Maybe the Chinese are telling us they loved NOPE? In that inscrutable Oriental way?
Bugs Bunny hatin’ on women, Donald Duck riffin’ on guitar, Mickey Mouse takin’ a . . .
All young women whom the current political junta doesn’t like–westernized, assertive, working girls with their own plans–are represented as ball-crushing fiends.
“The Land of the NRA, the Home of the Dead”
I am an immigrant to this country, with an American son. Today, to me, freedom in America seems to be coming close to meaning the good fortune for my son to not get shot randomly, coldly, in a public place, anywhere, in any-town, at any-time America….
Roe v Wade Overturned
My Friends, enjoy the future drafted and curated for women by Amy Coney Barrett, who definitely far exceeds at least Clarence Thomas in the cojones department.
Washington DC South Asia Literary Festival Panel now on YOUTUBE
One of BUZZFEED News’ “15 Books From Smaller Presses You Won’t Be Able to Put Down!”
Inviting YOU
to the Washington DC, South Asia Literary Festival 2022 Friends, you are warmly invited to the following event: Washington DC, South Asia Literary Festival 2022 Sample More About Love’s Garden And Related Events Below:
How to Read Macbeth Again and Understand the Horrors of Climate Change
Faced by either individual extinction (death), or collective extinction (climate catastrophe), especially if self-propelled, humans find the idea of complete senselessness almost as terrifying as physical annihilation. In Shakespeare’s immortal lines, and through his tragic protagonist’s unavailing last-minute regret for what he has done out of pride, arrogance, and ambition, we hear the echo of humanity’s lament in the face of extinction, whether individual or collective.
To Write About and From Within the Ineffable, the Unthinkable, the Unimaginable–Can You?
Have we, in some elusive way, been using language as not expression but as count?… ? And fast?
How Not To Be Taken In By Your Doomsday Prophet Veterinarian: Cats, Love, and ER
but if you don’t give her the benefit of ER, well….
My Pushcart Nomination
‘After the House Burned Down”
How to Write a Historical Novel and (MAYBE) not be in it….
Writing the Historical Novel: Reading and Craft talk with Dr. Nandini Bhattacharya–Zoom Nov. 5th 4-5 PM
Call for Papers on South Asia and Masculinity
We invite papers that are sensitive to contradictions, ambiguities, and affective dissonances that surface in the fictional depictions of masculinities due to economic, racial, religious, caste, and sexual hierarchies and conflicts.
Announcing the Tasveer South Asia Festival online…. Movies, Books and Conversations
Announcing the Tasveer South Asia Festival online
Sleep no more
“Glamis hath murdered sleep, and therefore Cawdor shall sleep no more. Macbeth shall sleep no more.”
Terrific tidbits
I have the pleasure of sharing the following new works of art by wonderful writers, with reviews and associated events for their powerful voices
April 15, 2021; Checks and Balances
Can a man die of oxygen deprivation if there’s a strong, heavy knee placed on his neck for 9 (oh, just give and take, the killings haven’t even slowed down yet, homeys) minutes? Or must we dig for alternative causes like all the ills that black folks have been heir to and victim-blamed for throughout these last great American centuries—drugs, poor self-care, poverty, despair, lack of faith in the SYSTEM and the MAN, systemic denigration [note the intended pun! The word means ‘to blacken’!] and devaluation—till we come up with something resembling business as usual.
How will you observe this American President’s Day?
Now, I understand why it is important to trust and respect these institutions and figures. We have to believe in something, since much else in American history is now revealed to be quite embarrassing in the eyes of the whole world. But can the answers to my wonderment about the American President’s Day really be found in the Constitution? Or the politics of the Founding Fathers? The same men who thought and asserted they could uphold E Pluribus Unum while holding and fathering slaves?
Eat drink and be merry, for tomorrow you may be in Utah
I wandered, literally, up and down the bruited and brutal ‘Oregon Trail’ which so many nineteenth-century Americans eager (or greedy) for a ‘better life,’ for the ‘American Dream’ set out on, in unbelievably rickety wagons, with children, wives, cattle, guns, food, elders (most in small quantities, except sometimes children) for the Pacific West and Northwest.
Annus Mirabilis, or Year of Wonders
Dear Friends and Readers, Is it possible? Is our Annus Mirabilis almost over? Really? 2020 is not going to jump back and take another swipe at us, sink down with us to the bottom of the ocean, turning off our living daylights?
YouTube Channel, Readings, and Travels
And two night ago I arrived at the Centrum Writer’s Residency in Port Townsend, WA, to write, reflect, self-flagellate (? always!) and look at the Pacific for three weeks.
You can Still watch a reading by me, Usha Akella and Tori Reynolds, two amazing poets, at the KGB BAR, Nov 15, 6 -8 PM CST
PLEASE CONSIDER DONATING TO KGB BAR when you sign up for this event.
This iconic, independent literary institution of New York is on the verge of closing doors forever unless we, the public, readers and writers, who want the arts to survive, support them.
The Three O-s
I will express strong love for Obstinate Older Oaklike men with thinning hair (as long as it’s not orange); I will let my heart flutter a little now and then; and I will even cry as I smile or laugh like a fool. The latter might happen at 7 pm CST tonight when my president addresses the nation.
Election 2020
Brave New World of Election 2020, half of the voters in the world’s most powerful country (leaving out the word ‘democracy’) have voted for Donald Trump
November 3, 2020 — what will the next eighty years bring?
Wendy J. Fox on Love’s Garden: “Love is an enigma, but marriage is serious business,” writes Bhattacharya in this novel that spans three decades and three generations of women in India under British colonial rule. The book deftly confronts how, for these women, marriage is often an escape route and the only pathway to having a home of their own. Though the setting is somewhat historical, spanning both world wars and the turbulent backdrop of the Indian independence movement, the novel is a timeless story of redemption.
About those silver linings in spite of COVID
Friends, below are some curated virtual events, artistic and literary, that are the silver lining in COVID skies. Because wherever you are in the world, COVID can’t stop you from attending these. So I’ve listed them below from soonest to latest. I could only list some, and there are many great ones I’m missing. Maybe you can write in comments about those.
Joyfully announcing retailers for Love’s Garden, my novel, in India
the Mother will understand if you don’t visit her in pandals this year, for she knows our hearts, is in our hearts. She is our heart. For she is our MOTHER. We worship her in our hearts.
Silver Lining — virtual readings
I hope at the end of that time there were be a ‘newer,’ ‘better’ normal, including a top to bottom clean-up of the big White House on 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Now, here are some free and open events at the Vermont Studio Center.
Review of Love’s Garden
Forewords Review of Love’s Garden BUY LOCALLY VIA BOOKSHOP BUY ON AMAZON LOVE’S GARDEN Nandini BhattacharyaAubade Publishing (Oct 27, 2020)Softcover $18.95 (435pp)978-1-951547-08-0 Clarion Rating: 4 out of 5 Love’s Garden is an expansive love story set during turbulent times. https://atomic-temporary-161503341.wpcomstaging.com/wp-admin/post.php?post=3983 Mari Carlson, Forewords Review of Love’s Garden Nandini Bhattacharya’s historical romance Love’s Garden witnesses India’s turbulent history at the turn of the twentieth century through the lives of one family. In 1898, Britain has influenced India’s law to the extent that Saroj need not die when her first husband does. Nor is she forced to marry her brother-in-law against her wishes. Instead, she arranges to marry…
AWWW, it’s a Happy Birthday
Dear Friends and Readers, Near and Far, please join me for the Happy Birthday of Love’s Garden You’re invited for the VIRTUAL book launch and happy birthday of Love’s Garden, An epic family saga of war, love, friendship, and sacrifice in twentieth-century India during its fight against British rule… TANTARAAAHH!! October 27, 2020 Find Love’s Garden at Amazon: and mark your calendars for these free, virtual, various and, I’d claim, virtuous events: Reading at the KGB Bar, New York City, Nov 15, 2020, 7-9 PM Book Launch at Brazos Bookstore, Houston, TX, Oct 27, 2020, 7–8 PM Reviewers hail it…
American Rust — review
This is a good time to take note that America’s president, who promised to help the hard-working backbone of American manufacturing toiling in mills, mines and swamps, is now telling the same unrelieved people to re-elect him by committing voter fraud.
The Great Goddess Comes
Their misdeeds are legion, but here’s a short one: xenophobia, racism, corruption, personal and moral turpitude, lies, egomania, megalomania, and constant, untiring self-interest.
Please join me for the Launch of my novel Love’s Garden at Brazos Bookstore, Houston, TX
Friends, I have the great pleasure of inviting you to the Book Launch of Love’s Garden, October 27, 2020, 7-8 pm, at Brazos Bookstore, Houston.
‘I Hate Men’
‘We should have the right not to like men,’ says Pauline Harmange
Do you like free books?
Would you like to read Love’s Garden for free?
On Arundhati Roy, from the writer of Love’s Garden….
“The targets of the dual assault of communal fascism and neo-liberalism are the poor and the minority communities (who, as time goes by are gradually being impoverished.) As neoliberalism drives its wedge between the rich and the poor, between India Shining and India, it becomes increasingly absurd for any mainstream political party to pretend to represent the interests of both the rich and the poor, because the interests of one can only be represented at the cost of the other.”
Read Love’s Garden for free in the next two months
Life’s a story about a journey. I’ve been on a few lately, and have reported about some. But stories have their journeys too. As I’ve been traveling, so has my debut novel, Love’s Garden https://www.facebook.com/watch/live/?v=3121058904637971&ref=watch_permalink Today I write to invite you, friends and readers, to read Love’s Garden FOR FREE, in the next two months, courtesy my excellent publisher Aubade Publishing, and NetGalley. https://www.netgalley.com/widget/268442/redeem/9ca1d204d8261cc444af4980ea46301368971a3b447503879f429055fe90e79c Oh, these are tough times https://fortune.com/2020/07/12/work-from-home-coronavirus-time-distortion/ But Stories are what will get us through the shadows and searchlights of History So I invite to join me in the recent legs of my journey as a writer,…
Race and America; Political Blackness 2
I Can’t Breathe
Where is this city in North America? Three guesses enough?
So, where am I safe? And, why am I having to ask this question?
Cambridge Writers Workshop reading for Institute International Education got over 1000 views last night. Hope you were there!
“IIE’s mission is to help people and organizations leverage the power of international education to thrive in today’s interconnected world.”
“We believe that when education transcends borders, it opens minds, enabling people to go beyond building connections to solving problems together. Our vision is a peaceful, equitable world enriched by the international exchange of ideas and greater understanding between people and cultures.”
IIE focuses on work that “advances scholarship, builds economies, and promotes access to opportunity.” They run over 200 programs for international students with more than 29,000 participants.
If you would like to join us in supporting IIE’s work, you can learn more about making a direct donation here:
https://www.iie.org/Donate/Where-to-give
Sweet dreams are made of these….
Hot off the Press. Holding my first print copy of my debut novel. I never thought this would happen. So, thanks to all whom I acknowledge in the book and to all readers who would honor me by reading it. Love’s Garden It’s 1898. India is ruled by the British, and India’s women are ruled by British masters as well as Indian men. A desperate young widow makes an unspeakable sacrifice to save herself from ultimate dishonor. Though she marries a stranger for security and shelter, her damaged second family pays dearly for this Faustian bargain. Then, an extraordinary atonement,…
Literary Durbar! For the Rights of Minorities and Refugees, and against xenophobic mentalities!
*****In light of recent pressures against allowing international students — futuremakers — to stay in the United States during the COVID-19 pandemic, CWW would like to emphasize their support of international connection and study.******
The Hills Times presents Love’s Garden, courtesy of Dr. Ratan Bhattacharjee, Associate Professor and Chair of English, Motijheel College, Kolkata; Columnist; Poet; and Editor in Chief of Literary Confluence : A Global Journal of English and Culture Studies
My sincerest thanks to Dr. Ratan Bhattacharjee for writing about my debut novel, a great honor for me, and especially heartwarming coming from a fellow Indian and creative intellectual.
What’s the TIME?
“Thanks to COVID, we have rediscovered that we are just one species, and not necessarily the strongest one. This virus, in a way, could suppress the human species as we know it—that is, if we do nothing. This makes it unprecedented. It puts our whole view of the modern world—our vision of progress, our mastery over nature—in doubt.” Francois Hartog, historian
“I hate 2020”
To survive, we must learn to be sustainable while not taking this grand planet and its self-sustaining but sensitive ecosystem for granted.
The Topeka School
Ben Lerner’s The Tople School makes you despair a little about parenting.
Love’s Garden — Nearly There!
Love’s Garden — Nearly There!
Autobiography of Political Blackness
This series will be about my connection as a South Asian-American to Political Blackness, a term now in use to describe solidarity across races.
Big Bad Wolves
Rajput’s tragic death must be seen in the context that in the fairly global fairy tale where power generally devours women and spits them out as gristle (remember Red Riding Hood’s Wolf?), a MAN has suffered that unlikely fate. A MAN has died a womanly death. Whether anyone says it out loud or not, that Rajput was a man, that he was upper-caste Hindu, that he was gorgeous, that he was talented, meant nothing because he had “no godfather.” Like women, who have only one kind, for which Rajput presumably didn’t qualify or apply.
What kind of Despair? What kind of Hope? Let’s be ANTINA.
We need to be ANTINA: COVID ANTI-NATIONALISTS.
Happiness is talking about writing
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One Planet, Only One 
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