When the Cicadas Sing: A Village Summer Among Paddy Fields and Grandma
I remember the first time my grandmother taught me how to plant rice. I was nine. The school was closed for summer break. On the last day, I rushed home in excitement. I emptied the books from my school bag and packed them with the change of clothes. The next day, Mother dropped me off […]
How Storytelling in Corporate Culture Can Engage, Inspire & Transform Your Workplace
Do you remember the last time you sat down to read a book? What if I tell you that reading for just six minutes can reduce stress levels by 68%? Or that reading fiction can improve your decision-making capabilities by 50 to 100%? There are hundreds of studies proving the benefits of reading both personally […]
The Making of a Cricket Hero: R. Ashwin’s I Have the Streets Review
Yash Pawaskar reviews I Have the Streets by R. Ashwin and Sidharth Monga (published by Ebury Press, Penguin Random House India, 2024). The 2024 T20 World Cup was going on. As usual, my colleague and I were discussing cricket. In one of our conversations, I showed him the hot-off-the-press book I was reading—I Have the […]
Why Translation and Localisation Efforts are Great Economic Strategies for Your Company
Localisation, the practice of adapting content or information in the cultural context of the target audience, is an inclusive choice with enormous economic benefits. This includes not only language but also tone, imagery, visuals, UI and more. Translation is just one part of this process. English is the most popular language on the web, used […]
Schoolboy Fears and Literary Joys: The Adventures of Rusty by Ruskin Bond Review
Zoeb Matin reviews The Adventures of Rusty by Ruskin Bond (published by National Book Trust, 1995). It is curious, sometimes, when one thinks of it just how a particular day in childhood could hold a little of both excitement and fear within the space of an hour. For us, at school, it was inevitably the […]
What are Family Archives and How Can You Make One to Capture your Family Histories?
There is a common stereotype about family histories and the stories that evoke the family setup. Sitting with a loved one – a mother, father, grandparent, aunt – maybe before bedtime or lounging in the afternoon, as they recall their childhood, their years of growing up, fables they heard, games they played, their ancestral homes, […]
Art versus artist: New perspectives enrich this old question at The Purple Corner
Over the last month, two prominent names got embroiled in the now prominent, often discussed, but forever inconclusive debate around the art versus artist – the globally beloved Alice Munro and Neil Gaiman. This brought back a question that has been discussed, most prominently since the #meToo movement. If you like a piece of work, […]
Shatranj Ke Khilari: Analyzing Satyajit Ray’s Adaptation of Premchand’s Classic
Literary adaptations in Indian cinema are rare. Great literary adaptations in Indian cinema are rarer. Satyajit Ray’s Shatranj Ke Khilari (1977), adapted from the eponymous short story by Premchand (1924), easily falls into the latter category. If you’ve ever tried searching for sports adaptations from Indian literature, you’d be sorely disappointed by the meagre numbers, […]
My Riveting Journey Through Japanese Literature: From Higashino to Tanizaki
There comes a time in a reader’s life when nothing on the bookshelf inspires her enough to be picked up. Back in the summer of 2016, I found myself facing such a bookshelf in the capital of the southernmost of the northeastern states of India. I had just lost my mother, quit my high-paying, high-stress […]
Indian Feminist Literature Through the Ages
Indian feminist literature has evolved significantly through the decades and centuries, reflecting the evolution of the complex socio-cultural South Asian landscape. From the earliest reformist writings to the modern explorations of gender and identity, Indian feminist literature has a wide range of voices advocating for women’s rights and challenging the mainstream patriarchal norms. In this […]
