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SPECIAL SERIES Raj Kamal Jha, 33 TRUE BLUE Nobody realised Raj Kamal Jha's The Blue Bedspread made it to the Booker longlist of 20 this year. It was a strangely apt denouement for a novel stretching across one long night, conjuring up a Calcutta that proved a trifle morbid for the genteel literati that has granted itself a copyright on the city and its imagery. Jha, an insomniac who writes after finishing work at The Indian Express, Delhi , was the toast of the book world overseas though. Picador paid him an "advance of $275,000". More eloquent was the praise from John Fowles (The French Lieutenant's Woman): "Something rather remarkable, almost a coming of age of the Indian novel." Jha, with an engineering degree from IIT Kharagpur behind him, is cagey about the future: "My ambition is to write a few decent books and keep pushing the envelope." He may yet get his literary award though. The Blue Bedspread is on the shortlist of six for The Guardian First Book Award. An age from now, when Jha is wrinkled and grey, he may well sip that glass of claret and remark, "1999 was a good year." He won't be talking about the wine. -Ashok Malik |
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