When people ask me why all my writing is set in Bombay, I say that I am unable to let it go. The city haunts me; it inspires me. The best way for me to describe Bombay is that it is a cross between a nightingale and a vulture: beauty and death. My previous novels The Cripple and His Talismans and The Song of Kahunsha reflect that. But when I am in Canada, my new home, the place that I ache for is about 65 miles from Bombay. It is called Dahanu and this is where my new novel is set.
Dahanu Road traces the journey of my people, the Zoroastrian Iranis, from Iran to Bombay, and then Dahanu, where they set up fruit orchards. They grew just one fruit, sweet and brown, called the chickoo. This novel is my love letter - dark, disturbing and ribald (as all love letters should be) to a place and people that mean a lot to me.
Stay tuned to this blog, and I hope that the music you hear in the coming days will haunt, inspire, and entertain.
Anosh.
About Me
- Anosh Irani
- Anosh Irani was born and brought up in Bombay, India and moved to Vancouver in 1998. He is the author of the acclaimed novels THE CRIPPLE AND HIS TALISMANS and THE SONG OF KAHUNSHA, which was a finalist for CBC Radio's Canada Reads and the Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize, was published in thirteen countries, and was a bestseller in Canada and Italy. His play BOMBAY BLACK was a Dora Award winner for Outstanding New Play. Irani was nominated for the Governor General’s Award for Drama for his anthology The Bombay Plays: THE MATKA KING & BOMBAY BLACK. His novel DAHANU ROAD was longlisted for the 2010 Man Asian Literary Prize.