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The Master of Unfinished Things
A riveting collection of memoirs, essays and random musings, The Master of Unfinished Things showcases the voice of Hindi literary maestro Geet Chaturvedi, brought to life in English by Anita Gopalan.
Through these heartfelt memoirs, Geet explores his relationship with books, writers, cricket and nature, much of it rooted in Mumbai, the city of his heart. Thoughtful essays grapple with questions about writing, identity and memory, blending introspection, myths and anecdotes. Diary entries, short prose and poetry offer deeply contemplative, standalone moments—each one a complete story in itself. Interestingly, the final essay is a meditation on the art and inevitability of incompleteness. This beautifully crafted turn lends the book a paradoxically perfect conclusion and leaves us fulfilled amidst unfinished endings
Through these heartfelt memoirs, Geet explores his relationship with books, writers, cricket and nature, much of it rooted in Mumbai, the city of his heart. Thoughtful essays grapple with questions about writing, identity and memory, blending introspection, myths and anecdotes. Diary entries, short prose and poetry offer deeply contemplative, standalone moments—each one a complete story in itself. Interestingly, the final essay is a meditation on the art and inevitability of incompleteness. This beautifully crafted turn lends the book a paradoxically perfect conclusion and leaves us fulfilled amidst unfinished endings
167 pages, Kindle Edition
Published March 31, 2025
2 people are currently reading
13 people want to read
About the author
Geet Chaturvedi
15 books37 followersBorn on 27 th November 1977 in Mumbai, Geet Chaturvedi is one of the most widely read contemporary literary authors in Hindi. He has published eleven books including two collections of novellas and three collections of poems. His books 'Nyoonatam Main' and 'Khushiyon Ke Guptchar' are included in the bestselling lists even though they are hardcore literary poems. His celebrated essays on literature, cinema and music are collected in 'Table Lamp' and 'Adhuri Cheezon Ka Devta'.
For poetry, Geet is the recipient of Bharat Bhushan Agrawal Award, Spandan Kriti Samman and Vaagdhara Navratna Samman. For fiction, he has received Krishna Pratap Katha Award, Shailesh Matiyani Award, Krishna Baldev Vaid Fellowship and Syed Haider Raza Fellowship. He is considered one of the best Indian authors by many literary forums and publications including the Indian Express.
Geet Chaturvedi’s works have been translated into 22 languages. In 2019, his book of poems in English translation ‘The Memory of Now’ was published in the USA. The English translation of his novella Simsim, translated by Anita Gopalan, was awarded ‘PEN-Heim Translation Grant’ by PEN America. Geet lives in Bhopal, India.
गीत चतुर्वेदी का जन्म २७ नवम्बर १९७७ को मुम्बई में हुआ। उनके दो कविता-संग्रह न्यूनतम मैं (२०१७) और आलाप में गिरह (२०१०) प्रकाशित हैं। उसी वर्ष लम्बी कहानियों की दो किताबें सावंत आंटी की लड़कियाँ व पिंक स्लिप डैडी आयी। उन्हें कविता के लिए भारत भूषण अग्रवाल पुरस्कार, गल्प के लिए कृष्ण प्रताप कथा सम्मान मिल चुके हैं। ‘इण्डियन एक्सप्रेस’ सहित कई प्रकाशन संस्थानों ने उन्हें भारत के सर्वश्रेष्ठ लेखकों में शुमार किया है। उनकी रचनाएँ देश-दुनिया की सत्रह भाषाओं में अनूदित हो चुकी हैं। उनके नॉवेल सिमसिम के अँग्रेज़ी अनुवाद (अनुवादक : अनिता गोपालन) को ‘पेन अमेरिका’ ने अन्तरराष्ट्रीय स्तर पर प्रतिष्ठित ‘पेन-हैम ट्रांसलेशन ग्रांट २०१६’ अवार्ड किया है।
गीत इन दिनों भोपाल रहते हैं। उनका ईमेल पता है : geetchaturvediofficial@gmail.com
For poetry, Geet is the recipient of Bharat Bhushan Agrawal Award, Spandan Kriti Samman and Vaagdhara Navratna Samman. For fiction, he has received Krishna Pratap Katha Award, Shailesh Matiyani Award, Krishna Baldev Vaid Fellowship and Syed Haider Raza Fellowship. He is considered one of the best Indian authors by many literary forums and publications including the Indian Express.
Geet Chaturvedi’s works have been translated into 22 languages. In 2019, his book of poems in English translation ‘The Memory of Now’ was published in the USA. The English translation of his novella Simsim, translated by Anita Gopalan, was awarded ‘PEN-Heim Translation Grant’ by PEN America. Geet lives in Bhopal, India.
गीत चतुर्वेदी का जन्म २७ नवम्बर १९७७ को मुम्बई में हुआ। उनके दो कविता-संग्रह न्यूनतम मैं (२०१७) और आलाप में गिरह (२०१०) प्रकाशित हैं। उसी वर्ष लम्बी कहानियों की दो किताबें सावंत आंटी की लड़कियाँ व पिंक स्लिप डैडी आयी। उन्हें कविता के लिए भारत भूषण अग्रवाल पुरस्कार, गल्प के लिए कृष्ण प्रताप कथा सम्मान मिल चुके हैं। ‘इण्डियन एक्सप्रेस’ सहित कई प्रकाशन संस्थानों ने उन्हें भारत के सर्वश्रेष्ठ लेखकों में शुमार किया है। उनकी रचनाएँ देश-दुनिया की सत्रह भाषाओं में अनूदित हो चुकी हैं। उनके नॉवेल सिमसिम के अँग्रेज़ी अनुवाद (अनुवादक : अनिता गोपालन) को ‘पेन अमेरिका’ ने अन्तरराष्ट्रीय स्तर पर प्रतिष्ठित ‘पेन-हैम ट्रांसलेशन ग्रांट २०१६’ अवार्ड किया है।
गीत इन दिनों भोपाल रहते हैं। उनका ईमेल पता है : geetchaturvediofficial@gmail.com
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
October 16, 2025
BOOK REVIEW: THE MASTER OF UNFINISHED THINGS BY GEET CHATURVEDI, TRANSLATED BY ANITA GOPALAN
After reading Simsim by Geet Chaturvedi and Anita Gopalan last year and thoroughly enjoying it, I was delighted when Anita Gopalan herself reached out to send me a copy of The Master of Unfinished Things. Since I live in the UAE, she kindly coordinated with Penguin Random House, who arranged for the book to reach me. I would like to begin by thanking both Anita and Penguin Random House for this thoughtful gesture.
This book is a beautiful collection of memoirs, essays, anecdotes, and diary entries—like a goodie bag filled with old letters, favourite pens, cherished memories, and delicate feathers from the past.
The book is divided into three parts:
Memoirs
Diary and Creative Prose
Essays
Part 1: Memoirs
The story I loved most in this section is Cat Years. The author describes how his family had many cats across generations. One day, a neighbour’s cat moves in with them, makes their home its own, and later gives birth to kittens. The author and his siblings each pick one to play with. What follows is tender, unexpected, and deeply relatable. I found this story both cute and nostalgic, capturing the unpredictability and warmth of childhood memories.
Part 2: Diary and Creative Prose
My favourite piece from this section is My Forever Buddha Musings. Here, the author reflects on Buddha’s meditation and his encounters with Mara, the demon king. One line that stayed with me was:
“A world without stories is a world without life.”
How true! Stories sustain us all.
Many of the entries are deeply relatable, such as when the author revisits a place after many years, only to find it changed beyond recognition—a sentiment many of us share. There are also mentions of films from China, Kurdistan, Israel, Italy, and Vietnam, making the reflections culturally rich and layered.
Part 3: Essays
From the essays, The Karvi Flowers stood out to me the most. These flowers bloom once every seven years in the Sahyadri mountains of Maharashtra. The author laments how such a magnificent natural event often goes unnoticed, comparing it to the unseen beauty in our everyday lives. He beautifully connects the symbolism of flowers to mythology and human emotions, concluding that flowers have accompanied humankind through every season—of sorrow, happiness, hope, and despair—sprinkling their fragrance and magic throughout our journey.
Another memorable essay, Laila’s Finger, begins with a story about a poet’s revenge but ends with a fascinating legend about an angel named Laila. It is believed that before we are reborn, Laila presses her forefinger to our upper lip, erasing all our memories—hence the little indentation we all carry. Without Laila’s “Alt-Ctrl-Del” of memory— imagine the chaos our minds would have to handle when we are reborn.
The titular essay, which appears last in the collection, is deeply philosophical and contemplative. It explores how things in nature are both complete and incomplete, an idea explained with remarkable clarity and beauty.
Throughout the book, Chaturvedi references many great writers such as Gabriel García Márquez, Pablo Neruda, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Philip Larkin, and Dante Alighieri, weaving a literary thread across time and culture.
Overall, The Master of Unfinished Things is an easy yet thought-provoking read, filled with pieces that are charming, poignant, and deeply human. The mythological short stories are especially engaging. Anita Gopalan’s translation flows so smoothly that it never once feels like a translated work—it reads as naturally as if it were written in English.
A book that celebrates memory, imagination, and the art of unfinished stories—I really enjoyed reading it!
After reading Simsim by Geet Chaturvedi and Anita Gopalan last year and thoroughly enjoying it, I was delighted when Anita Gopalan herself reached out to send me a copy of The Master of Unfinished Things. Since I live in the UAE, she kindly coordinated with Penguin Random House, who arranged for the book to reach me. I would like to begin by thanking both Anita and Penguin Random House for this thoughtful gesture.
This book is a beautiful collection of memoirs, essays, anecdotes, and diary entries—like a goodie bag filled with old letters, favourite pens, cherished memories, and delicate feathers from the past.
The book is divided into three parts:
Memoirs
Diary and Creative Prose
Essays
Part 1: Memoirs
The story I loved most in this section is Cat Years. The author describes how his family had many cats across generations. One day, a neighbour’s cat moves in with them, makes their home its own, and later gives birth to kittens. The author and his siblings each pick one to play with. What follows is tender, unexpected, and deeply relatable. I found this story both cute and nostalgic, capturing the unpredictability and warmth of childhood memories.
Part 2: Diary and Creative Prose
My favourite piece from this section is My Forever Buddha Musings. Here, the author reflects on Buddha’s meditation and his encounters with Mara, the demon king. One line that stayed with me was:
“A world without stories is a world without life.”
How true! Stories sustain us all.
Many of the entries are deeply relatable, such as when the author revisits a place after many years, only to find it changed beyond recognition—a sentiment many of us share. There are also mentions of films from China, Kurdistan, Israel, Italy, and Vietnam, making the reflections culturally rich and layered.
Part 3: Essays
From the essays, The Karvi Flowers stood out to me the most. These flowers bloom once every seven years in the Sahyadri mountains of Maharashtra. The author laments how such a magnificent natural event often goes unnoticed, comparing it to the unseen beauty in our everyday lives. He beautifully connects the symbolism of flowers to mythology and human emotions, concluding that flowers have accompanied humankind through every season—of sorrow, happiness, hope, and despair—sprinkling their fragrance and magic throughout our journey.
Another memorable essay, Laila’s Finger, begins with a story about a poet’s revenge but ends with a fascinating legend about an angel named Laila. It is believed that before we are reborn, Laila presses her forefinger to our upper lip, erasing all our memories—hence the little indentation we all carry. Without Laila’s “Alt-Ctrl-Del” of memory— imagine the chaos our minds would have to handle when we are reborn.
The titular essay, which appears last in the collection, is deeply philosophical and contemplative. It explores how things in nature are both complete and incomplete, an idea explained with remarkable clarity and beauty.
Throughout the book, Chaturvedi references many great writers such as Gabriel García Márquez, Pablo Neruda, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Philip Larkin, and Dante Alighieri, weaving a literary thread across time and culture.
Overall, The Master of Unfinished Things is an easy yet thought-provoking read, filled with pieces that are charming, poignant, and deeply human. The mythological short stories are especially engaging. Anita Gopalan’s translation flows so smoothly that it never once feels like a translated work—it reads as naturally as if it were written in English.
A book that celebrates memory, imagination, and the art of unfinished stories—I really enjoyed reading it!
May 16, 2025
Geet Chaturvedi’s 'The Master of Unfinished Things' is a thoughtful, finely crafted meditation on the unfinished—on fragments of memory, ideas left open, and the quiet weight of what remains unsaid. Structured in three sections—diary entries, creative prose, and essays—the book moves fluidly between the personal and the reflective, offering a literary form that feels both intimate and expansive.
Despite the title's suggestion of incompleteness, the work exudes a sense of self-contained fulfillment, showcasing Chaturvedi's mastery in weaving together fragmented narratives into a cohesive whole.
Chaturvedi’s prose carries the clarity of thought and the restraint of poetry. His language is unhurried, attentive to detail, and tuned to the subtleties of inner life. Rather than offer conclusions, the pieces invite the reader to dwell in uncertainty, to sit with ambiguity, and to find meaning not in closure, but in process. Anita Gopalan's adept translation, which captures the subtle nuances and lyrical quality of Chaturvedi's prose, making the collection accessible to a broader audience.
There is a steady commitment to truth, and to language as a medium for quiet inquiry. The essays, in particular, stand out for their depth and precision, while the diary sections reveal a more vulnerable, inward gaze.
'The Master of Unfinished Things' is a luminous, unhurried book. In celebrating the incomplete, it becomes a complete work of art. A true testament to Geet Chaturvedi’s literary brilliance.
Despite the title's suggestion of incompleteness, the work exudes a sense of self-contained fulfillment, showcasing Chaturvedi's mastery in weaving together fragmented narratives into a cohesive whole.
Chaturvedi’s prose carries the clarity of thought and the restraint of poetry. His language is unhurried, attentive to detail, and tuned to the subtleties of inner life. Rather than offer conclusions, the pieces invite the reader to dwell in uncertainty, to sit with ambiguity, and to find meaning not in closure, but in process. Anita Gopalan's adept translation, which captures the subtle nuances and lyrical quality of Chaturvedi's prose, making the collection accessible to a broader audience.
There is a steady commitment to truth, and to language as a medium for quiet inquiry. The essays, in particular, stand out for their depth and precision, while the diary sections reveal a more vulnerable, inward gaze.
'The Master of Unfinished Things' is a luminous, unhurried book. In celebrating the incomplete, it becomes a complete work of art. A true testament to Geet Chaturvedi’s literary brilliance.
August 25, 2025
I wish this book was interesting as the title! Master of Unfinished Things is a book about accepting incompleteness as the essence of life. It shows that love, writing, and existence itself can never be truly finished and that’s what makes them meaningful. Don’t wait for the “perfect moment” ; completion is an illusion. Love fully, but know that time reshapes everything. Embrace imperfection, it’s where truth often hides. Incompleteness is not weakness; it is life’s beauty.
July 21, 2025
It is a tender meditation on fragments: of thought, memory, art. With lyrical precision, it celebrates incompletion as a form of beauty. In every essay, the unsaid hums louder than the said. It resonated with me.
July 20, 2025
Beautiful writing. Makes me pause, think back on life, move ahead. Beautiful translation.
September 7, 2025
This book is a collection of essays, a few of them autobiographical. Though the translation is good I would like to read the Hindi original. I did not like all the pieces.
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September 22, 2025Insightful and fulfilling read. Full review coming soon.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews