Amitav Ghosh

Writer

Born: 11 July 1956

Website : www.amitavghosh.com

He is an Indian writer and the winner of the 54th Jnanpith award, best known for his work in English fiction.
He is the author of The Circle of Reason (his 1986 debut novel), The Shadow Lines (1988), The Calcutta Chromosome (1995), The Glass Palace (2000), The Hungry Tide (2004), and Sea of Poppies (2008), the first volume of The Ibis trilogy, set in the 1830s, just before the Opium War, which encapsulates the colonial history of the East. Ghosh’s River of Smoke (2011), is the second volume of The Ibis trilogy.
The third, Flood of Fire, completing the trilogy, was published 28 May 2015 to positive reviews.
The Shadow Lines that won him the Sahitya Akademi Award “throws light on the phenomenon of communal violence and the way its roots have spread deeply and widely in the collective psyche of the Indian subcontinent”.
The Circle of Reason won the Prix Médicis étranger, one of France’s top literary awards.
The Calcutta Chromosome won the Arthur C. Clarke Award for 1997.
Sea of Poppies was shortlisted for the 2008 Man Booker Prize.
It was the co-winner of the Vodafone Crossword Book Award in 2009, as well as co-winner of the 2010 Dan David Prize.
River of Smoke was shortlisted for the Man Asian Literary Prize 2011.
The government of India awarded him the civilian honor of Padma Shri in 2007.
He also received – together with Margaret Atwood – the Israeli Dan David Prize.
He famously withdrew his novel The Glass Palace from consideration for the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize, where it was awarded the best novel in the Eurasian section, citing his objections to the term “commonwealth” and the unfairness of the English language requirement specified in the rules.
He received the lifetime achievement award at Tata Literature Live, the Mumbai LitFest on November 20, 2016.
He has conferred the 54th Jnanpith award in December 2018 and is the first Indian writer in English to have been chosen for this honor.