Intimate Relations remaps the discussion on gender and the nation in South Asia through a close study of the domestic novel as a literary genre and a tool for social reform. As a product of the intersection of literary and social reform movements, in the late nineteenth century the domestic novel became a site for literary innovation and also for rethinking women's roles in society and politics. Krupa Shandilya focuses primarily on social reform movements that negotiated the intimate relations between men and women in Hindu and Muslim society, namely, the widow remarriage act in Bengal (1856) and the education of women promoted by the Aligarh movement (1858-1900). Both movements were invested in recovering woman as a "respectable" subject for the Hindu and Muslim nation, where respectability connoted asexual spirituality. While most South Asian literary scholarship has focused on a normative Hindu woman, Intimate Relations couples discussion of the representation of the widow in bhadralok (upper-caste, middle-class) society with that of the courtesan of sharif (upper-class, Muslim, feudal) society in Bengali and Urdu novels from the 1880s to the 1920s. By drawing together their disparate histories in the context of contemporaneous social reform movements, Shandilya reflects on the similarities of Hindu and Islamic constructions of the gendered nation.

Published in 1899, Muhammad Hadi Ruswa's famous novel, "Umrao Jaan Ada, " created a sensation when it came out, with its candid fictionalized account of Umrao Jaan, based on a renowned Lucknow courtesan and poetess of the same name. Considered by many as the first Urdu novel, it remains highly popular today, and has been the basis for three films and a Pakistani television serial. But despite Ruswa's notoriety, few know that a month after he wrote "Umrao Jaan Ada," Ruswa penned a sly novella entitled "Junun-e-Intezar, " in which "Umrao" avenges herself on her creator, Ruswa, by narrating the story of his life. Blurring the lines between truth and fiction, narrator and character, this clever narrative strategy gives the courtesan a voice.
While "Umrao Jaan Ada" is still celebrated, "Junun-e-Intezar" has been completely forgotten--until now. "The Madness of Waiting "redresses this imbalance, featuring both the Urdu original and a superb English translation of "Junun-e-Intezar." The book also includes a critical introduction that rethinks "Umrao Jaan Ada" and the Urdu literary milieu of the late-nineteenth-century Lucknow courtesan.