Title: Silhouettes of Time
Author: Maya Mitra Das
Publisher: Authors Press
ISBN: 978-1943471072
Pages: 226
Genre: Fiction
Reviewed by: David Allen
Pacific Book Review
These stories of author Maya Mitra Das are exemplars of the wider, more global, more inclusive world of fiction now out there. The landscape of writing has changed for the better: the ‘good old boys’ school has been superseded by an infusion of diversity and diverse perspectives. Some of the best writing now comes to us from disenfranchised, native, and/or Third World authors.
The change is welcome, refreshing, long overdue. In one of Das’ stories, a young Indian girl describes the life-changing horrors of Hindu versus Muslim strife; she witnesses the murder of her parents and must then live as a displaced woebegone servant in some stranger’s home. The tragedy of displacement and loss is set against the exotic backdrop of early 20th century India and Mahatma Gandhi’s struggle against British colonial rule. Poetry and song, from Tagore and other sources, appear in tasteful strophes, adding just the right cadence to the swift narrative.
Half a world away, in Charleston, South Carolina, in ‘A Lily Blooms in Summer’, a young white woman lives out her bliss – and nightmare – as she tries to make a life with a half ‘colored’ man. She experiences the full force of cultural inertia and reaction, somehow deals with the turbulence, and lives to tell the tale.
Amrita, the personable narrator of ‘Grandpa’s Sunday Shakespeare Scholars’, describes her grandfather’s literary gatherings, where she first heard tell of Shakespeare, Shelley, Wordsworth, Tennyson. Clearly, as in all of these stories, Das’ heroines reflect one or more of the many facets of herself.
‘The Vigilant Muse’ is a syncretic panegyric to nature: specifically, to the limitless beauty of a mountain (Mount Diablo), and its verdure – trees worthy of love, respect, and nurturing. A girl confides in a tree – and the tree talks back. This is great magical realism, deftly handled in the service of a charming tale that takes on a historical, universal significance.
This collection offers much, much more. Another girl gets to meet the ‘creative’ of her dreams, the Russian composer Alexander Scriabin (who it turns out fulfilled a lifelong longing to see his music played in India.
So, the world of Silhouettes of Time is a rich one – a glistening omnibus of flavors, epochs, and sensibilities. Historical event limns timeless themes such as love, creativity, passion, and family. The stories are unified by a singular vision and voice, a voice that is gentle, rhythmic, soothing. The prose is beguiling in its simplicity and directness – but empyrean in its reach and sensitivity. This is a book for readers of all stripes and persuasions – a paean to the tree of life.
