Tomb of Sand

Geetanjali Shree, translated by Daisy Rockwell

Tilted Axis Press

Otago Daily Times, May 21st 2022

Hindi writer and feminist Geetangali Shree’s fifth novel charts the complexity of family and the damage of Partition through the adventures of octagenarian Mohatarma Chandraprabha Devi – Ma  –  and her middle-aged, unmarried daughter Beti. Following the death of her husband, Ma takes to her bed, face turned to the wall as if trying to slip away. Her family plead and cajole to no avail until, one day, she suddenly rises and disappears. When she is eventually found, confused and malnourished, Beti nurses her back to health, only to find her own ascetic life thrown into disorder by a mother who seems to have entered a second childhood. Further disruption follows when Ma embarks on a pilgrimage to Pakistan, which reveals a history of which the family was entirely ignorant.

This central plot is, however, merely one aspect of a much more complicated structure. The narrator constantly breaks the fourth wall, derailing the plot with digressions into philosophy and fable, changes in style, and perspectives that range from Ma’s children to crows, walls and roads. Shree delights in the dhawani – resonance – of words, which her translator, Daisy Rockwell describes as prioritising linguistic echo over dictionary meaning, and figurative language and allusion abound. Ma’s life embodies key tenets of Buddist thought (the title refers to a meditative trance so deeply that practitioners become entombed in the drifting sands), and the novel itself becomes a metaphysical exploration of the transformative power of storytelling. But above all else, the book is a celebration of India: “chock-a-block willy-nilly slapdash crammed scattered messy raptor snatching nail-catching; old.” Tomb of Sand is a mad, glad, glorious creation that will delight and frustrate in equal measure, and it is a testament to the skill of Shree and Rockwell alike that its verbal and cultural exuberance survives –  or transcends – translation.