FIFTY-FIVE PILLARS RED WALLS

First published in 1961 Usha Priyamvada’s debut novel Pachpan Khambe Laal Deewaarein is located within the boundaries of an all-women’s college in Delhi. Behind its walls is Sushma Sharma—lecturer warden single and sole provider for her large family. Despite her relative youth and elegance she is resigned to the regimented loneliness of her life until a chance meeting with the charismatic Neel. Then long-thwarted desires uncurl and the shackles she has accepted suddenly begin to seem unbearable. But the world around her is still unchanged and independence still causes scandal… In spare evocative prose Fifty-five Pillars Red Walls skilfully explores the physical mental and social paradigms which locked so many women into narrow ideals as they still do. Daisy Rockwell’s pitch-perfect translation brings this quietly intense poignant and pathbreaking Hindi novel into the blazing spotlight of classic Indian literature for the first time