In what seems like a modern indictment of the race for instant literary labelling, Nirmal Verma’s writings defied the trappings of casual reading. There are many ways leading to his wide-ranging body of work but none of them is an easy route. To a large extent, that means that any attempt to revisit Verma’s life and writings – and, more so, the voguish urge to link the two – is fraught with risks that plague the recountings of many literary journeys.
That’s why it’s refreshing to note that Vineet Gill’s Here and Hereafter, published by Penguin Random House, steers clear of such dangers and offers a new prism to look back at Verma’s work. Gill excels in tracing the diffused elements that possibly went into the making of the great Hindi writer’s literary landscape and craft in the second half of the twentieth century.
