Matriarchs, Cows and Epic Villains

The figures in Suniti Namjoshi’s compelling stories range from shape-shifting cows to ruling mothers, from sage donkeys to epic villains. This substantial collection includes fables old and new, lyric poems and epigrams, long narratives and short introductory comments. We also complete the Ravana trilogy with ‘Shupi’s Choices’ and ‘Kumbh’. The villainous siblings are ridiculous at times, but they also show us our own shortcomings.

Funny, irreverent, tongue-in-cheek, joyful and profound, these tales are a delight to read. Matriarchs, Cows and Epic Villains is a selection of Suniti Namjoshi’s work, which continues to raise questions about how we deal with our destiny as human beings and confront our inadequacies.

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Suniti Namjoshi is a poet, fabulist and children’s writer with over forty books to her name. After a stint in the Indian Administrative Service, Namjoshi moved to Canada where she earned a PhD at McGill University, taught at the University of Toronto for many years, and then moved on to doing what she loves best—writing. A selection of her works is published in The Fabulous Feminist (2012). Her books include Suki (2013), a memoir about her beloved cat; Foxy Aesop: On the Edge (2018), which asks point-blank whether it is the function of writers to save the world; and Dangerous Pursuits (2022), which contains ‘Bad People’, the first part of the trilogy about Ravana and his siblings.