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Battles of Our Own

Battles of Our Own

Jagadish Mohanty
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An Indian ‘industrial novel’ from the winner of the 1990 Odisha Sahitya Akademi Award

Jagadish Mohanty’s Battles of Our Own is a rare work of modern Odia and Indian fiction. It seeks to delineate a world that is off the grid. Its action unfolds in the remote and non-descript Tarbahar Colliery-a fictional name for the over hundred-year-old open-cast Himgiri Rampur coal mine in the hinterland of western Odisha. A work of gritty realism in its portrayal of a dark and dangerous underworld where coal is extracted, the novel poignantly reveals the primeval struggle between man and brute nature.
Offering a complete experience of the ‘industrial novel’-face offs between trade unions and management, trade union rivalry, and clandestine deals between enemy camps-this work brings alive Mohanty’s literary genius, which takes us to a world beyond the simplistic binary division between the worker and the master. The novel unravels a complex, fractious, and nuanced picture of the human condition.
This sensitive and evocative rendering by Himansu S. Mohapatra and Paul St-Pierre captures the thrill, beauty, horror and tragedy of this fictional tour de force.

Imprint: India Penguin Modern Classics

Published: Apr/2022

ISBN: 9780143451747

Length : 272 Pages

MRP : ₹399.00

Battles of Our Own

Jagadish Mohanty

An Indian ‘industrial novel’ from the winner of the 1990 Odisha Sahitya Akademi Award

Jagadish Mohanty’s Battles of Our Own is a rare work of modern Odia and Indian fiction. It seeks to delineate a world that is off the grid. Its action unfolds in the remote and non-descript Tarbahar Colliery-a fictional name for the over hundred-year-old open-cast Himgiri Rampur coal mine in the hinterland of western Odisha. A work of gritty realism in its portrayal of a dark and dangerous underworld where coal is extracted, the novel poignantly reveals the primeval struggle between man and brute nature.
Offering a complete experience of the ‘industrial novel’-face offs between trade unions and management, trade union rivalry, and clandestine deals between enemy camps-this work brings alive Mohanty’s literary genius, which takes us to a world beyond the simplistic binary division between the worker and the master. The novel unravels a complex, fractious, and nuanced picture of the human condition.
This sensitive and evocative rendering by Himansu S. Mohapatra and Paul St-Pierre captures the thrill, beauty, horror and tragedy of this fictional tour de force.

Buying Options
Paperback / Hardback

Jagadish Mohanty

Jagadish Mohanty (1951-2013) is an influential Odia writer whose most productive years were from the 1970s through to the 1990s, although he was active right until his untimely death at 62. A trend setter in Odia short fiction, he mediated the existentialist experience of angst and alienation, thereby giving Odia literature the much needed international exposure. Two finest short story collections out of his thirteen are Dakshina Duari Ghara (South-Facing House), published in 1979, and Album (1981). The two are also available in English translation. He wrote five novels, including Kanishka Kanishka (1986), which explored the moral dilemmas faced by ordinary individuals in their quest for an authentic existence. Nija Nija Panipatha (1990), translated as Battles of Our Own, is a unique Indian example of the industrial novel

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