Editor's Note
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At Out of Print, we are receptive to all literary short fiction, so long as it has a tangible connection to the subcontinent. Our issues are generally un-themed. With the exception of June 2011, where we indulged our curiosity on how the mythology of the subcontinent informs contemporary fiction – yielding an issue with extraordinary and exciting narratives – our filters are independent of topic. The interesting thing is that sometimes there is a natural coherence to the stories, a theme that emerges, and sometimes what you get is a collection of stories that we like but have nothing obvious in common.

 

This December, we have the privilege of featuring a broad range of stories. If we were to try and categorise them I would say they explore the complex, multi-layered aspects of the region, both from a socio-political as well as from an intimate, human point of view, in ways that rise beyond the cultural context. Altaf Tyrewala’s Mischief in Netanagar is a chilling commentary on urban ennui, where the protagonist feels so disempowered that he comments, ‘To belong to the community, to the land or to the nation, a man must first be in possession of himself.’ Tyrewala’s sharp, energetic writing follows a cricket match between India and Pakistan on a quiet afternoon in Netanagar. We are pleased to feature Lucinda Nelson Dhavan for the second time in Out of Print. Her keenly observed Boys And Girls Together leads us to the inevitable consequences of having a refuge for battered women and a lodge for young men next door to each other in a ‘middle-sized, middle-class, sleepy city’ in India. The story evolves through characters that are bold and real. Two stories lift off from the trauma of the independence struggle. Dipika Mukherjee’s Patriots Of The Will, set in 1945,is a fictional rendition of the Indian National Army’s presence in what was then Malaya. A Bengali woman, a sweet maker, makes mishti and much more for Bose. Meenakshi Jauhari Chawla sets her tale of the fallibility of Lakhi Parshad, Member of Parliament in contemporary times. But a reference to Ritwik Ghatak’s Meghe Dhaka Tara draws our attention to the transition from the wounds of partition to the corruption of today, and the wiliness of the human mind in negotiating survival. The two remaining stories in this issue focus on the internal. Drawing on her scientific background, and her theoretical perspective on the ways in which molecules interact, our editor, Indira Chandrasekhar, examines the thought processes of a girl who struggles to make sense of her family and her relationships in Lennard-Jones Potentials. ‘Attract, release, attract, release,’ her mother says, adding, ‘Sometimes those soft bonds are the wisest.’ In Tashan Mehta’s Erasure, which begins, ‘When I left home, I came back to find they had erased me,’ a young woman, desperate to find herself searches among her family and friends but learns that they no longer see her.

 

Our cover this time is specially commissioned from Out of Print writer and friend, Vinayak Varma. When we indicated the scope of the stories and the imagery to Vinayak, he said, I gave careful consideration to the themes you presented me with, and I thought I'd try and combine them all using one iconic pop-culture-resonant image. …  a hand-drawn re-purposing of a frame from Amitabh Bachchan's 'Mere Angane Mein'song. I find the image … fascinatingly bipolar, and so very Indian. On the face of it, it looks like a man and a woman involved in some kind of dance. When you dwell on it a little longer, you start seeing the details that make it odd: the sneering superstar in drag, the chap in the business suit looking rather discombobulated, and the many silent spectators. If you don't know the cinematic context, the image could be a scene of the average Mumbayya roadside tamasha involving a eunuch, a businessman and the standard army of gawkers. The actual context, of course, is even stranger – a ridiculously misogynist song set in a high society party, in which a cross-dressing Amitabh Bachchan takes the piss out of an assortment of different feminine body types in [an] ... attempt at counselling a mentally distressed Amjad Khan.

 

 

 

 

The cover design by Yamuna Mukherjee contains a commissioned piece of artwork by Vinayak Varma entitled Tumhara Kya Kaam Hai, and images from a piece of Kalamkari or crafted-by-pen fabric depicting stories from Hindu mythology.

Vinayak Varma makes books and magazines for a living. Like many other no-talent charlatans that have of late infiltrated the publishing industry, he thrives in polluted cities but loudly and pretentiously yearns for sparkling forests and countrysides (damned hipster!). Witness his shady dealings and depthless inertia at www.vinvarma.com, a blog that has not been updated since the invention of hashtags.

 

Selected stories may contain language or details that could be viewed as offensive. Readers below 18 are cautioned to use discretion. Views expressed are those of the authors and not necessarily supported by Out of Print.