Author | Anjali Joseph |
---|---|
Language | English |
Genre | Drama |
Publisher | Fourth Estate |
Publication date | 2010 |
Publication place | United Kingdom |
Pages | 272 |
ISBN | 978-0-00-736077-2 |
Saraswati Park is a 2010 drama novel written by Anjali Joseph. Set in Mumbai, the book follows the story of Mohan Karekar, a pensive letter-writer living in the fictional housing complex of Saraswati Park. When his gay nephew, Ashish, moves in with him and his wife, Lakshmi, their mundane life goes through several changes. [1]
Saraswati Park was Joseph's debut novel for which she was awarded the Betty Trask Prize, Desmond Elliott Prize and Crossword Book Award. It was also nominated for The Hindu Literary Prize.
Mohan Karekar is a pensive letter-writer who lives with his wife, Lakshmi, in the housing complex of Saraswati Park in suburban Mumbai. Bored with his monotonous life, and stifled by his troublesome marriage, Mohan spends most of his time dreaming of becoming a writer. Meanwhile, Mohan's nephew, Ashish, a 19-year-old English literature student, moves in with them to complete his education after his parents are transferred to Indore. Ashish, struggling to accept his sexuality, is attracted to his classmate Sunder and later embarks on an affair with his much older tutor.
Reviewing for The Independent , Aamer Hussein wrote:
Saraswati Park works well as an intimate and at times wrily humorous study of a unexceptional young man's discovery of himself, through sex and study and the almost wordless support that family offers; it's also good at observing how the young glimpse their elders through a mist of self-absorbed, partial comprehension. [2]
Anna Scott of The Guardian labelled the book "a meticulously written tale of hope and regret" and Sameer Rahim of The Telegraph wrote that Joseph's writing was "well crafted and the images, when they succeed, feel spot-on". [3] [4]
Joseph was awarded the Betty Trask Prize in 2011. [5] Also that year, the novel won the Desmond Elliott Prize; one of the judges, Edward Stourton, praised Joseph's "extraordinary maturity" and added that it was "hard to believe that it is a first novel". [6] The novel also won the Vodafone Crossword Book Award for Fiction, sharing the trophy with Omair Ahmed's Jimmy The Terrorist, [7] and was nominated for The Hindu Literary Prize. [8]
The University of East Anglia's Creative Writing Course was founded by Sir Malcolm Bradbury and Sir Angus Wilson in 1970. The M.A. has been regarded among the most prestigious in the United Kingdom.
The Betty Trask Prize and Awards are for first novels written by authors under the age of 35 who reside in a current or former Commonwealth nation. Each year the awards total at least £20,000, with normally one author receiving a larger prize amount, called the "Prize", and the remainder given to other writers, called the "Awards". These were established in 1984 by the Society of Authors at the bequest of the late Betty Trask, a reclusive author of over thirty romance novels. They're given to traditional or romantic novels, rather than those of an experimental style, and either published or unpublished works.
Tabish Khair is an Indian English author and associate professor in the Department of English, University of Aarhus, Denmark. His books include Babu Fictions (2001), The Bus Stopped (2004), which was shortlisted for the Encore Award (UK) and The Thing About Thugs (2010), which has been shortlisted for a number of prizes, including the DSC Prize for South Asian Literature and the Man Asian Literary Prize. His poem Birds of North Europe won first prize in the sixth Poetry Society All India Poetry Competition held in 1995. In 2022, he published a new Sci Fi novel, [The Body by the Shore].
Nadeem Aslam FRSL is a British Pakistani novelist. His debut novel, Season of the Rainbirds, won the Betty Trask and the Author's Club First Novel Award. His critically acclaimed second novel Maps for Lost Lovers won Encore Award and Kiriyama Prize; it was shortlisted for International Dublin Literary Award, among others. Colm Tóibín described him as "one of the most exciting and serious British novelists writing now".
Jon McGregor is a British novelist and short story writer. In 2002, his first novel was longlisted for the Booker Prize, making him then the youngest-ever contender. His second and fourth novels were longlisted for the Booker Prize in 2006 and 2017 respectively. In 2012, his third novel, Even the Dogs, was awarded the International Dublin Literary Award. The New York Times has labelled him a "wicked British writer".
Shreekumar Varma is an Indian author, playwright, newspaper columnist and poet, known for the novels Lament of Mohini, Maria's Room and Kipling's Daughter, the children's books, Devil's Garden: Tales Of Pappudom, The Magic Store of Nu-Cham-Vu, Pazhassi Raja: The Royal Rebel, and his collected plays, Five & Other Plays and Midnight Hotel & Other Plays,.
Sacred Games is a mystery/thriller novel by Indian-American author Vikram Chandra published in 2006. Upon release, it received critical acclaim and subsequently won the Vodafone Crossword Book Award.
Sriram Karri is an English-language novelist, writer and columnist. His novel, The Autobiography of a Mad Nation, was longlisted for the Man Asian Literary Prize in 2009. His first book, The Spiritual Supermarket, was published by Mosaic Books for the Indian sub-continent in 2007. It was longlisted for the Vodafone Crossword Book Award, (Non-Fiction), in 2008.
Lakshmi Holmström MBE was an Indian-British writer, literary critic, and translator of Tamil fiction into English. Her most prominent works were her translations of short stories and novels by contemporary writers in Tamil, such as Mauni, Pudhumaipithan, Ashoka Mitran, Sundara Ramasami, C. S. Lakshmi, Bama, and Imayam.
The Crossword Book Award is an Indian book award hosted by Crossword Bookstores and their sponsors. The Award was instituted in 1998 by Indian book retailer Crossword with the intention of competing with The Booker Prize, Commonwealth Writers' Prize or The Pulitzer Prize.
Omair Ahmad is an Indian journalist and writer. His book Jimmy the Terrorist was shortlisted for the 2009 Man Asian Literary Prize.
Anil Menon is an Indian computer scientist and writer of speculative fiction. He has authored research papers and edited books on evolutionary algorithms. His research, in collaboration with Kishan Mehrotra, Chilukuri Mohan, and Sanjay Ranka, addresses the mathematical foundations of replicator systems, majorization, and reconstruction of probabilistic databases. His short stories and reviews have appeared in the anthology series Exotic Gothic, Strange Horizons, Interzone, Lady Churchill's Rosebud Wristlet, Chiaroscuro, Sybil's Garage, Apex Digest, and others.
The Hindu Literary Prize or The Hindu Best Fiction Award, established in 2010, is an Indian literary award sponsored by The Hindu Literary Review which is part of the newspaper The Hindu. It recognizes Indian works in English and English translation. The first year, 2010, the award was called The Hindu Best Fiction Award. Starting in 2018 a non-fiction category was included.
Benny Daniel, better known by his pen name Benyamin, is an Indian writer in Malayalam from Kerala. He is the author of about thirty books in various genres – from short stories to novels and memoirs. For his novel Goat Days (Aadujeevitham), he won the Abu Dhabi Sakthi Award, Kerala Sahitya Akademi Award and JCB Prize, and was shortlisted for the Man Asian Literary Prize. The novel Manthalirile 20 Communist Varshangal won the Vayalar Award in 2021.
The Desmond Elliott Prize is an annual award for the best debut novel written in English and published in the UK. The winning novel can be from any genre of fiction and must exhibit depth and breadth with a compelling narrative. The winner receives £10,000. The prize is named in honour of the distinguished late publisher and literary agent, Desmond Elliott.
Neel Mukherjee, FRSL is an Indian English-language writer based in London. He is the author of several critically acclaimed novels. He is also the brother of the television anchor and editor Udayan Mukherjee.
Anjali Joseph is an Indian novelist. Her first novel, Saraswati Park (2010), earned her several awards, including the Betty Trask Prize and Desmond Elliott Prize. Her second novel, Another Country, was released in 2012. In 2010, she was listed by The Telegraph as one of the 20 best writers under the age of 40. Her third novel, The Living (2016), was shortlisted for the DSC Prize and is a tender, lyrical and often funny novel which shines a light on everyday life. Her fourth novel, Keeping in Touch, was published in India in 2021 by Context and in the UK in 2022 by Scribe.
Annie Zaidi is an English-language writer from India. Her novel, Prelude To A Riot, won the Tata Literature Live! Awards for Book of the Year 2020. In 2019, she won The Nine Dots Prize for her work Bread, Cement, Cactus and in 2018 she won The Hindu Playwright Award for her play, Untitled-1. Her non-fiction debut, a collection of essays, Known Turf: Bantering with Bandits and Other True Tales, was short-listed for the Vodafone Crossword Book Award in 2010.
Lakshmi Nandan Bora was an Indian novelist and short story writer in the Assamese language, known for over 60 books he has authored, including award winning novels, Patal Bhairavi and Kayakalpa. A recipient of Sahitya Academy Award and Saraswati Samman, Bora was honoured by the Government of India in 2015 with Padma Shri, the fourth highest Indian civilian award. He died on 3 June 2021, from complications caused by COVID-19.
Sivaranjiniyum Innum Sila Pengalum is a 2021 Indian Tamil-language anthology film directed by Vasanth.