A CENTURY OF QUEERNESS IN HINDI FICTION

‘On The Edge' is a oneof-a-kind attempt at consolidating a selection of Hindi texts on same sex relationships

- Anukrti Upadhyay

The eminent literary historian and translator Ruth Vanita has an impressive body of scholarly work on same sex love, desire and relationships in Indian literature and culture. Her works have been widely quoted in the historic case to repeal section 377 of the Indian Penal Code back in 2018. Now, with On The Edge: 100 Years Of Hindi Fiction On Same-Sex Desire, Vanita turns specifically to queer love in Hindi fiction.

Published soon after the Supreme Court's hearings on petitions to legalise same sex marriages earlier this year, Vanita's anthology comprises short stories and excerpts from longer works, all translated and edited by her. Its timing and ambition, even after the recent disappointment of the same sex unions verdict in October, is important.

The chronology that On the Edge spans -from Discussing Chocolate, Pandey Bechan Sharma "Ugra's" 1924 short story, which first appeared in the magazine Matvala, to post-covid works from contemporary Hindi publications and the spectrum of relationships it displays, from tentative friendships to intense and sexual experiences-all speak to Vanita's depth of knowledge of modern Hindi literature and are an urgent reminder to know and understand the subcontinent's own stories of non-heteronormative desires in modern history.

The sequencing shows a striking evolution in the representation of same sex relationships and sexual identity in Hindi literature. In Discussing Chocolate, Ugra's controversial short story, homosexuality is presented variously as depravity, an illness, a societal evil. Read alongside his autobiography, the equally controversial Apni Khabar (2006), the story appears to derive from his own experiences through the early to mid-20th century, of child abuse and predation in travelling drama companies.