HOOKED BY A HOOKAH
India Today|February 13, 2023
The uncertainty that marks Shahidul Zahir's stories makes them at once beguiling and discomfiting
Manjula Padmanabhan
HOOKED BY A HOOKAH

WHY THERE ARE NO NOYONTARA FLOWERS IN AGARGAON COLONY: STORIES

by Shahidul Zahir; translated by V. Ramaswamy

HARPERCOLLINS INDIA

₹399; 26: pages

There are some authors whose prose rises off the printed page like a mist. Or a dream. Soon it begins to affect the prose style of the reviewer. Shahidul Zahir is an author of that sort. Or maybe not? It’s hard to tell. Maybe it’s the style of the translator, V. Ramaswamy. He appears to have done such a painstaking job that even though the words are in English, the fragrance of the writing remains Bengali.

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