Grandmother's Tale - Softcover

Narayan, R. K.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0880016248 ISBN 13: 9780880016247

Publisher: PerfectBound, 1999

Synopsis

For the new generation of readers about to discover India's R.K. Narayan, there could be no better introduction to his delightful writing than The Grandmother's Tale, a collection of new and selected stories celebrating a body of work that spans five decades. Standing supreme amidst this rich assortment of stories is the new title novella, brimming with Narayan's characteristic blend of masterful tragicomedy and revelatory domestic detail. As told by the narrator's grandmother, it recounts the adventures of her mother, married at ten and abandoned soon after, who spends the next twenty years tracking her runaway husband across the subcontinent to extract him from the hands of his new wife and life. Her immense courage and implacable will are the stuff of legend - but once her mission is completed, her independence vanishes. Other characters that leap from these pages include a storyteller whose magical source of tales dries up; a naive and love-stricken husband who, his astrologers say, must sleep with a prostitute in order to save his dying wife; a pampered child who discovers that his beloved uncle may be an imposter or even a murderer. Gentle irony, wryly drawn characters, and themes at once Indian and universal mark these humane stories, which firmly establish Narayan as a peer of V.S. Pritchett, Richard Yates, and William Trevor.

About this title

From the Back Cover:

'In the title story of this collection of marvellous stories, the narrator, a novelist, sits at the elbow of his grandmother as she tells of how her mother, betrothed at seven years old, had to pursue her runaway "husband" halfway across the subcontinent.In "Guru", a corrupt, grasping official gets his comeuppance, not so much because he is crooked but because he fails to honour a financial pledge made to his daughters-in-law.In "Salt and Sawdust", when a young woman embarks on a career as a novelist the characters are again made to tread the commercial fault lines between cordiality and aloofness ... From such nerve endings are the making of humour, sadness, wisdom and joy' Observer

'Narayan, the creator of the imaginary small town of Malgudi, is undoubtedly the most brilliant exponent of the fiction, as well as the friction, of intimacy ... Anthony Burgess has compared him to Chekhov.One might also compare him with those other masters of small worlds, John McGahern and Isaac Singer.That there is argument over his literary allegiances is proof of the universality of his intelligent charm' Sunday Times

'A storyteller of a high order ... It is as wise as it is funny' Daily Telegraph

'Irresistibly readable' The Herald

About this edition

• Publisher: PerfectBound
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 0880016248
• ISBN 13: 9780880016247
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 324