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Memory of Light

Memory of Light

Ruth Vanita
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SHORTLISTED FOR THE TATA LITERATURE LIVE! AWARD FOR FICTION 2020

Preparations for King George the Third’s fiftieth birthday gala are in full swing in Lucknow. As poets and performers vie to be part of the show, Chapla Bai, a dazzling courtesan from Kashi, briefly enters this competitive world, and sweeps the poet Nafis Bai off her feet. An irresistible passion takes root, expanding and contracting like a wave of light. Over two summers, aided by Nafis’s friends, the poets Insha and Rangin, and Sharad, himself in love with a man, they exchange letters and verses, feeding each other the heady fruit of desire. When Chapla leaves for home, they part with the dream of building a life together. Can their relationship survive the distances?

Narrated in the voice of Nafis, Memory of Light weaves an exquisite web of conversations, songs, reminiscences around a life-changing love.

Imprint: India Viking

Published: Jul/2020

ISBN: 9780670093519

Length : 224 Pages

MRP : ₹399.00

Memory of Light

Ruth Vanita

SHORTLISTED FOR THE TATA LITERATURE LIVE! AWARD FOR FICTION 2020

Preparations for King George the Third’s fiftieth birthday gala are in full swing in Lucknow. As poets and performers vie to be part of the show, Chapla Bai, a dazzling courtesan from Kashi, briefly enters this competitive world, and sweeps the poet Nafis Bai off her feet. An irresistible passion takes root, expanding and contracting like a wave of light. Over two summers, aided by Nafis’s friends, the poets Insha and Rangin, and Sharad, himself in love with a man, they exchange letters and verses, feeding each other the heady fruit of desire. When Chapla leaves for home, they part with the dream of building a life together. Can their relationship survive the distances?

Narrated in the voice of Nafis, Memory of Light weaves an exquisite web of conversations, songs, reminiscences around a life-changing love.

Buying Options
Paperback / Hardback
Ebooks

Ruth Vanita

Ruth Vanita is the author of many books, most recently The Broken Rainbow: Poems and Translations (2023); the novel Memory of Light (Penguin, 2022), which she translated into Hindi as Pariyon ke Beech (Rajkamal); The Dharma of Justice in the Sanskrit Epics: Debates on Gender, Varna and Species (Oxford University Press, 2022); Love’s Rite: Same-Sex Marriages in Modern India (Penguin, 2005; updated edition 2022). She has translated several works from Hindi to English, including Mahadevi Varma’s My Family (Penguin, 2021). She co-edited the path-breaking Same-Sex Love in India, and edited and translated On the Edge: A Hundred Years of Hindi Fiction on Same-Sex Desire (Penguin, 2023).

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My Family

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Same-sex Love in India

Edited by Ruth Vanita & Saleem, Ruth Vanita, Saleem Kidwai

The Night Sparkled and So Did All of Us

Memory of Light is a tender romance of two young courtesans in Nawabi-era Lucknow. The entire novel unfolds through the narrator, Nafis Bai’s memory of events, lending it her unique voice, which stays with the reader. Intrigued? Read an excerpt from the book below: Late at night before the big occasion, I tried the outfit […]

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