This volume maps the breadth and domain of genre literature in
India across seven languages (Tamil, Urdu, Bangla, Hindi, Odia,
Marathi and English) and nine genres for the first time. Over the
last few decades, detective/crime fiction and especially science
fiction/fantasy have slowly made their way into university
curricula and consideration by literary critics in India and the
West. However, there has been no substantial study of genre fiction
in the Indian languages, least of all from a comparative
perspective. This volume, with contributions from leading national
and international scholars, addresses this lacuna in critical
scholarship and provides an overview of diverse genre fictions.
Using methods from literary analysis, book history and Indian
aesthetic theories, the volume throws light on the variety of
contexts in which genre literature is read, activated and used,
from political debates surrounding national and regional identities
to caste and class conflicts. It shows that Indian genre fiction
(including pulp fiction, comics and graphic novels) transmutes
across languages, time periods, in translation and through
publication processes. While the book focuses on contemporary
postcolonial genre literature production, it also draws connections
to individual, centuries-long literary traditions of genre
literature in the Indian subcontinent. Further, it traces contested
hierarchies within these languages as well as current trends in
genre fiction criticism. Lucid and comprehensive, this book will be
of great interest to academics, students, practitioners, literary
critics and historians in the fields of postcolonialism, genre
studies, global genre fiction, media and popular culture, South
Asian literature, Indian literature, detective fiction, science
fiction, romance, crime fiction, horror, mythology, graphic novels,
comparative literature and South Asian studies. It will also appeal
to the informed general reader.
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