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Fiction. Asian & Asian American Studies. Mythology & Folklore. Supernatural love affairs abound in this book of six short mythological tales from the northeastern Indian state of Mizoram. There's one between a weretigress and a human hunter, another between a man and a phungpuinu (a very ugly sort of goblin), and one in which the king of the Lasi, or hidden folk, takes the beautiful human girl Chawngtinleri to be his bride. The book also includes a retelling of the Mizo creation myth: from the Thimzing (or Great Darkness) to the legendary Feast of Thlanrawkpa, and the war between the beasts of the air and the beasts of the land.
In these phenomenal essays, 14 scholars take stock of the effects and response to identity, and culture studies within Mizo literary narratives. The essays address issues that contextualize the development of subaltern and postcolonial studies and the quest for identity within the Mizo perspective. This book offers a multidisciplinary perspective, with insights from history, memory studies, cultural studies and attempt to locate and situate dynamics that are related to orality, history and narrative. Linking the concern with identity to popular literature, individualism, and the need to draw borderlines, the essays identify the most important topics in individual and collective identities in the Mizo. The illuminating essays contextualize developments within Mizo intellectual history, and display aspects that relate to the continuing force in the ongoing study of the relationship between literature, ethnography, and ethnic and cultural studies. From orality, colonial, and postcolonial parameters, the book analyzes the ways in which colonial struggles have continued to contribute to postcolonial discourse in the Mizo, by producing fundamental ideas about the relationship between non-western and western cultures.
An old Mizo proverb holds that a woman’s wisdom takes her only as far as the village stream. Such proverbs and beliefs have weighed heavily on the journeys of Mizo women such that even today, more than a century after the introduction of the written alphabet in Mizoram, there are barely any narratives by women in the existing body of published texts. Women’s limited access to speaking out in the time or orality sadly did not transform into opportunities to write and publish. And yet, when the editors of this volume—perhaps the first ever such anthology in the state—set out to search for writings by women, they were delighted and surprised to find a wealth of stories, narratives, personal accounts, poems, art and more. These now grace the pages of this remarkable first-of-its-kind book.
An illustrated guide to the folktales and real-life stories of the ghosts, monsters and demons of India, a culture famously rich in tradition and legends. Perfect for fans of Eli Roth's Urban Legends and Guillermo Del Toro's Cabinet of Curiosities. "I was not prepared for how deeply this book captivated me ... Ghosts, Monsters, and Demons of India is exemplary of what a book can be, how it can operate. It’s a bridge across space, time, and language" —Robin Sloan, author of Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore An encyclopedia of evil entities and folkloric fiends from across India, from Ladakh to Kerala, Lakshadweep to Nagaland, Naraka to Tuchenkwaka, complete with 60 spooky illustrations. Inside this book you will find ... Killer robots built with stolen Roman engineering technology that once guarded the relics of the Buddha The ghost of a 21-year-old motorcyclist whose Enfield Bullet is venerated at a highway temple in Rajasthan A Himalayan drum-playing spirit-teacher whose wife is a fearsome Yeti Diabolical entities conjured into existence by the simultaneous deaths of seven tigers Triple-rooted night-flying Vedic necromancers Call-centre employees from beyond the grave The dreaded Ngalei Ahmaw of Maraland, whose victims’ heads detach themselves from their bodies at night and go wandering in search of blood ... AND MORE
This book contains a gallery of jealous husbands and conniving goddesses, pious sparrows and randy mice, jewel-crazy girl ghosts and angry star demons, as well as a chapter of "naughty & dirty" folktales!
Surpanakha, Ravan's famous sister. Ugly and untamed, brutal and brazen-this is often how she is commonly perceived. One whose nose was sliced off by an angry Lakshman and the one who started a war. But was she really just a perpetrator of war? Or was she a victim? Was she 'Lanka's princess'? Or was she the reason behind its destruction? Surpanakha, which means the woman 'as hard as nails', was born as Meenakshi-the one with beautiful, fish-shaped eyes. She is often the most misunderstood character in the Ramayana. Growing up in the shadows of her brothers, who were destined to win wars, fame and prestige, she, instead, charted out a path filled with misery and revenge. Accused of manipulating events between Ram and Ravan, which culminated into a bloody war and annihilation of her family, Kavita Kané's Lanka's Princess makes us see the familiar events unfold from the eyes of a woman more hated than hateful...
Fiction. South Asia Studies. Selected and translated from the Tamil by Pritham Chakravarthy. Edited by Rakesh Khanna. The follow-up to 2008's successful first collection featuring stories by Indra Soundar Rajan, Medhavi, Jeyaraj, Pushpa Thangadorai, Rajesh Kumar, Indumathi, M.K.Narayanan, and Resakee. A young woman's fascination with blue films leads to a bizarre murder! A bloodline of debauched maharajas falls prey to an evil curse! A beautiful girl uses karate to retrieve a stolen idol! Seven thrilling tales from seven Indian and Singaporean masters of action, suspense, and horror!
Fiction. African & African American Studies. Translated from the Hausa by Aliyu Kamal. Beginning in the late 1980s, northern Nigeria saw a boom in popular fiction written in the Hausa language. Known as littattafan soyyaya ("love literature"), the books are often inspired by Hindi films, which have been hugely popular among Hausa speakers for decades and are primarily written by women. They have sparked a craze among young adult readers as well as a backlash from government censors and book-burning conservatives. SIN IS A PUPPY THAT FOLLOWS YOU HOME is an Islamic soap opera complete with polygamous households, virtuous women, scheming harlots, and black magic. "Utterly addictive... The main character's plight was so abysmal and her husband was such a lowdown a$ $, I was sure that by the end of the story, he'd get his and I wanted to be there to see it... Would I read more by this author? Heck yeah!" --Nnedi Okarafor "Blaft refers to Sin is a Puppy as a kind of "Islamic soap opera", and that isn't far off the mark. Balarama Ramat Yakubu's slim, fast-paced novel centres on Rabi, the long-suffering wife of one adulterous and wayward Alhaji Abdu. Rabi and Alhaji Abdu's elder daughter, Saudatu, of marriageable age and excellent, virtuous disposition, is a central character in a secondary story line that converges with the main. Although one does not want to give away the plot, suffice it to say that the trajectory of the novel's narrative will be familiar to those who have watched Hindi romance films, just with a twist... Blaft's foray into Nigerian popular literature is an intriguing, exciting project" --Subashini Navaratnam "Let us get the multiple meta-textual reasons for celebrating this book out of the way; it is a Hausa (Muslim, Black, Nigerian, African) woman writing for her peers, made accessible to us by desi publishers who find a glossary to be redundant. Kudos all round! But what did I actually think about the story of a woman (temporarily) leaving her abusive husband while her daughter finds a suitable boy (or rather, twice married man)? Dear reader, I was rather charmed by it... It is not heartwarming in the treacly manner of popular films, but instead, like the family histories your aunties tell you, full of compromises and small justices, and the "life goes on" approach to domestic tragedy. This is not a story of exotic Africa, nor of epochal moments in histories of colonialism and its aftermath, nor yet about the fetishized tensions of being Muslim. Instead, it is shopkeepers falling in love with women stopping to buy dress material, and mothers vacillating between the street being unsafe and being a good place to meet eligible men, and bored wives eyeing comely electricians summoned to fix the wiring. Let other books talk about purdah and polygamy; this is a book that concerns itself with soap" -- Deepa Dharmadhikari
An entrepreneurial Indian con artist gets wrapped up in a criminal caper in this satirical look at modern-day India. The first kidnapping wasn’t my fault. The others—those were definitely me. Meet Ramesh Kumar, “examinations consultant,” who makes a lucrative living taking tests for the sons of India’s elite. He is just a cog in the wheel that keeps the middle classes thriving, until he takes India’s national university entrance exam for a lackluster student and inadvertently comes in first. Ramesh sees an opportunity—perhaps even an obligation—to cash in on the newfound celebrity of this client Rudi, who’s soon juggling stardom and his new job as the host of a quiz show. The young man’s meteoric rise brings material wealth and romantic intrigue, until they’re both kidnapped and held for ransom. But the way out of their predicament will lead Ramesh and Rudi through a maze of crimes both large and small, their dizzying journey revealing a modern India in all its complexity, squalor, and beauty. Praise for How to Kidnap the Rich “A monstrously funny and unpredictable wild ride.” —Kevin Kwan, New York Times–bestselling author of the Crazy Rich Asians trilogy “Brimming with rat-a-tat wit, breezy prose, and a keen observation of colorism, casteism, and social inequity. Unputdownable!” —Alka Joshi, New York Times–bestselling author of The Henna Artist “Raina’s debut novel lives up to its billing as a fun caper and social satire thanks to strong characterization, a fast-paced plot, and an eye for the ridiculous. His delicious skewering of the social mores of Delhi’s über-rich and clear-eyed rendering of India’s social hierarchy propel sheer entertainment into striking elucidation in the mode of Aravind Adiga.” —Booklist (starred review)
Bombay was the city everyone came to in the early decades of the nineteenth century: among them, the Goans and the Mangaloreans. Looking for safe harbour, livelihood, and a new place to call home. Communities congregated around churches and markets, sharing lord and land with the native East Indians. The young among them were nudged on to the path of marriage, procreation and godliness, though noble intentions were often ambushed by errant love and plain and simple lust. As in the story of Annette and Benji (and Joe) or Michael and Merlyn (and Ellena). Lovers and haters, friends and family, married men and determined singles, churchgoers and abstainers, Bombay Balchão is a tangled tale of ordinary lives - of a woman who loses her husband to a dockyard explosion and turns to bootlegging, a teen romance that drowns like a paper boat, a social misfit rescued by his addiction to crosswords, a wife who tries to exorcise the spirit of her dead mother-in-law from her husband, a rebellious young woman who spurns true love for the abandonment of dance. Ordinary, except when seen through their own eyes.