2024 JCB Prize for Literature: Longlist split evenly between English novels, translations

The jury, chaired by author and poet Jerry Pinto, included Tridip Suhrud, Deepthi Sasidharan, Shaunak Sen, and Aqui Thami. The shortlist of five books will be revealed on October 23. The winner, to be announced on November 23, will receive Rs 25 lakh, with an additional Rs 10 lakh for the translator if a translated work wins. Each shortlisted author will also receive Rs 1 lakh, with Rs 50,000 for the translator if applicable.

In recent years, the JCB Prize has faced criticism for seemingly favouring translated works over English originals, raising questions about the focus of a prize dedicated to Indian writing in English. This year’s equal split between translations and originals might signal a shift, though one wonders if the jury had a specific mandate to ensure this balance. Did they have a spreadsheet open, ticking off boxes? Whether this equal representation of both categories will continue or affect future selections remains to be seen. Here is a look at the 10 novels on the longlist:

1. Chronicle of an Hour and a Half by Saharu Nusaiba Kannanari (Context/Westland): The debut novel of Saharu Nusaiba Kannanari, who lives in a small town called Areekode near Calicut in Kerala, is set in in the foothills of the Western Ghats. Here, a village called Vaiga is enduring the worst storm it has seen in decades: ceaseless rain, fallen trees, flooded river, severe power cuts … But another, more insidious storm is brewing beneath the surface. It begins as a rumour of an illicit affair — a rumour that brings Saud and his sons to Vaiga in search of Burhan. The rumour soon takes on a life of its own, fuelled by feverish WhatsApp messages. In the ensuing chaos, as Vaiga erupts into violence and a mob takes to the street, baying for blood.

2. Hurda by Atharva Pandit (Bloomsbury India): The debut novel by the journalist and translator is centred on three sisters — Anisha, Sanchita and Priyanka — from Murwani, a village in Maharashtra. On Valentine’s Day, 2013, they disappear from school. No one knows where they went or why, but everyone remembers they were up to no good. Six years later, a journalist from Mumbai returns to the scene of the crime and tries to piece together what exactly happened that fateful day. Hurda is that story told through the voices of the many whose lives intersected with those of the three sisters. Based on a real-life incident, it explores the pervasive and deep misogyny of contemporary India. It’s a whodunit as well as an examination of what the lives of women are worth.

3. Leaf, Water and Flow by Avadhoot Dongare, translated from the Marathi Paan, Pani Ni Pravah by Nadeem Khan (Ratna Books): Dongare has published three other novels in Marathi: Svatahala Faltu Samjanyachi Goshta (The Story of Being Useless, 2012), Eka Lekhakache Teen Sandarbha (Three Contexts of a Writer, 2013), and Bhintivarcha Chashma (Specs on the Wall, 2018). Paan, Pani Ni Pravah was awarded the Sahitya Akademi Yuva Puraskar in 2014. Leaf, Water and Flow explores a complex web of power dynamics, addressing everything from the language we use to the influence of state and anti-state forces. We encounter Naxalite and Maoist politics, an egret that witnesses a child’s death in central India, an author reflecting on these events, and a dying teak leaf. The story brings together a cast of diverse characters: a ‘professional revolutionary’ released from prison, an Adivasi woman who once belonged to a Maoist group, the wife of a police sub-inspector, and a reader who closes the novel with his own reflections. These voices don’t just tell their own stories; they intersect, question binaries, and contribute to a larger narrative that seeks to transcend individual perspectives.

4. Lorenzo Searches for the Meaning of Life by Upamanyu Chatterjee (Speaking Tiger Books): It takes us on a journey through the life of Lorenzo Senesi, a 19-year-old from Aquilina, Italy, who, after a Vespa accident in 1977, embarks on a search for meaning. His recovery leads him to a physiotherapy course, a prayer group, and ultimately to the serene isolation of Praglia Abbey, a Benedictine monastery outside Padua. Over the next decade, the monastery becomes Lorenzo’s spiritual anchor, offering him solace and discipline. His path, however, takes an unexpected turn when he is sent to a remote Benedictine ashram in Bangladesh’s Khulna district, where he spends years praying, learning Bengali, working at a physiotherapy clinic, and grappling with his newfound purpose. Despite finding fulfilment in this life of service, Lorenzo also discovers that devotion, while enriching, leaves space for longing.

5. Maria, Just Maria by Sandhya Mary, translated from the Malayalam by Jayasree Kalathil (HarperCollins India): An insightful and humorous take on ideas like normal-abnormal, natural-human, love-hate, etc. that define contemporary society, and the exuberant and moving story of a woman trying to find her place in this world. Maria — now in a psychiatric hospital, as she begins the process of ‘reconnecting with reality’ — recalls her journey of being ‘just Maria’ — a girl born into a Syrian Christian family in Kerala, whose companions were a grandfather who took her along to wander around the village and its toddy shops, a great-aunt with dementia who challenged Maria's position as the youngest in the family, a dog with a penchant for philosophy, various long-dead family members including a great-grandmother with a knack for prophecies, a patron saint who insisted on interfering in people’s affairs, and Karthav Eesho Mishiha with whom Maria has regular conversations.

6. Of Mothers and Other Perishables by Radhika Oberoi (Simon & Schuster India): A poignant debut, set in Delhi, about grief. Through the voice of a deceased woman, whose memories resonate within her storeroom — a repository of silk sarees, vinyl records, and old photographs —the novel offers a glimpse into her life in the 1970s and '80s. This storeroom acts as a nostalgic bioscope of her romance, marriage, and motherhood. Parallel to her reminiscences is the narrative of her daughter, nicknamed The Wailer, who provides a sardonic view of the advertising world. As she navigates the chaos of a presentation night, her life shifts dramatically when protests erupt in Delhi against a bill persecuting Muslims. The Wailer, and her Muslim colleague, find themselves swept into the tumult. The novel also explores the life of The Wailer’s younger sister, Toon, a coffee startup CEO. Through these intertwined stories, personal and political histories clash in this haunting tale of betrayal and memory.

7. Sanatan by Sharankumar Limbale, translated from the Marathi by Paromita Sengupta (Penguin India): Sanatan is the gut-wrenching story of Bhimnak Mahar and his ilk, who have been subjected to barbaric abuse and inhuman discrimination by the upper castes over centuries. The story begins with the young Bhimnak in pre-Independence India. It then traverses time and geographical boundaries to end with Bhimnak’s grandson. The circular narrative pattern is reflective of the endless cycle of pain that the Mahars are unable to break free from, no matter how hard they try, no matter where they go, no matter if they change their identity and religion. Using myths, the Puranas and historical texts as resources, Sharankumar Limbale rewrites Dalit history in this novel as he attempts to tell the truth, with an intention to build what he calls ‘a new and progressive social order’. Limbale not just brings his reader face to face with uncomfortable realities, he also suggests what could be an alternative social order in the future.

8. The Distaste of the Earth by Kynpham Singh Nongkynrih (Penguin India): It takes us into the ancient world of Khasi kings and queens, warriors and plunderers, and chronicles the sorrows of a young man caught up in that world. This layered fictional history of a land where a queen falls in love with a pauper, where animals recount their tales of woe against man, and where retribution ― destructive to both good and bad ― arrives, sooner or later, begins in a pata, the local bar, whose patrons form a microcosm of the world around them. Kynpham Sing Nongkynrih equips these endearing characters to explore, through the tragic life of the protagonist, the nature of human existence, raising questions about earthly powers, godly dispensation, and where our anthropocentric attitude is leading us. Through a universe of fierce warriors and ruthless wars, the novel grapples with themes such as greed and oppression, revenge and justice, love and the tragedy of love, strife and the peace that comes when one ‘unyokes’ oneself, ‘disconnected from the sources of wretchedness, a fluffy down in the wind of fortune’. The novel reimagines a world where man is a despot, where God is ostensibly absent, perhaps much like our own.

9. Talashnama: The Quest by Ismail Darbesh, translated from the Bengali by V Ramaswamy (HarperCollins India): Ismail Darbesh’s debut novel, in which love, religion, modernity and politics collide, is set in Sadnahati, a Muslim-majority village in West Bengal. It is the story of Riziya, an educated and headstrong woman with an anguished past. Hounded by a devastating secret, Riziya elopes with her tutor, Suman Nath, a Hindu, although it is Tahirul — the local Imam torn between duty and desire — who is her true love. On the day she leaves, she allegedly writes anti-Islamic graffiti on the wall of the village mosque — an incident that both baffles and enrages the villagers. Ten years later, Suman Nath takes his own life, and Riziya must return to a Sadnahati fraught with disapproval and condemnation. A bestseller in the original Bangla, it is an evocative inquiry into the uncertainties and challenges of being Muslim in today’s India.

10. The One Legged by Sakyajit Bhattacharya, translated from the Bengali by Rituparna Mukherjee (Antonym Collections): Sakyajit Bhattacharya has written around 40 short stories and nine novels, including Ekhane Derek Bose Ache, Ekanore, Shesh Mrito Pakhi, and Rakkhoser Ghorbari, an anthology of short stories. In The One Legged, when the mouldy wall of the old mansion began to heave and the shadows of the cursed tree ruffled his nights, Tunu learned how darkness lives not only at night — that the home itself is like a sleeping giant, shrouded in secrets, grief and loss. As the receding history repeated itself, Tunu turned slowly, but definitely, into someone else.