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| Credit: Janet H Swinney; Design: Kay Green |
Bio: Janet H Swinney is a former education inspector who grew up in the North East of England, got her political education in Scotland and now lives in London. She has longstanding connections with India that have deeply influenced her writing. Her work has appeared in print anthologies and online journals across the UK, India and America, and has been listed in many competitions. Her story ‘The Map of Bihar’ was nominated for the Eric Hoffer prize for prose 2012. She was a runner-up for the London Short Story Prize 2014. She has written features articles for the UK press including the Guardian and the Times.
Synopsis: The Map of Bihar is a collection of stories about yearning; about aspiration thwarted and fulfilled. Faced with the constraints of culture, caste, class, poverty and the complexities of modern-day life, individuals from opposite sides of the globe strive for something better. Their ambition takes many forms. While some reach out towards a distant vision of fulfilment, the best that others can hope for is simply to survive. And while some turn out to be adept at grabbing opportunities, others are not so fortunate. Between them, they display resourcefulness, resilience, vulnerability and, sometimes, a pungent sense of humour.
EC: Welcome to Asian Books Blog, Janet. Congratulations on The Map of Bihar, which I thoroughly enjoyed reading. The short stories take place primarily in India and the northeast of England. Why these two locations?
JHS: Thanks for inviting me, Elaine. I was born and grew up in a village in the North East of England. I couldn’t wait to get away from the place. It was a very close-knit community, where everybody knew what you were up to, and was very keen to tell you not to do it. It wasn’t until I had to go back many years later that I realised the strengths of that community, even though much had happened politically and economically in the intervening years to undermine them. I was brought up as a Christian, but I thought the teachings were flawed. When I was a teenager, I started casting around for something else. I became interested in Indian philosophy, and I started practising yoga. I wanted to go to India to find a guru. But for a young woman with no money and no worldly wisdom, that was a complete impossibility.
Then, in 1973, I was at Leeds University ostensibly studying for a teaching qualification, but in reality doing everything to avoid it, and met the composer, Naresh Sohal. Our interests in yoga philosophy and music drew us together and that was the start of a relationship that lasted until he died in 2018, forty-five years later. Naresh gave me an extensive drubbing about the shortcomings of the British Raj, which I had to concede was justified. Over the time we were together, we visited India frequently, staying with his family in Punjab and exploring many other parts of the country.
