A darkly funny, sharply observed, and deeply moving novel about the surprises and struggles of life in contemporary Delhi
'Confirms Anjum Hasan as one of the most important writers of our time' WILLIAM DALRYMPLE
Alif is a middle-aged history teacher living in contemporary Delhi. He's often lost in reveries on India's past, but it's the present that presses down on him. His wife is set on a bigger house and a better car while trying to ace her MBA exams; his teenage son wants to quit school to get rich; his colleagues are suspicious of a Muslim teaching Indian history; and his old friend has just reconnected with a childhood sweetheart for whom Alif has always had feelings.
Then one day, while leading a school field trip, the unthinkable happens, and Alif finds his job on the line as his life - and the world around him - rapidly descends into chaos.
Rezensionen / Stimmen
One of the finest contemporary Indian fiction writers... [A] sparkling new novel * independent.co.uk * An extraordinary tale of an ordinary Muslim ... Hasan is cannily observant, a sophisticated writer with a wry and subtle sense of humour * TRIBUNE INDIA * A wonderful Delhi novel for our times, a Shahr-e-Ashob of the new India. History's Angel is eloquent, brave, elegaic and ultimately, heartbreaking. This remarkable novel reminded me of both of Ahmed Ali's Twilight in Delhi and Anita Desai's In Custody, and confirms Anjum Hasan as one of our finest and most important writers -- WILLIAM DALRYMPLE This absorbing novel trespasses, from sentence to sentence, the boundaries that usually demarcate the grandeur of the historical from the tedium, humour, and disappointments of ordinary human life. Domesticity, everyday routine, and our historical pasts and futures are conjoined here tantalisingly, with impressive skill, and with real tenderness -- AMIT CHAUDHURI A shimmering, intelligent rage roils under a cool surface in History's Angel, which manages at once to be "made so insistantly, so noisily, of now" and inhabit layers of history. Hasan's eye is sharp and her aim is unerring. This is a work of sublime elegance -- SHRUTI SWAMY A seething seismic tale about the disturbing times the Muslims of India are living through, in ever growing dread of worse to come. Told in a subdued, sad, ironical tenor, it is compassionate without being sentimental. The novel asserts humanity and hope in the face of widening fissures through its main protagonist who, drawing sustenance from a deep historical perspective, refuses to play the victim and negotiates the situation empathetically -- GEETANJALI SHREE, author of the International Booker Prize-winning Tomb of Sand Extremely timely ... History's Angel helps us view the erasures of the past through a living lens. With sensitivity and nuance, Anjum Hasan draws us into the world of Alif, a Muslim history teacher in contemporary Delhi -- DAISY ROCKWELL Hasan's prose is introspective, carefully observed, and imbued with more than what is said ... [Her] gaze is clear-sighted and unflinching * Indian Express * Remarkable and insightful ... Engrossing ... Elegant. * National Herald * Genius ... one of the finest Indian writers alive * Firstpost * Craftily written ... The elegant, pondered and deep-reaching prose of this collection allows subversive humour to surface effortlessly ... The 230 pages are filled with underlineable gems . . . Hasan explores many of the relevant experiences of life in present-day * The Hindu * Hasan grants this hero such a complete inner life - and surrounds him with such finely drawn characters - that the very air he breathes seems dense with thoughts and longings * WALL STREET JOURNAL *
Sprache
Verlagsort
Maße
Höhe: 197 mm
Breite: 129 mm
Dicke: 20 mm
Gewicht
ISBN-13
978-1-5266-5605-6 (9781526656056)
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Schweitzer Klassifikation
Anjum Hasan is the author of three novels and two short story collections, which have been shortlisted for the Indian Academy of Letters Prize, the Sahiya Akademi Award, the Hindu Best Fiction Award and the Crossword Fiction Award, as well as being longlisted for the Man Asia Literary Prize and the DSC Prize for South Asian Literature. Her short fiction and essays have appeared in Granta, Paris Review, Los Angeles Review of Books, among many others.
