Nabarun Bhattacharya Knihy

Poor, poor, hard-luck Herbert Sarkar: born into a fancy Calcutta family but cursed from birth (his philandering movie director father is killed in a car crash and his mother dies soon after, when he's still just a baby), he is taken as an orphan into his uncle's house, only to fall further and further down the family totem pole. Despite good looks ("Hollywood-ish, Leslie Howard-ish)" and native talents, he is scorned by all but his kind aunt. Poor Herbert: so lovable but so little loved. Cheated of his inheritance, living on the roof in cast-off clothing, he pines for love, but all is woe: his own nephews beat him up. At twenty, however, he suddenly seems to possess the gift of speaking with the dead. Herbert is bathed in glory. From less than zero to starry heights--what an apotheosis. The wheel of fortune turns again, all too soon... Legendary, scathingly satiric, wildly energetic, deeply tender, Herbert is an Indian masterwork.

Set against the backdrop of West Bengal, this surreal novel blends absurdist humor with political satire. The story follows Marshall Bhodi Sarkar, a military figure and sorcerer, as he uncovers historical artifacts while searching for oil. Teaming up with the eccentric Flaperoos-men, they embark on a whimsical and improbable revolution against the Marxist-Leninist government. The narrative intertwines elements of magic realism and a rich tapestry of Bengali history, offering a vibrant and chaotic exploration of subaltern resistance.

A collection of inventive and surprising short stories from one of India's most prominent countercultural writers. In this wildly inventive collection of Nabarun Bhattacharya's stories we meet characters such as a trigger-happy cop in an authoritarian police state, a man who holds on to a piece of rope from a deadly noose, a retired revolutionary thrilled by delusions of grandeur, and people working for a corporation that arranges lavish suicides for a price. Ranging from scathing satires of society to surreal investigations of violence and love, these stories are also a window onto the political and social climate in Bengal, tracing both pan-Indian developments like the 1975 Emergency and local ones like militant-leftist Naxalism and the decades-long Communist reign in the state. Expertly translated from the Bengali, Hawa Hawa and Other Stories is a journey through the mind of one of the most daring countercultural writers of India, one with particular resonance in these chaotic times.