Sacred Games

I love prose, all kinds of fiction/non-fiction and admire poems from a certain distance. However, literary translation does not figure high up in the list of my favourite intellectual activities. Since childhood I insisted on reading books in all forms: novels, comics etc in their source language. I was reassured to a certain extent only during the teenage days by the English version of Asterix. The characters have such appropriate names (Vitalstatistix for example!), that till date I hesitate using the original French names (Abraracourcix). By pure irony of fate, I finally landed up with a profession which compels me to look at literary translation occasionally.
Recently I read Sacred Games by Vikram Chanda. A powerful narration of an underworld don’s life punctuated by glimpses of daily activities of a police inspector. As a translator, my attention was immediately caught by the use of Hindi, Urdu and Marathi colloquial language in the dialogues. The style and the usage add a refreshing tang to the saga. It is very easy to imagine oneself in Pune or Chandigarh when Sartaj singh (policeman) hums popular Dev Anand song from the 70s. As I read the book, almost instinctively I wanted to lay my hands on a translated version of the novel. Indian English literature is widely available in French version, though I hardly ever venture into buying them. Hence it wasn’t difficult to pick up the French translation of Sacred Games entitled “Le seigneur de Bombay”. Often one finds translator’s note or an extended introduction in such works. In this case however there’s none. Instead, there is a detailed glossaire of whopping 27 pages explaining all vernacular words with lot of care. Even the songs (yahan kaun hain tera, musafir …) have been explained well. The dialogues retain all familiar forms of addressing like “Bhai”, “Bibi” and the like. This is a common feature in translated works. Perhaps what is less common is to find some passages with original swearing (sala langra lulla). The book makes easy reading and successfully conveys the Indianness to the readers. The French version describes the Crossword Hutch Book Award (won by Vikram Chanda for Sacred Games) as the “goncourt indien”!! A curious choice of words for an award which was instituted in 1998 to encourage Indian writers in English.