A review by crimpinglife
Bombay Stories by Aftab Ahmad, Matt Reeck, Saadat Hasan Manto

5.0

Bombay Stories ( some of which are located in Pune) is a hilarious, and quite fascinating read. The short stories describe a Bombay in the 1930s; at the cusp of Independence from the British Raj but judging by the still somewhat prejudiced multiculturalism of the city - complete with Jews, Parsis, Muslims, Sikhs, Hindus, Christians and Anglo-Saxons - has not yet reached the peak of sectarian/ethnic violence (at home and abroad) that would enable Independence and later, Partition to occur. Manto writes about his own life living - and drinking vast quantitities of Bombay's alcohol - with/among the medley of actors, gangsters, street people and prostitutes of the city. Each character is humanized by Manto with witty prose and humurous but often compassionate writing style. Although the rising tensions in India are mentioned its clear from the casual nonchalance that Manto writes with that he believes that Bombay will remain apart from such ridiculousness. How very wrong he was.

Nevertheless, Manto, I am happy to report, is truly a master of the short story form. Definitely Bombay Stories read if you can - my personal favourite of the stories was Mozelle and Peerun.