Inside Story with Humphrey

Let Goldster’s Inside Story take you deep inside India with Namita Gokhale, an exceptional author, publisher and director of literary festivals. Namita’s latest novel The Blind Matriarch is a family saga told from the viewpoint of a blind grandmother living on the top floor of a rambling house shared with her large extended family. This timely novel explores the clamour and complexity of multi-generational households in India and is described as “a clear-eyed chronicle of the tragedies of India’s encounter with the Coronavirus, the cynicism and despair that accompanied it, and the resilience and strength of the human spirit”.

Namita’s other books include Book of Shadows (2000) and Things to Leave Behind (2016). More recently, her brilliantly funny and often moving Jaipur Journals (2020) introduces a cascade of characters and stories from her stewardship of the Jaipur Literary Festival, which she founded with the author William Dalrymple in little more than a hut in the grounds of the Diggi Palace in Jaipur. The festival has since become an iconic beast on the international literary scene. It is free and open to anyone who wants to rub shoulders with the likes of Tom Stoppard, Salman Rushdie and Ian McEwan.

To find out more about India, its literature, its characters and its colours, and why Jaipur is called the Pink City, join Humphrey Hawksley in conversation with Namita Gokhale at 12:00 noon, on Thursday 17 March with Goldster’s Inside Story. 

To purchase the book, click here.