Samit Basu
Samit Basu | |
|---|---|
| Samit Basu Samit Basu | |
| Born | 1979-12-14 Kolkata, India |
| Occupation | Novelist |
| Nationality | Indian |
| Period | 2002– |
| Genre | Fantasy |
| Website | |
| http://samitbasu.com | |
Samit Basu is the author of The Simoqin Prophecies and The Manticore's Secret, the first two parts of The GameWorld Trilogy, a fantasy trilogy published by Penguin Books, India. He currently lives and works in Delhi, India.
Biography
Born December 14th, 1979, Basu grew up in Calcutta, where he studied at Don Bosco School, and later Presidency College, Kolkata, where he obtained a degree in Economics. He dropped out of the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad and then went on to complete a course in broadcasting and documentary filmmaking at the University of Westminster, London.
Writing career
The Simoqin Prophecies was written when Basu was 22 and published when he was 23, making him one of India's youngest successful authors. In 2003, Basu was in Outlook magazine's list of 16 Indian achievers under 25. He has contributed to The Harper Collins Anthology of New Indian Writing (2004). He has also written short stories for children, which appear in the Puffin Book of Bedtime stories (2005), the Puffin Book of Funny Stories (2005) and 'Seven Science Fiction Stories' (Scholastic India, 2006). In 2006, Basu published a series of articles and interviews on Indian speculative fiction called The Trousers of Time: Possible futures of Indian speculative fiction in English on a fellowship from Sarai In 2007, Basu contributed to 'Superhero!', a collection of stories about Indian superheroes published by Scholastic India and was declared, along with other prominent young Indians such as Rahul Gandhi and Vidya Balan, one of India's most promising 'Emerging Indians' by a survey conducted by IMRB and The Week magazine, India.
The Simoqin Prophecies, written in English, has been published in Swedish by Ordbilder, and German (from Piper Verlag) and Spanish translations of the GameWorld trilogy are on their way.
Apart from his novel writing, Basu is a popular columnist, scriptwriter, documentary filmmaker and freelance journalist writing on travel, film, books and pop culture. He also runs a popular weblog. Basu has also started writing comics for Virgin Comics. His initial projects with them are Devi (#3-#10) and The Tall Tales of Vishnu Sharma based on the Panchatantra
Writing style
Basu follows a unique writing style in the GameWorld trilogy. There are innumerable allusions to literary works from all over the world, including fantasy fiction and other fiction, to tales of superheroes and occasionally even to movies. He draws inspiration heavily from Indian and Greek mythology, Indian folklore and modern fantasy fiction works. This medley of ideas creates a comic and absurd world. Basu liberally uses puns, tangential references, and situational humour to augment the hilarity. At the same time, the text is interspersed with pithy observations and revelations.
Bibliography
| Name | Group | Publisher | ISBN | Publishing date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| The Simoqin Prophecies | The Gameworld Trilogy | Penguin Books India | ISBN 0-14-303043-4 | 2004 |
| The Manticore's Secret | The Gameworld Trilogy | Penguin Books India | ISBN 0-14-400067-9 | 2005 |
| The Unwaba Revelations | The Gameworld Trilogy | Penguin Books India | ? |
Sources
- Samit Basu's website
- Week-IMRB survey profile on Basu from the Emerging Indians award story.
- Profile in Outlook magazine, India from a list of 16 Indian achievers under 25 (2003)
- Profile in DNA newspaper, Mumbai
- Review of Basu's first novel in Outlook magazine, India
- Profile in Indian Express newspaper
- Samit Basu on MySpace.com
External links
- Short story: The Plasmoids
- Short story: Roundabout (A Delhi Fable) for Outlook City Limits, Delhi (2005)
- Article on literary spats among Indian writers (Tehelka newspaper, 2005)
- Interview with British/Asian writer Hari Kunzru
- Basu's fellowship project essays and interviews on Indian speculative fiction in books and comics