Earlier this year two new novels – one by Salman Rushdie and the other by Vikram Seth – were launched with much fanfare. Nothing significant in that since new books by luminaries are launched all the time. What was notable was the fact that although both writers are Indians, it did not evoke the surprise that it might have earlier.
Even a couple of decades ago it would have been difficult for those born with a 'foreign' tongue to find their work accepted as part of the canon of literature written in English. But now, Rushdie's The Ground Beneath Her Feet and Seth's An Equal Music are matter-of-factly taken as two more additions to the vast corpus of an area of literature now identified as "Indian Writing in English", which, having gained recognition in the West, has become the subject of numerous Web-sites and English department courses, and continues to generate interest both at home and abroad.
The corpus of Indian writing in English has reached such monumental proportions over the last two decades that it is nearly impossible to recount the names and works of all writers. It was Arundhati Roy's The God of Small Things (1997) that took Indian writing to new heights of recognition, but the easy acceptance it received followed those who had been there earlier.
The world of Indo-Anglian writing has continued to thrive since Rushdie's publication of the Booker Prize-winning Midnight's Children in 1981, followed by The Satanic Verses, which, due to the fatwa, in a twisted way immortalised him in the literary world. Some of the titles that stand out are Amitav Ghosh's The Circle of Reason and The Shadow Lines, Upamanyu Chatterjee's English August: An Indian Story, Vikram Seth's Golden Gate and A Suitable Boy, Allan Sealy's Trotter-Nama, and Rohinton Mistry's Such a Long Journey and A Fine Balance.