india author m 1- a-nan - University of Wollongong

y discussion of links between All About H. Hatterr (1948) and Forster, philsophy and the
Absurd, Dostoevsky’s Notes from the Underground, Camus, Sartre and Beckett.
Concentrates on ‘The Song to Ganga’ in Hatterr as crucial expression of visionary experience.
Desani's minor works are dealt with in the chapters "Kipling's Mother and Hali's Women" and
"Goan, meet a Samoan". Determines the writing to be entirely self-reflexive. Comprehensive
bibliography.
RIEMENSCHNEIDER, DIETER. "All About H. Hatterr and the Problem of Cultural
Alienation" The Literary Criterion 20.2 (1985):23-35. The problem of alienation is intensified
by the numerous expressions of a lack of communication in the text. Perceives the structure of
the book coheres in translating “the message of the practical East” into a comprehensible
statement. Claims an existential analysis answers the central quandary of the narrator’s quest.
SHARRAD, PAUL. "Musings on the Hats of Hatterr" ACLALS Bulletin 7th Series No. 4
(1986):79-87.
Suggests two contexts for reading Desani’s masterpiece: literature of Anglo-India,
meaning both colonial and racially mixed; and literary “Indianness”, grounded in classical
Sanskrit literature. Compares All about H. Hatterr (1948) to Rudyard Kipling’s Kim (1901)
and to Dandin’s Dasakumaracarita as an originary Sanskrit source. Desani simultaneously
confirms and undermines the authority of both Christian and Hindu dogma.
SRINATH, C.N. "G.V. Desani: All about H. Hatterr" Literary Criterion 9.3 (1970): 40-56.
Reissued in The Literary Landscape Delhi: Mittal Publications, 1986: 12-30.
Character study identifying the distinctive message of Hatterr in the description of a
metaphysical attitude to life as leela or play. Hatterr shows both zest for life and passive
acceptance of its contrasts. Makes comparison to Raja Rao’s The Cat and Shakespeare and
notes the importance of the ‘hymn’ to Ganga section. Reveals the author’s fusing of technique
and tone to express Hatterr’s attitude to life: a blend of the humourous, the grotesque and the
serious.
Deshpande, Gauri
VERMA, MONIKA. "Gauri Deshpande" in DWIVEDI, A.N. "Eves' Song: Contemporary
English Verse by Indian Women" Studies in Contemporary Indo-English Verse: A Collection
of Critical Essays. Vol. I Female Poets Bareilly: Prakash Book Depot, 1985: 65-75.
VARMA, MONIKA. “Gauri Deshpande” Commonwealth Quarterly 9.28 (1984): 15-28.
Between Births works in two styles: delicate lyricism and assertive sincerity. Praises restraint
and attention to Indian reality, noting lapses into poeticising, dramatic excess, careless
punctuation and “feminine mushiness”. Evaluative critique favouring tight craft, “poetic
seriousness”, correspondence to reality, and repression of physical detail: generally wanting of
women poets less of “sights and thighs”.
Deshpande, Shashi
KING, ADELE. "Shashi Deshpande: Portraits of an Indian Woman" in KIRPAL, VINEY,
ed. & introd. The New Indian Novel in English: A Study of the 80s New Delhi: Allied
Publishers, 1990: 159-67.
DeSouza, Eunice
JUSSAWALLA, ADIL. “One Woman’s Poetry” JSAL 18.1 (1983):88-90.