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Rural narratives after Premchand remained unnoticed because of not being written in English. Rural India and Peasantry: Ethnography in stories after Premchand is a study of literary representation of rural life in a vast expanse of land designated as the Hindi Heartland. What lends unique strength to this work is that after Premchand, fictional narrative has not really been dealt with such scholarly seriousness or contextualized in the socio-economic scenario of the rural world and peasantry. More than thirty stories discussed in ten chapters, inherit a strong tradition of peasant narratives since the times of Premchand, exposing the reader to an intricate array of messy complications and contingencies, the small peasantry and the rural world has experienced since the early decades of independent India through the period of liberalization till the recent decades. Exploring non- canonical rural stories in Hindi, unfolds a spectrum of ethnic-cultural and psychological biographies
about the evolving rural scenario in the democratic India of our times. The substantial reference to concrete facts and data vindicate the realistic strain of the work. It would set a new example of interdisciplinary scholarship and open up new vistas of further scholarship, especially in the Cultural studies. The authentically translated excerpts, transcribe the spirit of rural India.
List of contents
- Introduction: Rural India and Peasantry in Stories
- 1: Village India: Difficult Stories
- 2: Land Grab: The Dispossessed in the Spectacles of Jugaad
- 3: Small Farmers of Cane and Paddy: Post-Harvest Delays and Non-Payment
- 4: Women Peasants in Triple Jeopardy: Conmen as Philanthropists
- 5: Why Do Rural Poor Continue to Remain Poor and Uneducated?
- 6: Rural Migration: Dismantling Rural Resources
- 7: When Hunger Hits the Rural Poor, Aged, and Disabled: The Meal of Mice and Dead Cow
- 8: Farmers in Death Row: Farming- Risky, Sisyphean; Usury- Back Breaking
- 9: Despoiled Environment: In the Politics of Integrated Development, Money Grows on Trees
About the author
Professor and former Head, Department of English, Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi. Worked in MGKV university, as a Faculty in GWU Washington DC, 2008-2009, Served as Chair India Studies in the Dept of Theatre and Performance, Monash University Melbourne2017
Summary
Drawing on a rich storehouse of short stories in Hindi, after Premchand, the book evokes the entire spectrum of crises that the rural world has experienced since the early decades of independent India through the period of liberalization till the recent decades. The transcribed excerpts poignantly carry the spirit of rural India.
