The Essential U. R. Ananthamurthy

U. R. Ananthamurthy (1932–2014) writer teacher literary critic and public intellectual was born in Shivamogga district in Karnataka. In 1965 his debut novel <i>Samskara</i> took the literary world by storm with its unflinching portrayal of the rigid orthodoxy in Brahmin society. Since then it has become a landmark novel of the modernist or Navya movement of the 1950s and 1960s in Kannada literature. In a career that spanned more than five decades Ananthamurthy wrote five novels several collections of short stories poetry and essays a play and an autobiography. He received the Jnanpith Award India’s highest literary honour in 1994 and was nominated for the Man Booker International Prize in 2013.<br><br> <i>The Essential U. R. Ananthamurthy</i> is a five-part compendium of select fictional and non-fictional works poetry and autobiographical writings from one of India’s most illustrious and outspoken writers. The section ‘Novels’ portrays characters in conflict with tradition idealism and modernity in a rapidly changing independent India through excerpts from powerful novels such as <i>Samskara Bharathipura Avasthe</i> and <i>Bhava</i>. ‘Poetry’ presents five evocative poems on the themes of power and politics. ‘Short Stories’ highlights the chief themes that preoccupied Ananthamurthy—the constraints of the traditional order the cultural dominance of the West the sinister workings of power and the creativity of political dissent. ‘Essays and Speeches’ captures the range and depth of Ananthamurthy’s democratic imagination through his writings on cultural identity and literature community and creativity linguistic and nationalist politics and on figures such as Mahatma Gandhi and Ram Manohar Lohia. And the final section ‘Memoirs’ gathers Ananthamurthy’s memories of family friendships work and travel from the different phases of his life.<br><br> <i>The Essential U. R. Ananthamurthy</i> offers a rich glimpse into the mind of one of modern India’s most profound writers and thinkers and demonstrates why Ananthamurthy’s works will endure for generations to come.