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Born and educated in India and the States, Vijay Lakshmi,
a critic and social commentator, writes of the
psychological conflicts and moral dilemmas of the Indian
women settling in western societies. Her fiction,
lyrical and intense, portrays the alienation and the
pathos of the life lived in a contemporary metropolis,
whether American, European, or Indian. Her awards
include a Senior Fulbright Fellowship at Yale
University, and Editor's Prize from Orbis (U.K.) for her
story "Touchline." Two of her other stories –
"Mannequin" and "Distances" – have been translated into
French and Chinese.
Widely traveled in Europe, the States, and the Far East,
a mother of two grown-up children, she lives with her
husband in Glenside, and teaches college in
Philadelphia.
Pomegranate Dreams and other stories
Seven stories that move you to tears and laughter, and
the tornado of a novella that churns up everything in
its path. These appear as a collection for the first
time.
The stories, narrated by sensitive women, offer a
distillation of the emotional highs and lows experienced
by people newly joining a western society. The novella,
on the other hand, chronicles the hopes, despair, and
dreams of a young girl growing up in a new land, while
distraught by the memories of the old home. Altogether,
this witty fiction, by turns tender, comic, or
satirical, recounts the unexpected turns to which the
life of an immigrant is invariably treated. In essence,
though, it bears the hallmark of the novel experience of
all human communities everywhere.
Vijay Lakshmi's keen reflections surprise the readers at
the turn of each page, even as her narrative invites
them to ruminate upon the human river flowing through
city streets, meandering through slums and suburbs,
littered with broken lives and their tacky dreams. If
her stories rely upon lyrical symbolism, the novella
resorts to mythical analogs for its subliminal messages,
using bits of ancient Indian mythology to interpret and
critique the newcomer's experience of living in western
societies.
The stories are absolutely convincing.... And
Pomegranate Dreams material is so rich, the girl's
family so intriguing, and the theme of assimilation of
such importance that the piece feels to me like a
novella longing to be a novel."
– Paule Marshall, author, Brown Girl, Brownstones
"Vijay Lakshmi's fiction reaches out with strong beauty
to a community of minds located in a transnational
space. Her urbane rhythms, alert to diasporic
dislocations, continue to hark back to her Indian past."
– Jaysinh Birjepatil, Professor of English, Marlboro
College, Vermont.
To read a review, click
here |
