'A Teashop in Kamalapura and Other Classic Kannada Stories' review: The many maps of cultural memories

A Teashop in Kamalapura and Other Classic Kannada Stories is a collection of 18 landmark Kannada short stories published over 85 years — from the beginning of the 20th century to the 1980s — in English translation. The anthology offers a panoramic view of evolving Kannada literary traditions during this period. The editor of the series is Mini Krishnan, who has been a longtime advocate of Indian literature in translation. In her insightful introduction, she frames these stories as part of cultural memory: “Translation is a deep reading of a text. Every story or poem has a voice.”

Susheela Punitha is known for her translations of several Kannada literary works, including the notable Asprushyaru by Vaidehi (2012) and Dweepa by Na D’Souza (2013). Her translation of UR Ananthamurthy’s Bharatipura won a Sahitya Akademi award. In a delightful detail connecting the present and the past, she shares in her translator’s note that her late husband’s great-grandfather, Rev David Punitha, was a member of Rev Kittel’s Committee that compiled a Kannada-English dictionary in 1894. 

Punitha’s translations are sensitive and faithful renderings. She has taken efforts to source these stories from Kannada magazines and journals. With notable breadth, this anthology brings together the work of writers from north and south Karnataka, across three phases of modern Kannada writing: the Navodaya or Renaissance, Pragatishila or Progressive, and Navya or New Age. The stories contain wit, irony, deep feeling, and social commentary. The wry and witty title story by Panje Mangesharaya of Bantwal, South Karnataka, “Kamalapurada Hotlinalli,” published in 1900, is the first in the Navodaya tradition. Kerura Vasudevacharya’s delightful “Malleshi’s Sweethearts” (1912) is written in a charming, colloquial style with earthy humour: “Did you have eyes only for this tall, graceful sugarcane?” says a woman character to a young girl. Ajampura Sitaram (Ananda) and Nanjanaguru Thirumalamba add darker notes, asking readers to introspect about injustice and violence. “The Master’s Satyanarayana” by Koradkal Srinivasrao (1938) is an unsparing protest against the exploitation of landless labourers. Its spare sentences take us into the austere heart of poverty: “These children had only seen bunches of bananas hung in shops at fairs. They had never eaten any.”

The stories cover a vast social and emotional terrain. In The Story of Jogi Anjappa’s Hen (1945-55), Masti Venkatesha Iyengar uses light humour and irony to question notions of law and justice. “Rangappa had received an order recently, appointing him as the Bench Magistrate in our taluk. Everyone in our village was very happy, since our Shanbhag now had the authority to punish. The power to punish is considered a great prestige among our villagers. They feel that such a person should be equal to, at least, a subedar.”

In the final story, Sara Aboobacker’s searing “Between Rules and Regulations” (1985), we see a young girl who once worked as a maid, enduring her mistress’s beatings, just to earn two sovereigns of gold. Her mother explains, with painful reasoning, why she cannot leave the job: “Who’ll marry you if you don’t have at least some ear-studs with jhumkis dangling from them?” Finally, to pay for the daughter’s wedding, the older woman pawns her 14-year-old son as a bonded labourer.

Other writers — Kodagina Gowramma, H V Savithramma, Shamaladevi Belgaunkar, Saraswathibai Rajawade, and Triveni (Anasuya Shankar) — underscore women’s growing presence in literature. As you close the book, you begin to understand why, in her introductory note, Mini Krishnan frames the collection as a reflection on memory, empathy, and moral consciousness. This rich anthology is valuable not only for the narratives themselves, but also for the landscape they cover as they interact with identity, modernity, and social change.