Shillong, Sept 8: Writer Koral Dasgupta was at Taj Vivanta, Shillong on Sunday for the “The Write Circle” organised by Prabha Khaitan Foundation.
This was the third such event organised by PKF.
Koral is an author who has published books from academic non-fiction to relationship dramas. The books are discussed from the context of gender studies, art, myth, and ecocritical literature. Her books are shelved in the libraries of prominent US Universities- University of Harvard, University of Pennsylvania and others. She has worked on the five-book Sati series – a retelling of the stories of the Panch Kanya from Indian mythology. The five books – Ahalya, Kunti, Draupadi, Mandodari, and Taara are on the shelves.
Koral’s interpretation of the mythological characters was appreciated by the audience. The session began with the welcome address by Pooja Goenka from Ehsaas, an umbrella body of women from across India. Jyoti Agarwal, also from Ehsaas, moderated the discussion by picking up interesting insights into the author’s mind concerning the deep understanding she has of the “Panch Kanyas”. The author spoke how these five books of the Sati series is everyone’s story from one perspective or the other. The author also spoke about the book “The Summer Holidays” a comedy and a family drama. Summer holidays has also been selected for screen adaptation. After a 50-minute conversation, the discussion was opened to the house for an interactive question answer session . The audience had numerous questions, and Koral dealt into the conversation to answer each of them. During the question answer, Koral’s metaphor to explain the most iconic scene from Mahabharata where Arjun questions his “Antaraatma” or conscience before going ahead with the wear- is it important to kill, will it benefit anyone?? If we had every human being thinking like Arjun, the world would be a much more peaceful to live in.
