Author: Harishankar Parsai
Publisher: Manas
Year: 1994
Language: English
Pages: 198
ISBN/UPC (if available): 8185938261
Description
First collection in English of some of the numerous stories by the doyen of Hindi satirists who has boldly exposed and denounced all that is corrupt and venomous in the Indian body politic.
Post-independence Hindi witnessed an explosion of satirical writing. 'Para Ninda Sukha' or schadenfreude being the staple in any beleaguered society, satire flourished in Hindi as never before. Writers like Shrilal Shukla, Sharad Joshi, Manohar Shyam Joshi, Mudra Rakshas, Gopal Chaturvedi, Sudhish Pachauri, Prem Janamejaya and Latif Ghonghi -- led by Harishankar Parsai -- helped Hindi satire attain its full stature as a valid literary genre.
It is perhaps the first anthology from a major Hindi satirist in English, and its validity lies in the apt selections and enjoyable translations. His sharp pen relentlessly targets the heartlessness of our caste-ridden society, the vagaries of bureaucracy, the baseness of our politicians and all the vulgarities that go unnoticed in our daily lives.
By turns gently critical, mordantly humorous and downright funny, Parsai's writing is a telling comment on the condition of man.
TRANSLATOR: C M Naim was educated at Lucknow University and the University of California, Berkeley. He has taught Urdu language and literature at the University of Chicago and co-founded Journal of South Asian Literature. His translations of modern Urdu short stories and poems have appeared in many journals and anthologies in India and the United States.