From Booker-winner Jhabvala (Shards of Memory, 1995, etc.) comes
fourteen compressed stories (five published previously), mostly set
in New Delhi or New York, in which themes of rivalry, family
discord, and loyalty at odds with convention are explored with
consummate grace and skill. For the six tales from India, the
ministerial level of civil service in the generations living after
Indian independence (1947) offers a frequent point of departure: In
one story ("Independence"), a woman lends her expertise to
arranging proper social functions for less sophisticated members of
the new Indian ruling class, thereby rousing the scorn of her
drunken poet husband, and finds a sweet but fitful solace in the
arms of a general being groomed as Minister of Defense; in another,
a college boy, expected by his mother to follow in the footsteps of
her illustrious family, falters when his girlfriend's father,
prominent in government, is forced from office in a bribery scandal
("A New Delhi Romance"). As for the seven New York pieces, a
curious picture of life on the Upper East Side emerges as sex looms
large to skew normal relations: A young wife watches as her husband
pursues various men from their beach house, then has to put up with
her mother falling head over heels for one of his conquests ("A
Summer by the Sea"). Elsewhere, a daughter's preference for
carpentry and the willowy clerk in a cheese shop is not what her
frosty, chauffeur-driven mama had in mind ("Broken Promises"). The
gem here, though, is set in London, where an emigre writer's
struggle to balance a need for both his wife and his mistress is
observed by his young granddaughter ("Two Muses"). Each piece of
Jhabvala's worldly mosaic offers precise, subtle views of people
who are trying to make the best of their lives: their essential
humanity remains compelling - even if their circumstances sometimes
seem too much alike. (Kirkus Reviews)
Hailed as one of the best books of 1998 by the Los Angeles Times,
this group of twelve short stories was written over the past twenty
years. From the steamy streets of New Delhi to New Yorks tony Upper
East Side, Jhabvalas characters grapple with the universal
quandaries of the human experiencejealousy, passion, temptation,
and deceptiontruths of life and love that follow no matter where we
wander. This collection features new short fiction from Ruth Prawer
Jhabvala, Booker Prizewinning author of Heat and Dust and Academy
Awardwinning screenwriter of Howards End and A Room With a View .
Written over the past twenty years, these engrossing stories are
domestic tapestries, threaded with the emotional lives and complex
psychologies of intense lovers, quarreling married couples, weary
elders, and their restless adult children. Whether languishing
inside their shuttered New Delhi homes or hosting dinner parties in
the overfurnished apartments of their Manhattan high-rises,
Jhabvalas characters grapple with the universal quandaries of the
human experience--jealousy, passion, temptation, deception--and
truths of life and love that follow no matter where we wander.
Written over twenty years and featuring settings that range from
the crowded bazaars of India to New Yorks Upper East Side, this
magnificent collection brings together fourteen new stories by a
writer of unparalleled grace, insight, and emotional power. Ruth
Prawer Jhabvala, well-known for her Merchant-Ivory screenplays and
her Booker Prize-winning novel Heat and Dust, claims unique
territory in her short fiction, occupying the cusp between two
worlds, India and the West. She expertly mingles the two in subject
matter, perspective, and style to offer stories of universal
appeal.Whether languishing inside their shuttered New Delhi homes
or hosting dinner parties in their baroque Manhattan apartments,
Jhabvalas characters are men and women of sensual passions and
worldly ambition. They confront loneliness and neglect, struggle
for independence in a world of manners and manipulations, and
adjust to both welcome and unwelcome guests who stay too long and
change their hosts lives in devastating ways. Hers are stories of
elegance and exquisite delicacy, weaving complex domestic
tapestries that range over entire lives. A proper Indian gentleman
tries to help his wayward younger brother. A grand hostess on the
eve of Indias independence uses her power for personal and
political ends. A frail New York socialite tries to understand her
daughters alternative life. And a circle of emotionally empty,
upperclass New Yorkers adopts an old Indian woman as their
spiritual guide.To read these stories is to succumb to the power of
a true master--a writer who spans two worlds and who uses this
singular perspective to illuminate hidden truths. The sensuousness
of India, the neuroses of New York--both are portrayed vividly in
these powerful narratives and marvelous entertainments.
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