Manju Kapur lives in New Delhi, where she is a teacher of English Literature at Miranda House, Delhi University. She won the 1998 Commonwealth Writer's Prize (Eurasia) for her first novel Difficult Daughters, which was a bestseller in India and the UK. The book is set during India's independence struggle and is partially based on the life of Kapur's own mother, Virmati (whose photograph, along with Kapur's father, is on the cover of the bok). Virmati enters into a scandalous relationship with her married neighbour, the Professor. The relationship parallels India's battle for freedom, and eventually Virmati becomes the Professor's second wife. The book is set mostly in Amritsar and Lahore. Difficult Daughters has been translated into Marathi and six European languages. Her second novel, 'A Married Woman' has been translated into Spanish, 'Married Woman' is a story of love, set at a time of political and religious upheaval. Told with sympathy and intelligence, a Married Woman is the story of an artist whose canvas challenges the constraints of middle-class existence. Her latest novel 'The Immigrant', is the story of Delhi-based Nina, a 30-year-old unmarried professor trying to make ends meet. Life for Nina is nothing but a continuous struggle. But hope comes in the form of an arranged marriage with Ananda, an NRI based in Canada.
As mentioned in 'The Guardian' UK, "Manju Kapur has a non-commonplace gift for writing about commonplace people without exaggerating their dullness for effect or falling into dullness herself." |
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