Contents
Acknowledgements xv Chronology xvii Introduction xxv
Nissim, Lightly, and other pieces Adil Jussawalla Have I Heard Right, I Wonder 3 Asha A. Bhende Remembering Nissim 6 Gieve Patel A Recollection 12 Santan Rodrigues Nissim: Poet, Friend, Teacher 15 Gillian Tindall on Nissim Ezekiel 20 Dnyaneshwar Nadkarni Nissim Ezekiel as Art Critic 25 Minakshi Raja Remembering Nissim 28 Laeeq Fatehally About Nissim 31
[vii] CONTENTS
Indu Saraiya Nissim, Lightly 34
Personally Speaking: a series of interviews with Imtiaz and Anil Dharker 4 3 with Saleem Peeradina 51 with Zubin Driver 6 2 with Noorul Hasan 6 8
Many Poems, two Plays, and a Short Story From Collected Poems On an African Mask 75 The Worm 76 Portrait 76 Jamini Roy 77 Night of the Scorpion 78 Virginal 79 The Railway Clerk 80
Song 81
How She Lives Now 82
In The Garden 84
Events 85
From 'The Behaviour of Lovebirds and other compositions' 89 The Behaviour of Lovebirds 90 The Homing Salmon 93 The Social Life of Baboons 95 The Perception of Pain 97
[viii] CONTENTS
The Hyderabad Poems 99 Singapore Sequence 104 Six Short Prayers 125 Shillong 126 a new poem 128
Marriage Poem 129 Song of Deprivation 157 Smoke 175
The Creative Writer as Critic, and other essays Cross-Cultural Encounter in Literature 181 American Poet and Critic Today, An Indian Viewpoint 187
The Creative Writer as Critic 200
Censorship and the Writer 209 Mukesh Vatsyayana interviews Nissim Ezekiel 216
Poetry in the time of tempests 221
On Writers and Books
T.S. Eliot: a personal review 227 Introduction to A Martin Luther King Reader 239
Thoreau and Gandhi 246
Gitanjali 256
Introduction to Rajaji Reader 263
[ix] CONTENTS
Sartre as Playwright 268
Book Reviews
I Shall Not Hear The Nightingaleby Khushwant Singh 277
Land's Endby Adil Jussawalla 280 Violence Turned To Vitality Missing Person by Adil Jussawalla 282 Quiet Violence, poems by Sitakant Mahapatra 286 Indian Answers: a masterly analysis The Speaking Tree: A Study of Indian Culture and Society by Richard Lannoy 291 Two Poets: A.K. Ramanujan and Keki N. Daruwalla 300 An Indian Sherlock Holmes The Adventures ofFeluda by Satyajit Ray 307
Difficult Images Serendip by Dom Moraes 311
Art and Artists
The Vocabulary of Art Criticism 315
Souza: crude power 318 Gieve PateFs Paintings: satire on canvas 322 Gieve Patel: artist and environment 324 Padamsee and his Workshop: academic or avant-garde? 329
Satish Gujral: an art of half-truths 333
[x] CONTENTS
Krishen Khanna: without local habitation or name 337
Bhupen Khakhar: the eccentric genius 341
K. Laxma Gaud: holding the para-world in subjection 345
The Discrete Charm of Vivan Sundaram 349
The Politics of Discontent: the Freedom First years
Who Leads in the Arts? 355
Afghanistan 359
A Sense of Failure 363
The Moral Imperative 365
How to Destroy the Unity of India 368
The Cultural Vacuum 370
Non-alignment 373
This and That
A Footnote or Less 379
Minding My Business Why live when you can have a beautiful funeral? 382 The Sublime and the Ridiculous 384 Why shouldn't I get ahead before I get out? 386
Science and I: against the fault-finders 390
A Fragment 393
[xi] CONTENTS
Academia Keki N. Daruwalla Nissim Ezekiel: Perched on Hyphens, between Poetry and Prayer, Soul and Flesh 397 Kersy Katrak Paterfamilias 408 Makarand Paranjape A Poetry of Proportions: Nissim EzekiePs Quest for the Exact Name 413 Bruce King That Preface 435 Daphna Erdinast-Vulcan Part of My Flesh: the Subversive Jewish Voice of Nissim Ezekiel 442 E.V. Ramakrishnan 'My backward place is where I am': the Public Voice in Nissim EzekiePs Po etry 459 Geetha Ganapathy-Dore Language as Instrument of Humour, Irony and Satire in Nissim EzekiePs Poetry 470 Shirley Chew Nissim Ezekiel and the Poetics of (Un)-belonging 488 G. J.V. Prasad Always in the/Poet's Eye: Nissim EzekiePs India 499
Prashant K. Sinha, Shirish Chindhade Edinburgh Interlude': a Reinforcement of Concerns 509
John Oliver Perry Social Servant, Moral Evaluator, Self-Analyst: 518 Nissim Ezekiel as Critic for India
[xii] CONTENTS
Tabish Khair Beyond the Drawing-room: the Plays of Nissim Ezekiel 539
Vrinda Nabar Domesticity and Drama: Nissim EzekieFs Marriage Poem 550 and Don yt Call it Suicide
Bibliography 557
Contributors 561
Index 568
[ xiii ]