My review of Zia Haider Rahman’s “strange and brilliant” novel in the New York Times Book Review. An excerpt: Zafar’s narration shifts registers — “this fluctuation from crystal clarity of exposition to a barely restrained fury” — and folds into lengthy but fascinating digressions. Like the narrator of W. G. Sebald’s “The Rings of Saturn,”… Read more »
Posts By: Amitava Kumar
Patna Poems
I have written before about taking a train to my hometown Patna. This evening I translated two train poems, from Hindi, by the Patna poet Alokdhanwa for @TheTakeaway #ThisIsWhere. Junction Ah, Junction! Where trains stop for long Collecting water for the rest Of the journey I search there For my old fellow travelers… Read more »
Chronogram Profile
A piece on A Matter of Rats in the Hudson Valley magazine, Chronogram: A Matter of Rats was inspired by E. B. White’s 1949 essay Here Is New York, for which White traveled to Manhattan during a heat wave, staying at the Algonquin Hotel and going on daily foraging trips. Kumar followed his lead, visiting… Read more »
The Place of Place
Download the “Introduction” to A Matter of Rats, entitled “The Place of Place” and written specially for the US edition, here on Scribd. Each book, like a place on a map joined by roads and rivers to other places, is connected to other books. That is certainly true about this books about my hometown, Patna…. Read more »
Choosing My Epitaph
When the Indian edition of A Matter of Rats came out, I was asked during one of my interviews about the epitaph I would choose for myself: Q: What would you like your epitaph to read? AK: He failed often, but look – no one fails all the time. More