‘Sakina’s Kiss’: English translation of Vivek Shanbhag’s novel to release in October

New Delhi, Sep 4 (PTI) The English translation of celebrated Kannada author Vivek Shanbhag’s 2021 novel “Sakinala Muttu” will hit the stands next month, announced publisher Penguin Random House India (PRHI) on Monday.

The novel, titled “Sakina’s Kiss” in English, is translated by Sahitya Akademi Award winner Srinath Perur. It is currently available on pre-order in select bookstores and will be on e-commerce platform next week onwards.

“The world works in mysterious ways and my writing confirms this to me. Being translated by Srinath Perur is a process that can take me deeper into my own work. I am grateful for his generosity of spirit and attention to craft,” said Shanbhag, author of bestselling and widely translated “Ghachar Ghochar”, in a statement.

Set over four sleepless days, the protagonist, Venkat, and his family find their lives turned upside down as they get embroiled in a world of street gangs and murky journalism.

The novel, touted to be a literary masterpiece, keeps readers on the edge as it interrogates the space between truth and perception.

“‘Sakina’s Kiss’ is a fast-paced novel, almost a thriller. But it’s also making profound observations about the limits of our understanding, about how what goes on in our heads and what happens in our homes can’t be separated from the events of the wider world.

“The book has been great fun to work on and I’m thrilled it will be in the hands of readers soon,” said Perur, who is also the translator of “Ghachar Ghochar” and co-translator of theatre veteran Girish Karnad’s memoir “This Life at Play”.

According to PRHI, the novel is a “precise meditation on the persistence of old biases and a rattled masculinity in India’s changing socio-political landscape”.

“It’s an exquisite piece of literature… His previous work transformed the way we approached novels in translation in this country, and with this book too we know that in Srinath Perur’s unassuming person lies one of our very best translators,” said Elizabeth Kuruvilla, associate publisher at PRHI.

The novel has received advance praise from well-known authors, including International Booker Prize-winning Geetanjali Shree and Commonwealth Book Prize-winning British-Pakistani author Mohammed Hanif.