Conversations with Aurangzeb, by Tamil literary icon Charu Nivedita, translated by Nandini Krishnan

HarperCollins

presents

A new novel from the cult Tamil writer Charu Nivedita

Conversations with Aurangzeb

PB | Fiction | 348 pp | Rs 499

A historical novel reimagined as satire, Conversations with Aurangzeb is a biting commentary about our times.

Translated brilliantly from the Tamil by the award-winning Nandini Krishnan.

‘Comprehensively irreverent…genre-bending…sparklingly witty’
— MANU PILLAI

‘Who would have thought Aurangzeb could be so entertaining’
— MANU JOSEPH

Releasing 20 October 2023

Author Charu Nivedita says, ‘I have been published for over fifty years in Tamil, but this is the first time a translation of my work has been commissioned by a mainstream English publisher. I have been gratified by the effort our editor Rahul Soni and everyone at HarperCollins – the proof-readers, fact checkers and legal team – have put into this work. Nandini Krishnan, being a writer, has not so much translated this novel as played with the material to create a work of art in English. I’m sure even readers with no interest in history will enjoy this book. It gladdens me that the first time my work reaches a world outside my language is with a book that means so much to me. My research showed me a side of Aurangzeb I did not know existed, and I hope readers will meet him through this novel.’

Translator Nandini Krishnan says, ‘Translating Conversations with Aurangzeb has been a unique experience. The translation was commissioned even as the Tamil version was being written, so Mr Charu Nivedita and I reworked the story to accommodate various incidents that occurred through the life of the manuscript, including the process of editing and the legal read. It was particularly wonderful to work with Rahul Soni, whose laughs over the phone were the greatest validation of this experimental novel and whose incisive and nuanced suggestions have made it a far superior book to the manuscript he received. Mr Charu Nivedita is a Tamil literary icon, and I’m honoured to have worked so closely with him. I do think my own craft has been honed by writing in tandem with his quite beautiful mind.’

Rahul Soni, Associate Publisher – Literary, HarperCollins India, says, ‘Charu Nivedita has been a not-so-well-kept secret in the Indian literary world, ever since his iconic, boundary-breaking novel Zero Degree was published in English translation many years ago. With Conversations with Aurangzeb, he turns his art towards writing a historical novel and what emerges is an idiosyncratic and satirical look at the ways of power through the ages and around the world. Yet this is no serious, po-faced examination – it’s a hilarious, darkly comic work that will have you rolling in the aisles even as it twists the dagger. And in Nandini Krishnan, Charu has found a translator with an equally fine-honed craft and sharp, quick wit. This has been the most fun I’ve had working on a book, and I know that readers will also be endlessly entertained by this supremely clever and irreverent novel.’

ABOUT THE BOOK

A writer hopes to get some primary research done for his new book by interviewing the spirit of Shah Jahan. But the endeavour turns into an obstacle course, with his translator arguing about how to start a novel, a fellow writer giving him unsolicited feedback, and a friend plaguing him with phone calls. Worst of all, Shah Jahan is elbowed out by Aurangzeb, who hijacks the novel. In a series of conversations touching upon everything from marketing strategies for emperors to mutiny, from Marxism to Sunny Leone, and culminating in two men and a spirit going to a bar, Aurangzeb and various other visitors tell a story no one could have predicted.

Part historical novel, part satire, Conversations with Aurangzeb – by the cult Tamil writer Charu Nivedita and brilliantly translated by Nandini Krishnan – is a biting commentary on our times.

PRAISE FOR THE BOOK

‘Wry Tamil humour is a distinct form of telling a story; there is something uncomplicated and good-natured about it. I am glad English readers are going to get a feel of it. If you know Tamil, you’d think you’re reading Tamil, and if you don’t know Tamil you would think you’re reading your mother tongue. Also, who would have thought Aurangzeb could be so entertaining.’

— MANU JOSEPH

‘Comprehensively irreverent, this genre-bending, sparklingly witty novel fuses history with the wryness of our own times. Bringing together a long-dead Mughal emperor and the impulses of the Instagram generation, it throws the reader headlong into a marriage of parody with social commentary. I was, in succession, befuddled, amused, alarmed, but always also spellbound.’

— MANU PILLAI

ABOUT THE AUTHOR AND THE TRANSLATOR

Charu Nivedita is the author of more than sixty works in Tamil, ranging from collections of essays to novels, anthologies of poetry to short stories. Known as a postmodern, transgressive writer, he is most interested in autofiction and metafiction. He is best known for the novel Zero Degree, which was longlisted for the 2013 edition of Jan Michalski Prize for Literature and has found a place in several academic syllabi in India and overseas. His books Marginal Man, To Byzantium: A Turkey Travelogue, Unfaithfully Yours, Morgue Keeper and Towards a Third Cinema have been translated into English and published by independent presses. Charu Nivedita lives in Chennai with his human and animal family.

Nandini Krishnan is the author of Hitched: The Modern Woman and Arranged Marriage and Invisible Men: Inside India’s Transmasculine Networks. She is also the award-winning translator of Estuary and Four Strokes of Luck by Perumal Murugan, and Ponniyin Selvan by Kalki Krishnamurthy. Nandini’s novel-in-manuscript won the Caravan and Writers of India Festival contest 2014. Her translation of Sajjad Haider Yaldram’s short story, ‘Save Me from My Friends’, was shortlisted for the Jawad Memorial Prize for Urdu–English Translation 2022. Nandini lives in Madras, with dozens of animals, thousands of books and a varying number of humans.

 

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For reviews, excerpts, interviews and more information, please contact Shivendra Singh at shivendra.singh@harpercollins.co.in