Lost and Found : Anita Desai’s Rosarita
This essay is not just about Desai’s latest offering, but an assessment of her works. She is someone whom Salman Rushdie calls, “a magnificent writer.”
Partition and the Vernacular
The refugee has always been the subject of jokes. This joke did the rounds during partition and even to this day in Bengal.
“It’s More Respectable to Work as a Maid!”: Partition, Miss Shefali, and Bhadralok Respectability
During the 1960s and ’70s, Miss Shefali (1947-2020), born Arati Das, was Calcutta’s leading cabaret performer. Originally from Narayanganj in eastern Bengal, she was only a few months old when her family relocated to India after Partition. However, their life in Calcutta was steeped in poverty. To ameliorate the circumstances of her family, she took up paid-employment while still a child—first, as a maid, and later, a dancer in a posh restaurant.
Book Review: No Return Address-Stories of Displacement and Alienation
In the preface to No Return Address: Partition and Stories of Displacement, Manjira Majumdar asks pertinent questions—Why was Bengal as a province divided several times by its rulers— was it to administer it better, divide its spoils among the British rulers, “or to break the spirit of a rebellious and creatively inclined community.”