General Knowledge - Books and Authors - Discussion

Anita Desai was born and educated in India. Her novels Fasting Feasting, Clear Light of Day and In Custody were shortlisted for the Booker Prize. She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and of the American Academy of Arts and Letters as well as a Fellow at Girton College, Cambridge. The book is about a famous Urdu poet and his (somewhat) protege, who is also the protagonist in the story. It talks about how the protagonist tries in vain to derive strength and justification for his misdoings from the already desolate and dissipated poet.