It was the season of beerbahutis and rain clouds, some time in the 4th century BC. In a cook grotto Gautam Nilambar, a final year student at the Forest University of Shravasti, chances upon Hari Syhankar, a Princeling yearning to be a Buddhist monk. He falls in love 3with the beautiful, sharp-witted champak. And thus begins a magnificent tale that flows through time, through Maghadhan Pataliputra, the kingdom of Ouch, the British Raj and into a Time of Independence. This fiery river of Time flows along the banks of their loves as they are recreated over the centuries through the ripples and the eddies keeping them together, keeping them apart. The Story comes full circle in post-Partition India when Hari Shankar and his friend Gautam Nilambar Dutt meet in a grotto in the forest of Shrvasti, and mourn the passing of their loves into meaninglessness, their friends which have left for Pakistan, and what remains of their country of which they were once so passionately proud.
What happens between then and now is history, full of the clangor of conflict, the deviousness of colonizers, the apathy of maharajas, and the irrelevance of religion in defining Indian ness.
Now available in English for the first time, this great novel, originally published in Urdu in 1959, is easily one of the most discussed in contemporary India, widely acclaimed as a literary landmark.
1 | The Time of the Peacocks | 1 |
2 | The Greek Traveller | 8 |
3 | TheSages’Grove | 15 |
4 | Aryani, Goddess of the Woods | 23 |
5 | The Autumn Moon | 29 |
6 | Sudarshan Yakshini—Tree Sprite, Good to Behold | 37 |
7 | Birdman of the Crossways | 41 |
8 | The Theatre in Pataliputra | 45 |
9 | The River | 50 |
10 | The Marvels and Strange Tales of Hindustan | 54 |
11 | The University Town of Jaunpur | 63 |
12 | Hussain Shah Nayak | 70 |
13 | “Champavati”: A Sufi Allegory | 75 |
14 | The Cavalcade | 79 |
15 | A Poet and a Musician | 86 |
16 | Kamal Among the Patched-smock People | 94 |
17 | Folk Singers of Bengal | 99 |
18 | Cyril Ashley of Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge | 105 |
19 | The Abominable Customs of the Gentoos and Mussalmans | 114 |
20 | The Confluence of Oceans | 118 |
21 | Nabob Cyril Ashley and his Bibi | 124 |
22 | AFaery Tale Kingdom | 130 |
23 | Farewell to Camelot | 139 |
24 | The Pagoda Tree | 145 |
25 | TheWaterwayofTears | 151 |
26 | The Queen and her Knights | 157 |
27 | Bakht Khan, Lord Governor-General | 165 |
28 | Champabai, Chowdhrain of Lucknow, (Photograph by Mashkoor-ud-Daulah, 1868) | 172 |
29 | Sunset and Sunrise Over the Gomti | 175 |
30 | The Bridge | 180 |
31 | Shahzada Gulfam of Badshah Bagh | 183 |
32 | A Spray of Roses | 194 |
33 | Warren Hastings Bahadur’s Haveli | 200 |
34 | The Maharajah’s Rolls Royce | 205 |
35 | The Last Song of Vajid Ali Shah | 208 |
36 | The Moon Garden | 213 |
37 | OvertheWaves | 221 |
38 | Inquilab, Zindabad! | 224 |
39 | Gautam Nilamber of Santiniketan | 237 |
40 | Quality Street | 240 |
41 | InderSabha | 244 |
42 | The Sage’s Grove | 252 |
43 | The Forest of Arden | 255 |
44 | Miss Champa Ahmed (Graduation Portrait by C. Mull, Hazrat Ganj, Lucknow) | 263 |
45 | The Broken Tanpura of Sultan Hussain Shah Nayak of Jaunpur | 269 |
46 | The Hon’ble Cyril Ashley of Sidney Sussex College | 276 |
47 | Young Indians in Mid-century England | 283 |
48 | Lala Rukh | 290 |
49 | The Revolutionaries | 294 |
50 | The BBC Canteen | 299 |
51 | John and Mary’s Painting Book | 304 |
52 | The Boat-House | 306 |
53 | The Trumpeter | 311 |
54 | Queen Mary’s Funeral | 315 |
55 | EndofanExile | 317 |
56 | Light on the Hilltop | 322 |
57 | LaPaloma | 326 |
58 | Autumn Journal | 328 |
59 | A Bunch of Heather Leaves | 332 |
60 | The Garden Room | 337 |
61 | ‘The Laurels’ | 345 |
62 | The Fugitive | 348 |
63 | The Urn | 353 |
64 | Windsong on the Heath | 355 |
65 | Stateless | 365 |
66 | Letter from Karachi | 374 |
67 | The Road to Sylhet | 379 |
68 | The Circuit House | 382 |
69 | The Tea Planter | 388 |
70 | The Pomegranate Tree | 396 |
71 | The Elusive Bird of the Doon Valley | 404 |
72 | Sudarshan Yakshini of the National Museum | 410 |
73 | The Highway to Shravasti | 420 |
It was the season of beerbahutis and rain clouds, some time in the 4th century BC. In a cook grotto Gautam Nilambar, a final year student at the Forest University of Shravasti, chances upon Hari Syhankar, a Princeling yearning to be a Buddhist monk. He falls in love 3with the beautiful, sharp-witted champak. And thus begins a magnificent tale that flows through time, through Maghadhan Pataliputra, the kingdom of Ouch, the British Raj and into a Time of Independence. This fiery river of Time flows along the banks of their loves as they are recreated over the centuries through the ripples and the eddies keeping them together, keeping them apart. The Story comes full circle in post-Partition India when Hari Shankar and his friend Gautam Nilambar Dutt meet in a grotto in the forest of Shrvasti, and mourn the passing of their loves into meaninglessness, their friends which have left for Pakistan, and what remains of their country of which they were once so passionately proud.
What happens between then and now is history, full of the clangor of conflict, the deviousness of colonizers, the apathy of maharajas, and the irrelevance of religion in defining Indian ness.
Now available in English for the first time, this great novel, originally published in Urdu in 1959, is easily one of the most discussed in contemporary India, widely acclaimed as a literary landmark.
1 | The Time of the Peacocks | 1 |
2 | The Greek Traveller | 8 |
3 | TheSages’Grove | 15 |
4 | Aryani, Goddess of the Woods | 23 |
5 | The Autumn Moon | 29 |
6 | Sudarshan Yakshini—Tree Sprite, Good to Behold | 37 |
7 | Birdman of the Crossways | 41 |
8 | The Theatre in Pataliputra | 45 |
9 | The River | 50 |
10 | The Marvels and Strange Tales of Hindustan | 54 |
11 | The University Town of Jaunpur | 63 |
12 | Hussain Shah Nayak | 70 |
13 | “Champavati”: A Sufi Allegory | 75 |
14 | The Cavalcade | 79 |
15 | A Poet and a Musician | 86 |
16 | Kamal Among the Patched-smock People | 94 |
17 | Folk Singers of Bengal | 99 |
18 | Cyril Ashley of Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge | 105 |
19 | The Abominable Customs of the Gentoos and Mussalmans | 114 |
20 | The Confluence of Oceans | 118 |
21 | Nabob Cyril Ashley and his Bibi | 124 |
22 | AFaery Tale Kingdom | 130 |
23 | Farewell to Camelot | 139 |
24 | The Pagoda Tree | 145 |
25 | TheWaterwayofTears | 151 |
26 | The Queen and her Knights | 157 |
27 | Bakht Khan, Lord Governor-General | 165 |
28 | Champabai, Chowdhrain of Lucknow, (Photograph by Mashkoor-ud-Daulah, 1868) | 172 |
29 | Sunset and Sunrise Over the Gomti | 175 |
30 | The Bridge | 180 |
31 | Shahzada Gulfam of Badshah Bagh | 183 |
32 | A Spray of Roses | 194 |
33 | Warren Hastings Bahadur’s Haveli | 200 |
34 | The Maharajah’s Rolls Royce | 205 |
35 | The Last Song of Vajid Ali Shah | 208 |
36 | The Moon Garden | 213 |
37 | OvertheWaves | 221 |
38 | Inquilab, Zindabad! | 224 |
39 | Gautam Nilamber of Santiniketan | 237 |
40 | Quality Street | 240 |
41 | InderSabha | 244 |
42 | The Sage’s Grove | 252 |
43 | The Forest of Arden | 255 |
44 | Miss Champa Ahmed (Graduation Portrait by C. Mull, Hazrat Ganj, Lucknow) | 263 |
45 | The Broken Tanpura of Sultan Hussain Shah Nayak of Jaunpur | 269 |
46 | The Hon’ble Cyril Ashley of Sidney Sussex College | 276 |
47 | Young Indians in Mid-century England | 283 |
48 | Lala Rukh | 290 |
49 | The Revolutionaries | 294 |
50 | The BBC Canteen | 299 |
51 | John and Mary’s Painting Book | 304 |
52 | The Boat-House | 306 |
53 | The Trumpeter | 311 |
54 | Queen Mary’s Funeral | 315 |
55 | EndofanExile | 317 |
56 | Light on the Hilltop | 322 |
57 | LaPaloma | 326 |
58 | Autumn Journal | 328 |
59 | A Bunch of Heather Leaves | 332 |
60 | The Garden Room | 337 |
61 | ‘The Laurels’ | 345 |
62 | The Fugitive | 348 |
63 | The Urn | 353 |
64 | Windsong on the Heath | 355 |
65 | Stateless | 365 |
66 | Letter from Karachi | 374 |
67 | The Road to Sylhet | 379 |
68 | The Circuit House | 382 |
69 | The Tea Planter | 388 |
70 | The Pomegranate Tree | 396 |
71 | The Elusive Bird of the Doon Valley | 404 |
72 | Sudarshan Yakshini of the National Museum | 410 |
73 | The Highway to Shravasti | 420 |