ancient monuments. Her several published books include Kings, Brahmanas, and Temples in Orissa: An Epigraphic Study (AD 300–1147) (1994); Ancient Delhi (1999; 2nd edn., 2006); a book for children, Mysteries of the Past: Archaeological Sites in India (2002); The Discovery of Ancient India: Early Archaeologists and the Beginnings of Archaeology (2004); and Delhi: Ancient History (edited, 2006).

A History of Ancient and Early Medieval India is the most comprehensive textbook yet for undergraduate and postgraduate students. It introduces students to original sources such as ancient texts, artefacts, inscriptions and coins, illustrating how historians construct history on their basis. Its clear and balanced explanation of concepts and historical debates enables students to independently evaluate evidence, arguments and theories. This remarkable textbook allows the reader to visualize and understand the rich and varied remains of India’s ancient past, transforming the process of discovering that past into an exciting experience.

A heavy tome, the 704 page book is available in hardcover, ISBN: 9788131711200 at Rs 3500, and in softcover, ISBN: 9788131716779 at Rs 499.

Giving them the finger....

Literally, that is. Apropos the recent hubub about celebrities and former Presidents being subject to questioning and frisking at airports, this new title from Tara Books, Chennai caught my eye.

"When designer and artist Andrea Anastasio visited the United States some years ago, he was fingerprinted (like everyone else) by the airport immigration authorities. This moment — both banal and ominous — stayed with him until it worked its way into his art.

The result is Fingerprint, a visual fable that celebrates resistance to state surveillance and control. The artist’s fingerprints, screen printed onto the pages of the book, create progressively complex patterns and sequences, transporting the fingerprint from the world of forensics and law into the freeing world of art and imagination.

An accompanying essay by historian and political activist V Geetha points to those suggestive instances when people across cultures and nations have resisted fingerprinting, asserting their right to existence while fighting all attempts to foreclose their identities.

This book is a fable for our times. Each copy is an original letterpressed handmade edition."

A work of art as well. Find it in our General Books category, 104 pages, hardcover, Rs 950. ISBN: 9788190675628

There comes a time

in each generation, when it becomes necessary for scientists to redefine their fields: abstracting, simplifying, and distilling the previous standard topics to make room for new advances and methods.

These lines are taken in part from the blurb of Jim Sethna's superb Statistical Mechanics: Entropy, Order parameters, and Complexity, an OUP title that has recently been reprinted by Ane Books, New Delhi.

I guess there also comes a time to try to get the best of what is available in the world market and bring it to places where it is difficult to come by... Ane are a publishing house of relatively recent origin, and are doing the scientific community in India a tremendous service by reprinting some excellent titles that were originals with OUP, CUP, Springer, and so on... A partial listing of what they offer in Physics and Nanoscience. More can be viewed on their website, and ordered there or from us.

• Foot : Atomic Physics. 695.00
• Mould : Basic Relativity. Rs. 695.00
• Greiner : Classical Mechanics. Rs. 695.00
• Greiner : Classical Mechanics Point Particles and Relativity. Rs. 895.00
• Chung : Composite Materials: Science & App. Rs. 895.00
• Blundell : Concepts in Thermal Physics. Rs. 795.00
• Smith : Environmental Physics. Rs. 595.00
• Greiner : Field Quantization. Rs 995.00
• Greiner : Gauge Theory of Weak Interactions. Rs. 995.00
• Cheng : Gauge Theory of Elementary Particle Physics. Rs. 595.00
• Cheng : Gauge Theory of Elementary Particle Physics : Problems & Solutions. Rs. 595.00
• Broker : Modern Classical Optics. Rs. 695.00
• Sapoval : Physics of Semiconductor. Rs. 695.00
• Perkings : Particle Astrophysics. Rs. 695.00
• Newnham : Properties of Materials. Rs. 695.00
• Rogalski : Quantum Physics. Rs. 495.00
• Greiner : Quantum Mechanics: An Introduction, 4th Ed. Rs. 395.00
• Greiner Quantum Mechanics : Special Chapters. Rs. 995.00
• Pilkuhn : Relativistic Quantum Mechanics, 2nd Ed. Rs. 695.00
• Greiner : Relatistic Quantum Mechanics : Wave Equations, 3rd Ed. Rs. 695.00
• Rogalaski : Solid State Physics. Rs. 595.00
• Chonavel : Statistical Signal Processing. Rs. 595.00
• Annett : Superconductivity, Superfluids an Condensates. Rs. 595.00
• Dove : Structure & Dynamics An atomic view of Materials. Rs. 795.00
• Krauth Statistical Mechanics : Algorithms & Computations. Rs. 795.00
• Sethna : Statistical Mechanics. Rs. 595.00
• Hummel : Understanding Materials Science, 2nd Ed. Rs. 895.00
• Gardner: From Instrumentation to Nanotechnology. Rs. 2500.00
• Fujita Micromachines as tools for Nanotechnology. Rs. 595.00
• Goser Nanoelectronics & Nanosystems. Rs. 695.00
• Fahrner : Nanotechnology & Nanoelectronics. Rs. 695.00
• Hughes : Nanoelectrmechanics in Engineering and Biology. Rs. 695.00
• Hsu : Nanotribology. Rs. 895.00
• Shchukin : Nanostructures. Rs. 995.00
• Deleru : Nanostructures : Theory & Modelling. Rs. 695.00

Discounting Gods

Meera Nanda, philosopher of science with initial training in biology is a visiting fellow (2009-10) at the Jawaharlal Institute of Advance Studies, JNU. Author of the books Prophets Facing Backward: Postmodernism, Science and Hindu Nationalism (Permanent Black) and Postmodernism and Religious Fundamentalism: A Scientific Rebuttal to Hindu Science (Navayana), Breaking the Spell of Dharma and other essays: A Case for Indian Enlightenment and The Wrongs of the Religious Right: Reflections on Science, Secularism and Hindutva (Three Essays Collective) her new title from Random House is The God Market: How Globalization is making India Hindu.

Some facts are startling. That we have more places of worship than educational institutions or health services is obvious once one thinks of it- its so much easier to build (and staff!) a temple than a school or hospital, but given the fact that India is a secular republic, is this really OK? And some others:

"Educated Indians in small towns are becoming more religious than less educated villagers. Half the total number tourist trips in a single year are for religious pilgrimages. State governments are selling land to temple trusts at throwaway prices, and corporate houses are setting up institutions for ‘value-based’ education?

The secular Indian state is constitutionally bound to have no official religion. However, India is not free from politicized religiosity which expresses itself in a growing sense of Hindu majoritarianism. The rising tide of popular Hinduism is directly linked with India embracing the gospel of free markets.

Middle-class Indians are becoming more actively religious as they are becoming prosperous. The last decade has seen the proliferation of powerful new god-men, a massive rise in temple rituals, the creation of new gods, and the increased demand for priests. The state is enabling the Hinduization with the help of the private sector. From actively promoting religious tourism, to handing over higher education to the private sector, some of whom use religious trusts to run the institutions that impart ‘value-based’ education, to giving away land at highly subsidized rates to gurus and god-men, many of the privatization measures of the government are linked with the promotion of Hinduism.

In this hard-hitting and controversial book, Meera Nanda uncovers the nexus between the state, temple and corporate India to reveal the ugly truth behind India’s leap into globalization and poses the question:

What room does this India that dreams saffron-tinged superpower dreams have for non-Hindu minorities? What happens to the India that Muslims, Christians, non-believers and other non-Hindus also call home as the country begins to see itself as India@superpower.OM? Can the country deliver on the promise of secularism without cultivating a secular culture in a secular polity?"

In our Religion and Politics sections, hardcover, 320 pages, Rs 395. ISBN: 9788184000955

Timely Advice

Some books capture the moment... and Daya Publisher's latest, Swine Flu: Diagnosis and Treatment by Sameer Prakash does just that.

A relatively new disease, this book is all about H1N1 and what it can and cannot do to humans- swine influenza virus (SIV) is an strain of the influenza family of viruses that is usually hosted by pigs. As of 2009, the known SIV strains are the influenza C virus and the subtypes of the influenza A virus, known as H1N1, H1N2, H3N1, H3N2, and H2N3.

While the deathless prose that announces the book asserts that "this work is a meticulous effort, in a comprehensive, exhaustive and authentic manner. It’s an asset for all scholars, researchers and medico professionals," what may be its strongest point is that it brings together in one place the important features of the disease and its treatment. Which, of course, is better than the breathless excitement of 24 x 7 television news channels, even if that is not saying very much.

The book provides some background to flu epidemics, from the 1918 disaster to the Hong Kong Flu in 1968, the 1976 panic in the US (where I too took a flu shot) and so on...It gives the details of what Influenza, the disease, is all about. The types of flu, which animals can get it, give it, and so on.. And how it can be treated, and when to panic and when to not. The book should be very useful, especially to our schools and colleges, and should be compulsory reading for our health professionals.

In our Public Health section, in hardcover, x+338pages, Rs 950. ISBN: 9788176222051

Muhammad Ali

Ever controversial, Muhammad Ali Jinnah of Pakistan has not always been dealt with kindly by historians and biographers. Complex, brilliant and ambitious, Jinnah remains, in many ways, a conundrum, understood least by those who have deified him as well as those that seek to vilify him.

Stanley Wolpert's biography Jinnah of Pakistan is "an important contribution to the study of one of the most significant episodes of modern history-the partition of India. Scholarly, insightful, understanding and brilliant. Scholarship and the art of portrayal merge so masterfully in the work that Jinnah's personality becomes truly alive. Wolpert's biography of Jinnah is excellently written...comprehensive in its sweep. The first scholarly biography of one of the most important political figures of the modern world. Beautifully written, insightful, and dispassionate, it brings to life this complex, brilliant, and ambitious leader. Wolpert's well-researched biography...will... revive the debate... on the measure of Jinnah's foresight."

Ainslee Embree, commenting on the book, says it is “an important contribution to the study of one of the most significant episodes of modern history, the partition of India. Jinnah’s role has been consistently distorted both in scholarly work and in the popular media as most recently in the Gandhi film…. Wolpert has suceeded in showing Jinnah as a rationalist of great intelligence and political ability, who was driven to become the spokesman for the partition of India by tides of Indian Nationalism….” And Norman Palmer: “A magnificent biography… We should be grateful to Stanley Wolpert for a book that combines meticulous research and scholarship with a lively and interesting style. He is one of the rare species: a scholar who can – and will -– write well.”

In our Biography section, in paperback, 419 pages, Rs 345, ISBN: 9780195678598

And now comes the Jaswant Singh book, Jinnah: India-Partition Independence. Heavy, at 674 pages, Rupa claim that Singh "doesn't uphold any sacred cows as he attempts to shatter the great many myths surrounding partition in both India and Pakistan." An unfortunate metaphor, given that Singh has been expelled from the Bharatiya Janata Party, champion of sacred cows and other sacred cows. Another partition seems to be in the offing within the BJP, between the voices of reason, if any, that would let the book be judged on its merits, if any, and the shrill tones that have expelled a man, who for all his shortcomings, demonstrated fealty in the face of reason.

Also in our Biography section, Rs. 695, In hardcover, 674 pages, ISBN: 9788129113788

Buddha at the bus stop

Navayana's latest book is Anne Monius' Imagining a place for Buddhism: Literary Culture and Religious Community in Tamil-Speaking South India. An Indian edition of the 2001 OUP monograph, this has a wonderful cover, of a statue of the Buddha at the Paravai bus stop, Perambalur, Tamilnadu. That Buddhism, metaphorically, missed the bus here as almost everywhere in India is only too obvious, but the importance of the Buddhist thought and philosophy all over India, including the south, has been recognised for long.

In this study, Monius, Professor of South Asian Religions at Harvard Divinity School focuses on two extant Buddhist Tamil texts – Maṇimēkalai (a sixth-century poetic narrative) and Vīracōliyam (an eleventh-century treatise on grammar and poetics) to shed light on the role of literature and literary culture in the formation, articulation and evolution of Tamil Buddhist religious identity and community.

"Non-Hindu communities such as Buddhists, Jains and Ājīvakas played such an important role in South Indian literary and religious culture, and in the administration of the state, between the fourth and seventh centuries that the later Saiva traditions labeled this period the Kalabhra interregnum—the interruption of the wicked ones. Despite their presence in Tamil inscriptional, archaeological and literary record, their significance has been undermined in historical narratives that have valorised the triumph of Tamil Śaivism, casting Buddhists and Jains as ‘foreigners’ to be spurned, ridiculed and dismissed as anti-Tamil. "

A review of the book that appeared in The Journal of Religion draws attention to this important and pioneering work. Anne Monius has produced a learned and detailed book on the insufficiently studied subject of Buddhism in South India, which greatly enriches our knowledge of the religious life of the early medieval Tamil-speaking region. . . . Monius’s lucidly written book greatly broadens our understanding of early Tamil Buddhist identity formation and evolution. It is a very welcome and creative addition to Tamil scholarship that sets a high standard for future work in the field and deserves to be widely read.

In our History and Religion sections, Rs 350, ISBN: 9788189059194

In respect of labour

Sabyasachi Bhattacharya has had several points of distinction in his long career in the Center for Historical Studies at the JNU. A leading historian of labour economics he also served as Vice Chancellor of Vishwa Bharati in Santiniketan, and now, post retirement, is Chairman of the Indian Council of Historical Research.

Marcel van der Linden, Research Director at the International Institute of Social History, Amsterdam, and Prabhu Mohapatra, Associate Professor of History at the University of Delhi volume, have edited the volume Labour matters towards global histories: Studies in honour of Sabyasachi Bhattacharya, Tulika New Delhi's latest offering.

The book "brings together a set of essays that highlight some of the major transformations in the field of labour history today.

The present juncture is one in which the geographical boundaries of the discipline, which were narrowly configured around the nation-state, are being challenged; and the analytical category of labour, for long identified with the industrial, unionized and male worker, has been stretched to include hitherto marginalized, informal workers. The shift away from Eurocentric comparisons in recent years has meant a questioning of the spatial, temporal and relational binaries that were dominant in the writing of labour history earlier. By focusing on sites, forms and relations of labour that habitually cut across the classical divides of labour history, the essays explore connections between events and processes across time and space. They demonstrate that global history is not just history at a global scale, but a macro-view of historical processes of importance to human societies and their systematic analyses at all scales. Global history, the contributions in this volume show, can be solidly based on micro-historical studies, if these studies connect with the larger areas of inquiry."

In our Economics and History sections. In hardcover, xxii+338 pages, Rs. 695. ISBN: 9788189487508

Monsoon? Festival

Red Earth, the wildly inventive group based in Delhi (remember their great calendar for the year?) are having a Monsoon Festival this year. One has to admire their fortitude, and the ability to ignore the weather...

However, the theme for their poster exhibition this year is Climate Change, capital C's. And this translates as Jalvayu Parivartan Par or जलवायु परिवर्तन पर।

There will be an exhibition of these art posters at the Max Mueller Bhawan (3 Kasturba Gandhi Marg, New Delhi) from 16-23 August 2009, 1.30 pm to 7.30 pm (Open from 1.30 pm to 5.30 pm only on 17-18 August) .

The show is curated by Himanshu Verma and the artists whose posters will show are

1. Atul Bhalla
2. Ektaa Aggarwal
3. Green Goose Design
4. Gunjan Gupta
5. Julius Macwan
6. Kapil Sharma
7. Nikki Duggal
8. Nishant Shukla
9. Parikhit Pal
10. Pranay Lal
11. Ravi Agarwal
12. Vibha Galhotra
13. Vivek
    

Dark, but comely

A new Leftword title THE DARKER NATIONS: A Biography of the Short-Lived Third World, has earned the author Vijay Prashad who teaches at Trinity College, Connecticut, the 2009 Muzaffar Ahmad Prize.

The Third World was not a place, argues Vijay Prashad. It was a project. "This book is a paradigm-shifting history of both a utopian concept and global movement—the idea of the Third World. The Darker Nations traces the intellectual origins and the political history of the attempt to knit together the world’s impoverished countries in opposition to the United States and Soviet spheres of influence in the decades following World War II, as nation after nation across Asia, Africa and South America gained political independence from colonial rule.

Traversing continents, Vijay Prashad’s fascinating narrative takes us from the birth of postcolonial nations after World War II to the downfall and corruption of nationalist regimes. A breakthrough book of cutting-edge scholarship, it includes vivid portraits of Third World giants like Jawaharlal Nehru, Egypt’s Nasser, and Indonesia’s Sukarno—as well as scores of extraordinary but now-forgotten intellectuals, artists, and freedom fighters.

The Darker Nations restores to memory the vibrant though flawed idea of the Third World, whose demise, Prashad ultimately argues, has produced a much impoverished international political arena.

Reviewers have been lavish in their praise. Tariq Ali: "At a time when the politicians and ideologues of the Washington Consensus appeal to former colonies to free themselves from history Vijay Prashad stubbornly carries on, recalling a past without which it is impossible to understand the present."

Badri Raina, in Frontline says The book alerts us to the intimate details of both the aspirations that set the Third World idea going and the cupidities that brought it to ground. EPW "This is a comprehensive, informative and rewarding book to read, and documents a critical part of our international politics and culture which is much misinterpreted nowadays." And The Hindu: "Based on prodigious research, this ambitious and wide-ranging book presents a fascinating account of the Third World, its rise and fall. Prashad’s study represents issue-based international history at its best. He weaves together the tale of Third World politics with stories about personalities, problems of revolution and social change, ideological tensions and people’s aspirations.”

In our Politics and History sections, in Paperback, 384 pages, Rs 350. ISBN: 9788187496670

Memories of Barragán

The latest addition to our Art and Architecture section is a Seagull Title, Space for Engagement, by Himanshu Burte, a Goa based architect who has written extensively on architecture and urban issues. His current research interests include contemporary Indian architecture and public space, sustainable technology, and the design of theatre spaces.

The cover reminded me of work of the Mexican architect, Luis Barragán. The resemblance may be specious, but it gave me a chance to go back and refresh my memories of this great master of minimalism. What pleasure!

Himanshu's book is about public spaces: "Why do we feel engaged with some places and not with others? How can architecture foster an engagement between people and public places? Spurred by questions like these, this book focuses on contemporary Indian cultural institutions, or artplaces, as a special kind of public place. Offering a critique of contemporary architectural and institutional approaches to ‘place-making’, this volume proposes an alternative approach to thinking about architecture centred on our experience of inhabiting spaces. Such a habitational approach is crucial if architecture (and, by extension, urban design) is to help nurture a larger engagement between people and their social environment."

In Hardcover, 336 pages, 135 b/w photographs, 22 b/w illus. and line drawings. Rs 950. ISBN: 9788170462781

377 and all that

Arvind Narrain and Marcus Eldridge have put together a primer, The Right that Dares to Speak its Name on the recent Naz Foundation decision that has been so much in the news...

This contains a schematic guide, explaining the case of Naz Foundation versus the Union of India. It then goes on to discuss the The Law, The Parties, The Bench, The Rationale, Conclusion, Basis of Ruling and the Territorial Applicability of the judgment. It then examines the background and finally contains a few commentaries that came out after the judgment,

• On Freedom's avenue, Gautam Bhan
• Reforming Macaulay, Kajal Bharadwaj
• India: From 'perversion' to right to life with dignity, Kalpana Kannabiran
• Who’s afraid of Homosexuality, Ram Jethmalani
• Striving for magic in the city of words, Lawrence Liang and Siddarth Narrain
• Its about all of us, Pratap Bhanu Mehta
• Good for all minorities, Tarunabh Khaitan
• Navigating the Noteworthy and the Nebulous in Naz Foundation, Vikram Raghavan
• Keeping Religion out of the Gay debate, Siddharth Bhatia

The Primer is 140 pages. A softcopy can be downloaded free of charge at the Alternative Law Forum website. Printed copies are priced at Rs 50 each and can be got from the ALF, or of course, from us.

Interpreting the present

Dipankar Gupta, my erstwhile colleague at the JNU, is one of the country's most visible scholars. His many books have done much to educate us all on what is happening around us. As one of India's foremost thinkers on social and economic issues, in his latest book The Caged Phoenix: Can India Fly? "he takes a critical—and controversial—look at the limits of the Indian success story, knocking down ivory towers and challenging comfortable assumptions in the process.

Through a fine blend of theory and new empirical evidence," Gupta argues "that despite the promises of Independence and liberalization India continues to remain caged in backwardness. Why does the phenomenal growth story not translate into development? Why is the much vaunted human-resource capital not taking India towards excellence? How can deprivation and prosperity live so easily side by side?

Questioning traditional thought, Dipankar Gupta critically examines:

• how the elite is reluctant to acknowledge that structural impediments, and not cultural factors, deny growth benefits to the majority of one billion plus Indians.
• how the wealth of a few is intimately tied to the poverty of many.
• the close link between growth in high technological sectors of the Indian economy on the one side, and sweat shops and rural stagnation on the other.
• how affluence came to the developed West only when general standards arose across all social classes.

Combining scholarship with an easy, engaging style, Dipankar Gupta enters uncharted territories to question why, despite so much talent, human resource and an open society, India is still waiting to fly."

In our Sociology and Essays sections, in hardcover, 336 pages. Rs 550. ISBN: 9780670082728

The sounds of silence

We don't see them at every major intersection of every big city in India. We don't see them working in our homes, in our friends homes, we don't see them sifting though the garbage, or begging at railway stations, we don't see them everywhere. And we really don't see them in the schools...

These invisible children form the subject of the book The Weight of Silence by Shelley Searle, a freelance writer based in Austin, Texas. She writes "Amidst the growing prosperity of India, there is an entire generation of parentless children growing up. They are everywhere. They fill the streets, the railway stations, the shanty villages. Some scrounge through trash for newspapers, rags or anything they can sell at traffic intersections. Others, often as young as two or three years old, beg. Many are homeless, overflowing orphanages and other institutional homes to live on the streets where they are extremely vulnerable to being trafficked into child labor if they’re lucky, brothels if they’re not. They are invisible children; their plight goes virtually unnoticed, their voices silenced."

While the book is not published in India, we stil thought some of you might like to learn about it. Its easily available, including from the author's website. In the year of Slumdog Millionaire, true stories may prove to be more valuable than easy fiction.

So where are the women??

The appalling statistics of male:female ratios in most Indian states is a matter of considerable public debate and concern. Today-Raksha Bandhan- there is a particularly poignant story in the papers, of a village in Rajasthan where the 10 girls will tie rakhis on the wrists of all the young men, some 250 of them, since none of the boys have sisters. Surviving, at any rate... With these numbers, it is perhaps just as well that Article 377 has recently been quashed!

At the same time, the overall invisibility of women is another matter of concern. Invisible Women, Visible Histories: Gender, Society and Polity in North India (VII to XII Century AD) by Devika Rangachari is a recent publication from Manohar that examines history from a gendered viewpoint, studying "the early medieval period in north India through a study of prominent - but representative - regional kingdoms located in Kashmir, Kanauj and across Bengal and Bihar. The book shows that the role and status of women differed considerably according to their regional contexts. The picture, therefore, is not a unifies one, thereby stressing the fact that sweeping statements on women cannot be made to apply to early medieval north India as a whole. The pivotal importance of gender in any historical reconstructions of the early medieval period in north India is thereby underscored."

Rawat Jaipur, one of the major publishers in the social sciences, have a number of books that examine such questions. For instance Bhaswati Das and Vimal Khawas (Eds.) volume, Gender issues in Development: Concerns for the 21st century. "Gender issues are wide and spread over the entire gamut of development. Over the decades it appeared to be the most intriguing for development plans. The present book, which is an outcome of a national seminar, held under the auspices of Council for Social Development, New Delhi, is an attempt to look into the gender issues involved in different development activities. The contributors are drawn from different social science backgrounds such as economics, sociology, demography, geography and anthropology. This is done purposely to have perspectives of all these disciplines in one single book."

Sangeeta Bharadwaj-Badal, in her Gender, Social Structure and Empowerment: Status Report of Women in India asks the all important question, " Is the persistence of female-male gaps in human development in India indicative of the low status assigned to women in that cultural setting? Are the various gender ideologies rooted in the different kinship structures leading to a subordinate status of women in India? Does economic development interact with kinship patterns to produce spatial variations in gender relations in India? Do these structural processes affect women's status differently in different parts of India? In other words, does place play a role in the constitution of gender differences in India? The book focuses on the mutual interdependence of gender relations, development levels, and social stratification without underestimating the full significance of each in Indian society.

The earlier narrow focus that considered status as a unitary construct and sought a universal explanation of the low status of women has been replaced in this work by a multidimensional view that argues for conceptualizing status broadly in terms of its economic, social and political dimensions. The contrasting performance of specific states/districts on each dimension clearly indicates that the dynamic and variable nature of women's status cannot be captured by any one dimension. It is observed that women's status is affected by kinship structures, development levels and social stratification, which vary over space and time individually and in interaction with each other. It is this variation that leads to differences in women's position from one region of India to another."

The Sage list on Gender issues is as diverse and as interesting. Prem Chowdhury's edited Gender discrimination in land ownership "analyzes the different degrees of discrimination meted out to women by the country’s inheritance laws and the corresponding customary practices in tribal societies. It also exposes the current socio-legal structure in the country, which systematically denies women the accessibility to and ownership of productive resources.

This book is eleventh in the series ‘Land Reforms in India’, initiated by the Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy of Administration, Mussoorie. The volume contains 14 well-researched chapters through which distinguished scholars look into the discrimination faced by women in various states of India. Highlighting the fact that different regions subject women to varied forms of discrimination, these chapters reveal that these emanate from various customs and practices, Shastric prescriptions and the Muslim personal laws (Shariat) which were crystallized during the British regime and further consolidated in the post-colonial period through various union, state and concurrent laws."

And finally, Living the Body: Embodiment, Womanhood and Identity in Contemporary India by Meenakshi Thapan which "explores the development of a sociology of embodiment in the context of women’s lives in contemporary, urban India. Through a critical analysis of gender and class, the author unravels the complexities that are intrinsic to the multi-layered and fluid construction of woman’s identity in relation to embodiment. Living the Body: Embodiment, Womanhood and Identity in Contemporary India is the first book that unfolds an understanding of women’s experience of embodiment by a careful analysis of the facts gathered from an Indian metropolis. The author brings out numerous voices representing multiple subjectivities through interviews of working class slum women, professional upper class women, adolescent young women in secondary schools and in a slum, and the visual and textual representation of women in a women’s magazine in English."

In our Gender Studies section.

Invisible Women, Visible Histories, Rs 1295, hardcover, 532 pages, ISBN: 9788173048081
Gender issues in Development, Rs 750, hardcover, 328 pages, ISBN: 9788131601914
Gender, Social Structure & Empowerment Rs 625, hardcover 232 pages, ISBN: 9788131602393
Gender discrimination in land ownership Rs 795, hardcover 352 pages, ISBN:9788178299426
Living the Body Rs 550, Hardcover 220 pages, ISBN: 9788178299013

A formidable oeuvre

In the past two decades, Lakshmi Holmström has established herself as one of the principal translators from Tamil (தமிழ்) to English. With clockwork regularity and efficiency, she brings novel after poem, short story after essay, classic after novel to a new life in English- a life that earns new readers, and casts a new light on the original work as well.

Her work is well represented on the Scholars site. Her anthology of short stories by Indian women, The Inner Courtyard was republished by Rupa in 2002 (Virago, 1990). Her most recent work (co-edited with K Srilata & Subashree Krishnaswamy) is The Rapids of a Great River: The Penguin Book of Tamil Poetry which "begins with selections from the earliest known Tamil poetry dating from the second century CE. The writings of the Sangam period laid the foundation for the Tamil poetic tradition, and they continue to underlie and inform the works of Tamil poets even today. The first part of this anthology traverses the Sangam and bhakti periods and closes with pre-modern poems from the nineteenth century.

The second part, a compilation of modern and contemporary poetry, opens with the work of the revolutionary poet Subramania Bharati. Breaking free from prescriptions, the new voices—which include Sri Lankan Tamils, women and dalits, among others—address the contemporary reader; the poems, underscored by a sharp rhetorical edge, grapple with the complexities of the modern political and social world. The selection is wide-ranging and the translations admirably echo the music, pace and resonance of the poems. This anthology links the old with the new, cementing the continuity of a richly textured tradition. There is something in the collection for every reader and each will make his or her own connections—at times startling, at other times familiar."

Holmström easily straddles centuries. In 1996 she did a rendering in English of the Tamil epics Silappadikaram the story of Kovalan and Kannagi and of how Kannagi avenges the wrong done to her husband and Manimekalai, a sequel to Silappadikaram, being the story of Kovalan’s daughter’s renunciation. There are strong spiritual undertones in the story that give an insight into the religious influence of those times.

But it is her translations of contemporary Tamil literature that are invaluable, bringing spectacular writers like Bama, Salma, Asokamitran and Ambai to a wider readership. Her translation of Bama's autobiography, Karukku, won the Crossword award, but more importantly, as K Srilata says in a review published in The Hindu, "Holmstrom's contribution as a translator is not merely to the field of Great Literature. In this case, the process of translation is a specifically political one and involves opening up to English-educated readers an entirely different sensibility, a startlingly honest reality."

She also translated Bama's novel Sangati, and her other colleague, Subhashree Krishnaswamy says in her review, also in The Hindu, "We can only thank Lakshmi Holmström for taking on the audacious task of rendering in English such a difficult book."

Her booklist is long. For OUP, she translated Ambai's In the Forest, a deer. With Katha, Holmström brought out translations of Asokamitran's Water, as well as a host of other works. And most recent is her translation of Salma's The Hour past midnight from Zubaan.


Find all these titles and others, mostly in our Indian Literature in Translation section...

Après moi...

The economists Jayati Ghosh and C P Chandrasekhar, colleagues at the Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, have done much to educate the lay public about economics policies and their consequences through their regular columns in newspapers and magazines.

This month Tulika, New Delhi brings out their book on the recent global financial crisis. Titled After Crisis: Adjustment, Recovery and Fragility in East Asia, the volume brings together a number of articles written in 2007, but which, with remarkable prescience, "remain extraordinarily relevant to the present times, not least because they anticipate the processes that led to the global financial meltdown in 2008. Many of them predict the severe impact the current global crisis is having on both financial variables and the real economy, in developing countries in particular.

The global financial crisis that exploded around September 2008 was just one more in a series of crises that have affected more than sixty countries in the era of financial liberalization. Of course the latest crisis is particularly significant in a number of ways: it originated in the core of capitalism, in the United States; it has spread dramatically across the world, even to countries that earlier seemed to be relatively secure; it calls into question many of the mainstream economic dogmas that have dominated economic policy-making for more than two decades. Yet, in some other ways, the current crisis is not very different from those that have preceded it in the recent past.

July 2007 marked the completion of a decade since the onset of financial crisis in several East and Southeast Asian countries. The crisis of 1997 focused attention on the dangers associated with a world dominated by fluid finance. It brought home the fact that financial liberalization can result in crises even in so-called ‘miracle economies’. Prior to the crisis, the pace and pattern of growth in many countries in that region were challenging the dominance of the original capitalist powers over the global economy. The 1997 crisis set back that process, and even after a decade many of these countries have not been able to recover their pre-crisis dynamism.

In hindsight, it is clear that currency and financial crises have devastating effects on the real economy. The ensuing liquidity crunch and wave of bankruptcies result in severe deflation, with attendant consequences for employment and the standard of living. The adoption, post-crisis, of conventional IMF stabilization strategies tends to worsen the situation: governments continue to adopt very restrictive macroeconomic policies and restrain public expenditure even in crucial social sectors. Finally, asset-price deflation and devaluation pave the way for foreign capital inflows that finance a transfer of ownership of assets from domestic to foreign investors, thereby enabling a conquest by international capital of important domestic assets and resources.

This book delineates the alternative trajectories of post-crisis development in different economies, the lessons they offer and the implications they have for alternative policies. It is important to take stock of these processes because it is becoming evident that the international financial system has still not evolved effective ways of preventing such crises among emerging economies and of reducing their damaging effects.

This book therefore has a wider focus than the East Asian ‘crisis economies’ alone: it tries to situate post-crisis developments in a broader analysis of the recent political economy of international capitalism, in particular, the role of mobile finance. It also offers comparative perspectives on post-crisis restructuring in other developing countries that have experienced crisis; as well as on the experience of other Asian countries that were affected by, but did not experience the financial crisis."

There are lessons in it for us all. Policy makers too.

In our Economics section, hardcover, 316 pages, Rs 650. ISBN: 9788189487584

Innovative science teaching

Some time ago Nature Medicine, a premier science journal carried an article about Jodo Gyan, an unusual organization in Shakarpur, that makes a variety of educational material for children. Jodo Gyan is an organization of professionals and social activists who have come together to find workable solutions to the problems in the classroom practices. They take a fresh look at the problems and draw upon cutting edge research to solve them and "are a social enterprise motivated by the need to find sustainable and broadly applicable solutions to make education meaningful for every child in our country." Their website, http://www.jodogyan.org says

"Jodo Gyan is an effort to participate in the process of development of the country. Since 1998 we have worked closely with students, teachers, teacher-educators and parents, particularly in mathematics and science education, to introduce innovative methods through which children will understand and enjoy what they are being taught. ....

We have set up Maths Labs in many schools and designed Science Discovery Rooms. Presently we are engaged in a programme called Design and Development of Innovative Curriculum for Primary Mathematics in four progressive schools in NCR. This involves curriculum designing, module making, modeling classroom transactions, assessment and evaluation.

We are a non funded, not-for-profit social enterprise. We intend to carry forward our work by establishing linkages with all organizations and individuals concerned with providing quality education to our children to enable them to embark on the path of inquiry-based learning."

They have wonderful kits for carrying out experiments- inexpensive and imaginative- and for doing mathematics. An ideal set, either for keeping your children occupied during the summer, or for sharing with friends, and the School. It would be great if groups of parents could get together and see that their children's classes (and this is mainly targeted to the primary sections) could get these kits. The price list can be seen on the Jodo Gyan website- here.

The article that made us aware of JG is also available online. It is entitled Science on a shoestring "Microscopes made from bamboo bring biology into focus", by Paroma Basu. As the picture on the right shows, it is the imagination to use everyday material in a very useful device that makes it possible to integrate science into everyday life in a meaningful way. At Rs 175 for a microscope, every class should have one, as should every child...

JG's details: Jodo Gyan Educational Services, E - 12 & 13, Shakurpur, Delhi –110034

http://www.jodogyan.org/home
Ph: 27102820, 27100104, 9312385974, 9873084472
Email jodogyandel@jodogyan.org

Time after time

Thomas Trautmann, professor of History at the University of Michigan has a new book, The Clash of Chronologies. In the past few years, Trautmann has written extensively on a number of issues of current as well as historical importance, some of which, Aryans and British India, and Languages and nations: the Dravidian proof in colonial Madras have also been published in India.

"The Clash of Chronologies shows the crucial value of the ancient period of Indian history for understanding India’s deep history. In this valuable volume, Thomas Trautmann makes this connection with great acuity through a series of studies, on topics ranging from the contrasting theories of time and history in India and Europe, persistent codes of kinship and marriage between north and south India, the conjuncture of ancient Indian and European traditions of language analysis in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, legacies of European scholars of India’s deep history such as Sir William Jones and A L Basham, and structures of the ancient Indian state. At a time when ancient history is being dismissed by some as a projection of colonial rule or hyper-magnified by others as the charter of the modern state, this book finds a middle way that restores the true weight and value of ancient history, namely as an essential component of the long view, a way of finding our place and a tool for making a future."

From Yoda Press, New Delhi. In our History and Anthropology sections, paperback, 352 pages, Rs 395. ISBN: 9788190618656