From the Editor’s Desk
They say Tansen (the musical maestro) introduced Raag Basant Bahar to the Mughal court, during the time of Akbar. The raag is a celebration of the onset of Spring and introduces the joy of the season into music. It is said that if the ragas are sung on time, they have a holistic effect on us. The music moulds our beings into the right frame of mind to accept the changes of the season. Wandering through the ruins of the erstwhile kingdom of Bundelkhand in Central India, I came upon the tomb of Tansen in Gwalior. It had rained suddenly that afternoon, as I sat drenched in the remembrance of that music from the past, while pigeons lovingly hovered over his grave in the shade of a slowly withering Tamarind tree. And yet, the colours are rich here, both music and silence penetrates our history. Unknown to me, another poet friend Mani Rao had travelled to Brindavan. She sent me colours of both joy and poverty, and some poetry from there. It seemed to me that as writers, and poets we live in the kingdom of imagined colours, which then fuses with what we see around us, and is often captured in our writing.
Mani had promised to share with us the nitty gritties of her work desk, which we feature in this issue. Our fiction section is richly populated, with an eclectic selection, stories like Her Own Shin Bone by Vince Dowdle Jr. is sure to stir you up. We have a robust non-fiction section, where Priscilla Jolly gives us a brilliant essay in her Reflections on Loneliness from a Kitchen Sink. We share the joy of reading Karthik Venkatesh's Ten Indian Languages, a book meant for young adults- but like all good books, can be read by anyone really. I review Sekhar Banerjee's Probably Geranium, and as always there's some lovely poetry.
As the snow melts, and winter gives way to Basant, here's making way for some wonderful literature too.
Thank you dear readers, I wish you a colourful Basant Panchami.
Maitreyee Bhattacharjee Chowdhury
Managing Editor, The Bangalore Review