The Master of the Unspoken. Remarks on Nirmal Verma

Among the Hindi writers of his generation Nirmal Verma probably had the closest affinity to Europe and European literature. Decades before exile and alienation became a standard topic of successful Anglo-Indian literature, Verma explored the situation of an Indian in Europe and incorporated techniques and influences of modern European literature into Hindi fiction. Some of his best stories are reflections of the state of Europe after World War II as seen by an outsider.

Uncle Saadat and the Great Manto

In his moving memoir „Uncle Manto“ Hamid Jalal draws a distinctive line between the private man he knew and the public figure Manto.

Why I Don’t Like Kafka

There are writers who have spawned a whole industry of interpreters. The volume of interpretative literature not uncommonly surpasses the work of the respective writer many times over and the sophistry critics invest into even the most marginal  aspects of the work seems to be motivated by a strange ambition to overcome the practicality of writing with the grandeur of theory.

My Top Ten Science Fiction Stories

It’s no wonder that I start my short fiction blog with a science fiction related article. I am a science fiction writer and probably will always be. There’s a special significance when sf people attempt the impossible and select the ten “best” sf stories of all time – as no other genre science fiction in its historic development has been dependent on achievements and innnovations in the short fiction realm.