Bibliofile

MS Found In A Bin

An A-list author, one of the torchbearers of Indians writing in English whose first book became a sensation in the ’90s, and whose later books have not lived up to the promise of that first one, is ready with a new novel after a gap of many years. He sub­mitted it to a leading publishing house but the senior editors there couldn’t believe what they were reading—pure drivel, not fit for publishing. So a team of editors got together, suggested certain changes to the language, the plot and the narrative, and sent it back to the author. Nothing doing, he said, he won’t like a single word or sentence touched. The publishing house is in a fix now, the author is big but the book is rubbish. Last heard, they were planning to ask him to take the MS somewhere else.

The Second Coming

If Rajnikant’s biography (Rajnikant: The Definitive Biography by Naman Rama­chandran) came out last year, can Kam­alahaasan’s be far behind? Journalist and director of L.V. Prasad Film Academy, K. Hariharan, is at it—he has met the other Tamil superstar over many sessions and the biography promises to have a lot of unknown anecdotes, both on his personal life and his long film career (Kamal’s first film as a child artiste, Kalathur Kannamma, was released 55 years ago).

Cat 22

What does a single letter matter in a book title? Bestsellers could well be called The Da Vinchi Cod and classics become Olive Twist. And how would the covers look? Take a look at The Guardian site, with 20 books with a missing letter.