Bibliofile

But Macaulay’s putris are unfazed. They are joining hands with desi writers for a five-day South Asian women writers’ conference sponsored by the British Council from February 16-21. Sparks are unlikely to fly a la Neemrana but 30 women writers from the subcontinent and the UK will retreat to Sanskriti Anandgram near Delhi for the occasion to discuss women writers’ biggest grouse: how to be seen and heard.

A publishing house that promoted putris of everyone from Kalidasa to Macaulay is disappearing. Kali for Women was set up in the heady days of belan-waving and anti-dowry marches, promoting women’s studies and writers. Some would say it was doomed anyway in these days of chicklit and champagne launches. But the twosome behind Kali, Ritu Menon and Urvashi Butalia, are determined to stay in feminist publishing even if they are going their separate ways. The sad business of broken marriages has begun: the splitting of the bookshelves. The one thing that can’t be shared, the Kali imprint, will cease to make its occasional appearance in bookstores.

He may be no Jeffrey Archer, who managed to dash off his Prison Diary in record time, but Tehelka reporter Kumar Badal didn’t waste his six months in lock-up. When he wasn’t writing letters for fellow prisoners, Badal was furiously taking notes for his own book. He has nearly completed his manuscript of his jail tales.