The Village Clock

<p>In <em>The Village Clock</em> Arshud Mahmood takes us inside a remotely beautiful world a rural village in India under British colonial rule. How distant the empire seems! In one story a young government clerk forsakes his desk job for a less remunerative one that allows him to be outdoors. In another on her wedding day a bride's family insults the family of the groom by presenting a marriage contract that suggests a lack of faith in the groom's devotion and another bride is chosen and married that afternoon. Figures like Lord Mountbatten and King George V referred to in passing seem slightly grotesque figures of fun reminders of a tumultuous modern world that threatens the horizon without ever quite arriving.</p><p><br></p><p><br></p><p><br></p>