Indian Writers Who Write in English

Because I grew up in India, and because I am interested in fiction about various cultures in contact with each other, I have sought out and read many novels by Indian writers writing in English. Starting in about the early 1980s, there was an increasing number of such novels being published. Some of these writers live in and write about India itself; more of them, the ones being published in the West, have either grown up in or moved to the United States, Canada, or the UK; many of their novels are about the experience of being immigrants, of being pulled between two cultures. By the end of the 20th century, fiction by Indian authors seemed ubiquitous, and was very well received and reviewed. Salman Rushdie and others have decried the fact that literature in other, indigenous (i.e., non-English) languages of India is rarely translated and still more rarely published outside of India. Similar concerns have been expressed by African writers. I understand this concern, and hope that more such fiction will be translated and published. In the meanwhile, though, I celebrate the wealth of Indian fiction that we readers have access to. Below I list some of the Indian authors whose work I have particularly enjoyed, and whom I particularly respect. Some of these authors have published numerous novels and short story collections; here I include one or two titles for each authors as samples.

Samina Ali - Madras on Rainy Days
Anita Desai - Fire on the Mountain
Kiran Desai - The Inheritance of Loss
Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni - the Mistress of Spices; Queen of Dreams
Tania James - Atlas of Unknowns
Ginu Kamani - Junglee Girl
Jhumpa Lahiri - The Namesake
Kamala Markandaya - Nectar in a Sieve
Gita Mehta - A River Sutra
Rohinton Mistry - Family Matters; A Fine Balance
Bharati Mukherjee - Jasmine; Desirable Daughters
Arundhati Roy - The God of Small Things
Salman Rushdie - Midnight's Children
Nayantara Sahgal - Rich Like Us
Manil Suri - The Death of Vishnu