Madhurima Barua

January 2023 The translation ecosystem in India suffers from a lack of training opportunities. At the same time, aspiring fiction writers are often marginalized due to circumstance, language, and lack of opportunities to develop their work. The Write Assamese project is a collaboration between Untold, which works with writers marginalized by community or conflict, and BEE Books, an Indian publisher based in Kolkata whose aim is to promote Indian literature in translation.

Video: Nilutpal Baruah reads a section of “Boots” in the original Assamese. Bedo Bora bought a pair of boots. He got them at the most expensive showroom in the mall. And went home with the triumphant expression of a Samurai back from an intense war at the border. They were expensive. Shiny black leather boots with steel studs. They had an aura about them. It was not as if he did not own any shoes. He did. It was not even as though the boots were going to suit him. They would not. This, he was sure of.

The village is named Ouguri, after the lake. Jayanti gazes at the huge lake from the shore. Someone is getting into a canoe to go fishing. The headman’s six-fingered nephew perhaps, a lucky fellow, famous for how his net always snares the heaviest haul. Some say he waits by the lake, hunched in the shadows, accompanied by a fiendish water demon. Turning her head, Jayanti sees her son, Deepak, sitting patiently with two fishing rods, waiting for the floaters to move. She is irritated.