Pragya’s Pen
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Putin. Gandhi. Beckett. Noise. Symbol. Bone.
Gandhi, for Putin, is merely a protocol stop These days I watch certain Indian intellectuals—once loud, now faint shadows in the Modi era—waiting for any passing gesture to revive their old, muddy idealism. Vladimir Putin came, placed flowers on Gandhi’s… Continue reading
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Jane Austen, Naipaul, and the Teacup of History
Author’s Note: This column grew from a memory I carried quietly for years—Naipaul’s remark on Austen, and the strange irony it held. Writing it helped me understand how literature outlives the noise around it, and how gentle voices endure longer… Continue reading
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Grammar Tilts Against the Storm
Father’s Lesson— from my debut poetry book Lost Mother My first rolling was in nursery days. My teacher’s word was like a hammer to me when she told me to write eight. Sweat began to trail — in winter days.… Continue reading
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THE THREE NATIONS OF FICTION
Every art has its capitals. Painters look back to Florence and Paris, musicians to Vienna and Leipzig. But if you ask where fiction — the novel and the short story — found its continuous home, you will not wander across… Continue reading
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A DIARY OF FRAGMENTS, WHERE THE PERSONAL AND LITERARY MEET IN SCATTERED RHYTHM
[This column gathers fragments I shared through August and September—notes from Kashi in progress, meditations on language, editing, memory, and literature. They came daily, like scattered pebbles; together they form a diary of two months’ writing and reflection.] A LANGUAGE… Continue reading
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Writers as Yogis: From Muscle to Mind, From Narration to Silence
Greatness, whether in the path of yoga or in the path of art, lies in one direction only: inward. The yogi leaves behind the body, then the mind, and finally the soul dissolves into its own essence. Body, mind, soul… Continue reading
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Why is Premchand not so widespread in the world like Anton Chekhov
If you look on any railway platform book stall, one picture exists invariantly—square face tapering down, big alive eyes, and sunken cheeks—that is Premchand. I am not saying that he is alone, but company figures are not constant, except for… Continue reading
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DEPTH OUTLASTS FASHION—FROM DICKENS TO KAFKA TO TODAY
What is better or worse for literature? The quiet tyranny of prizes or the constant demands of the market. Between both poles, the writer digs the hole like a mole. To be somewhere, or to be nowhere. Yes, the nowhere… Continue reading
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A Literature That Missed the Inner Turn
Both scenes were not synchronous, nor did they get along. I’m talking about Indian literary writings and the rest of global literature during the incipient phase of the 20th century. That era’s clock faced two world wars, and amid them,… Continue reading
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When Fiction Turns to Polemic: Llosa and the Price of Leaving the Temple
Mario Vargas Llosa, the Peruvian Nobel Laureate, remained a towering figure in the literary world and died this year after a long literary life. I often wonder what his literary career might have been if he had avoided the journalistic… Continue reading
Pragya’s Pen 