A Phantom Tiger and Other Stories

Book excerpt: These stories are elements of loud thinking triggered by the questions hurled at us by contemporary life. But, it doesn’t preach or recommend any ideology to you. Some of these stories may enthral you, some might lacerate you, some might tickle you and some might provoke you. Some might possibly provide you with new insights. Some could raise critical questions. Some might lead you to agree with the author’s position. Some may provoke you to oppose him. The aim is to spur you into thinking on your own. A reader’s mind is in no way inferior to a writer’s. Instead of looking at life as a mere story, or story as a mere extension of imagination, it projects a vision of life through these stories. It treaded a path of equilibrium—no pomposity of dismissively treating grass-root’s idiom; escaping the grip of pseudo-modernity complicating the written form of the language with the ostensible purpose of importing subtlety. Maalan V. Narayanan is an eminent award winning writer bilingual (Tamil and English) writer, bestowed with various coveted awards including Lee Kong Chian Research Fellowship of Singapore and ‘Krititva Samagra Samman’ (award for wholesomeness in creativity) of Bharaiya Basha Parishad.He has served in Senates of various Universities and committees of National Book Trust and Sahitya Akademi Dr.K.S.Subramanian, a former Director of Asian Development Bank, is an eminent translator who has won many awards for his translations. He holds a Ph.D from the University of the Philippines. He has translated more than 30 Tamil literary works of different genre into English and his translations have beem published by many leading reputed publishers of India.