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Nautch Boy: A Memoir of My Life in the Kothas
The Last Courtesan was his mother's story. Nautch Boy tells his own.
In a declining kotha, a sweet-faced, quiet boy dressed in matching pink shorts and top poses demurely for a photograph, clutching a vase of plastic white daisies. Around him, women dust their faces with powder, dab on scent and primp for the evening, sparkling and pirouetting like silver-screen heroines. He gazes in awe, mesmerized by the glamour and music swirling through the air. Will he join them in their dazzling dance?
When will he become a nautch boy? His mother, Rekhabai-a reigning courtesan-vows to sever every tie binding him to the kotha and secure a better future for him. Sent to a boarding school in the hills, he lives a double life-undulating his hips to Hindi film songs like his mother by night, and reciting Rossetti and Lear by heart under the school's strict gaze by day. Can he unlearn the music pulsing through his veins? When will he become an heir to the courtesan's dancing legacy?
Nautch Boy is Manish Gaekwad's own true tale-born in a courtesan's quarters, yet shaped by a privileged education. A reporter, screenwriter and novelist. He now trades that vase of fake daisies for vivid stories of love, laughter and decay from the kothas' fading splendour.
In a declining kotha, a sweet-faced, quiet boy dressed in matching pink shorts and top poses demurely for a photograph, clutching a vase of plastic white daisies. Around him, women dust their faces with powder, dab on scent and primp for the evening, sparkling and pirouetting like silver-screen heroines. He gazes in awe, mesmerized by the glamour and music swirling through the air. Will he join them in their dazzling dance?
When will he become a nautch boy? His mother, Rekhabai-a reigning courtesan-vows to sever every tie binding him to the kotha and secure a better future for him. Sent to a boarding school in the hills, he lives a double life-undulating his hips to Hindi film songs like his mother by night, and reciting Rossetti and Lear by heart under the school's strict gaze by day. Can he unlearn the music pulsing through his veins? When will he become an heir to the courtesan's dancing legacy?
Nautch Boy is Manish Gaekwad's own true tale-born in a courtesan's quarters, yet shaped by a privileged education. A reporter, screenwriter and novelist. He now trades that vase of fake daisies for vivid stories of love, laughter and decay from the kothas' fading splendour.
220 pages, Kindle Edition
Published August 14, 2025
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Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews
September 16, 2025
Manish Gaekwad’s Nautch Boy is a memoir of the author’s childhood, teenage years and subsequent life as the son of ‘the last courtesan’, a tawaif named Rekhabai. Gaekwad begins his book with how his mother got pregnant (she wanted to prove a point to others in the kotha, who derided her as being infertile), and how she seems to have almost chickened out at his birth, begging the doctor to save her, to ‘let her baby go’.
While the descriptions of daily life in the kotha were interesting (and unsettling: what a dysfunctional ‘family’ that would be, what a frightening life for a child), what really stayed with me were the relationships Gaekwad explores through this book. With the other children in the kotha; with schoolmates at the boarding school where he went (and ended up being sexually exploited); with his mostly distant father; and with his mother.
The first half of Nautch Boy unsettled me. The sense of pain, and of violence, built up, especially as this section of the book dealt with the author as a boy. A child, his childhood marred by the insensitivity of adults. There is, too, a growing sense of his own gender identity: his disinterest in sports and his enthusiasm for dancing, for reading, for other ‘feminine’ passions.
Yet, as Manish Gaekwad (in the course of his own memoir) grows older, his relationship with his mother changes. Or perhaps I am able to see a more nuanced view of his mother: a strong-willed character, a woman with a sense of humour. A son who realizes his mother loves him, and who loves her back. The last few chapters, recounting Gaekwad’s changing relationship with his now-ageing mother, especially through the Covid lockdown and beyond, were heart-wrenching: warm, loving in that matter-of-fact way that is expressed in very everyday things. By the end of the book I had a lump in my throat (and I will freely admit that I am not a one to cry easily, especially while reading).
I don’t lightly use the word ‘unforgettable’ for a book, but this, I think, is a book I will remember for a long, long time. Highly recommended.
While the descriptions of daily life in the kotha were interesting (and unsettling: what a dysfunctional ‘family’ that would be, what a frightening life for a child), what really stayed with me were the relationships Gaekwad explores through this book. With the other children in the kotha; with schoolmates at the boarding school where he went (and ended up being sexually exploited); with his mostly distant father; and with his mother.
The first half of Nautch Boy unsettled me. The sense of pain, and of violence, built up, especially as this section of the book dealt with the author as a boy. A child, his childhood marred by the insensitivity of adults. There is, too, a growing sense of his own gender identity: his disinterest in sports and his enthusiasm for dancing, for reading, for other ‘feminine’ passions.
Yet, as Manish Gaekwad (in the course of his own memoir) grows older, his relationship with his mother changes. Or perhaps I am able to see a more nuanced view of his mother: a strong-willed character, a woman with a sense of humour. A son who realizes his mother loves him, and who loves her back. The last few chapters, recounting Gaekwad’s changing relationship with his now-ageing mother, especially through the Covid lockdown and beyond, were heart-wrenching: warm, loving in that matter-of-fact way that is expressed in very everyday things. By the end of the book I had a lump in my throat (and I will freely admit that I am not a one to cry easily, especially while reading).
I don’t lightly use the word ‘unforgettable’ for a book, but this, I think, is a book I will remember for a long, long time. Highly recommended.
August 26, 2025
Some books are not meant to be read and forgotten; they are meant to be lived, carried within you, and revisited in the quiet corners of your heart. "Nautch Boy" by Manish Gaekwad is exactly that kind of book.
It is not just a memoir. It is a journey into the lanes of Kothas, a journey of survival, of a boy raised in a world that was never meant to nurture innocence, and of a mother whose courage became his greatest shield. Rekhabai — fierce, wounded, yet unbreakable — stands at the center of this story. She is not a woman written in glamour or fantasy, but one carved out of resilience, sacrifice, and a love so raw that it hurts to read. Through her, you begin to understand how survival can sometimes look like defiance, how violence can strangely mask itself as protection, and how even in the most unforgiving spaces, love finds a way to exist.
What stayed with me most deeply is the way Gaekwad refuses to separate light from darkness. He doesn’t paint his childhood in black and white. Instead, he shows us the strange dualities of life in the Kothas — music playing in the background while pain hides in the silence, Bollywood glamour seeping into memories that were otherwise colourless, laughter and sorrow coexisting in the same breath. His words blur the lines between home and prison, between tenderness and suffering, and that’s what makes this memoir so haunting.
This is also a story of a boy — Montu — who grew up learning that resilience was not a choice but a necessity. He inherited not just his mother’s struggles but also her strength, her refusal to bow down. And as readers, we mourn with him, we rejoice with him, and we carry his wounds as though they were our own.
Reading " Nautch Boy " is not easy. It unsettles you. It forces you to leave behind the cinematic fantasies you may have unknowingly held about courtesans and their world. It strips away the silk and the songs, leaving you with the unfiltered realities of women who were too often silenced. And yet, within that silence, Gaekwad finds a voice — his own and his mother’s — that refuses to be erased.
When I closed the book, I couldn’t move on right away. I sat with Rekhabai’s pain, with Montu’s resilience, and with the uncomfortable truths that this story lays bare. Some books make you feel entertained, some make you think, but this one makes you pause — to acknowledge lives we rarely speak of, to hold space for the unseen, and to remember that resilience is born out of the harshest of fires.
" Nautch Boy " is a book I’ll keep close for a long time. Not because it was easy to read, but because it was too real to ignore.
It is not just a memoir. It is a journey into the lanes of Kothas, a journey of survival, of a boy raised in a world that was never meant to nurture innocence, and of a mother whose courage became his greatest shield. Rekhabai — fierce, wounded, yet unbreakable — stands at the center of this story. She is not a woman written in glamour or fantasy, but one carved out of resilience, sacrifice, and a love so raw that it hurts to read. Through her, you begin to understand how survival can sometimes look like defiance, how violence can strangely mask itself as protection, and how even in the most unforgiving spaces, love finds a way to exist.
What stayed with me most deeply is the way Gaekwad refuses to separate light from darkness. He doesn’t paint his childhood in black and white. Instead, he shows us the strange dualities of life in the Kothas — music playing in the background while pain hides in the silence, Bollywood glamour seeping into memories that were otherwise colourless, laughter and sorrow coexisting in the same breath. His words blur the lines between home and prison, between tenderness and suffering, and that’s what makes this memoir so haunting.
This is also a story of a boy — Montu — who grew up learning that resilience was not a choice but a necessity. He inherited not just his mother’s struggles but also her strength, her refusal to bow down. And as readers, we mourn with him, we rejoice with him, and we carry his wounds as though they were our own.
Reading " Nautch Boy " is not easy. It unsettles you. It forces you to leave behind the cinematic fantasies you may have unknowingly held about courtesans and their world. It strips away the silk and the songs, leaving you with the unfiltered realities of women who were too often silenced. And yet, within that silence, Gaekwad finds a voice — his own and his mother’s — that refuses to be erased.
When I closed the book, I couldn’t move on right away. I sat with Rekhabai’s pain, with Montu’s resilience, and with the uncomfortable truths that this story lays bare. Some books make you feel entertained, some make you think, but this one makes you pause — to acknowledge lives we rarely speak of, to hold space for the unseen, and to remember that resilience is born out of the harshest of fires.
" Nautch Boy " is a book I’ll keep close for a long time. Not because it was easy to read, but because it was too real to ignore.
January 14, 2026
5/5 "This memoir is neither about the author nor about his mother. It is really about the relationship shared between the two, the push and pull of mother-son dynamics as they navigate the roughest terrains of their lives together or apart. He writes beautifully, without a doubt. He describes sounds, sights, tastes, and textures in such a way that I could not only see but also hear, taste, and feel them. There were moments where I laughed, moments where I cried, and moments where I felt life with all its trouble is indeed worth living."
August 26, 2025
I haven’t read The Last Courtesan, no. But the minute I finished reading Nautch Boy, I felt compelled to buy the earlier mentioned book. Manish Gaekwad’s memoir is a deeply moving and personal account of his mother Rekhabai’s attempts at protecting her son from all sorts of danger and violence lurking around the corners of Kothas. There’s a sense of beauty attached to the life of the Tawaifs, something that almost carries an undertone of poignance as they try to navigate through their lives all while being decked up in shimmery clothes and glinting jewellery. People for decades have been considering tawaifs as sex workers, an idea so wrong from the actual reality. And while reading Gaekwad’s memoir, I could feel myself peeping from behind the heavy dark curtains as these achingly beautiful women entertained the men with dances that would have put any Bollywood star to shame.
Nautch Boy speaks to you in ways that both fascinates and terrifies you. We picture a child growing up in the dark alleys that housed Kothas, where men jeered and passed lewd comments about the kid’s mother because she was a Tawaif. We see the kid struggling with his sexuality, drawn in by the women around him who looked like nothing less than goddesses. We watch him put on women’s clothing and ghungroos, dancing with joy but left confused by why some liked and others ridiculed his behaviour. But amidst all his experiences, there stood a mother who would go to great lengths to shield her son. She would educate him and push him away from her life as far as she could. Rekhabai’s words and actions might have been curt and cruel but her intentions were clear. She loved her son. Deeply. Immensely.
Gaekwad’s powerful memoir makes us take off our rose tinted glasses and look at the world for what it truly is. His reality is sits with us, a living breathing thing. One you cannot ignore. One you cannot forget.
Thank you for the copy HaperCollins!
Nautch Boy speaks to you in ways that both fascinates and terrifies you. We picture a child growing up in the dark alleys that housed Kothas, where men jeered and passed lewd comments about the kid’s mother because she was a Tawaif. We see the kid struggling with his sexuality, drawn in by the women around him who looked like nothing less than goddesses. We watch him put on women’s clothing and ghungroos, dancing with joy but left confused by why some liked and others ridiculed his behaviour. But amidst all his experiences, there stood a mother who would go to great lengths to shield her son. She would educate him and push him away from her life as far as she could. Rekhabai’s words and actions might have been curt and cruel but her intentions were clear. She loved her son. Deeply. Immensely.
Gaekwad’s powerful memoir makes us take off our rose tinted glasses and look at the world for what it truly is. His reality is sits with us, a living breathing thing. One you cannot ignore. One you cannot forget.
Thank you for the copy HaperCollins!
August 18, 2025
Finished this beautiful book. Manish writes so evocatively that his words burrow deep within you. I have so much more to say, but for now I’m too emotional. I’m going to let it sink in…mourn Rekha’s death, rejoice in her life, and think about her Montu, the boy she raised so well against all odds. Will post a longer review soon. Suffice it to say: please buy a copy and start reading.
October 6, 2025
There are memoirs that speak, and then there are those that bleed. "Nautch Boy" belongs to the later category. It isn’t just a story, it’s a wound dressed in words. Manish Gaekwad’s autobiographical account of being born to a courtesan and growing up in the shadow of both stigma and stardust is an act of remembering what the world prefers to forget. It’s not just the story of a boy who escaped the kotha; it’s the story of what it means to carry the kotha inside you, its rhythm, its music, its loneliness, even when you’ve left it far behind.
At its heart, this book is a haunting meditation on identity, the kind that’s not chosen but inherited, and the lifelong struggle to make peace with it. The book oscillates between two worlds, the glittering yet decaying kothas of Bowbazar, and the rigid, ‘civilized’ world of boarding schools in the hills. These contrasting spaces are not just geographical; they are moral and emotional divides.
The author's s mother, Rekhabai, embodies the resilience of women trapped between desire and duty. Her kotha is both her stage and her prison. Her son, meanwhile, becomes the site of her redemption, the proof that she can break the cycle of shame. But what happens when that very shame becomes a part of the boy’s marrow? The author's writing navigates that silent inheritance of trauma, the unspoken guilt of being born from a body society refuses to sanctify.
Rekhabai is not a conventional mother; she is both the nurturer and the performer, both fiercely protective and emotionally absent at times. Her love isn’t expressed in lullabies but in sacrifices, in the quiet determination to send her son away even if it means loneliness for herself. There’s a raw tenderness in how Gaekwad recalls her, not saintly, not flawless, but real.
In one sense, the book is her elegy. Every page throbs with her unspoken pain, a woman fighting to preserve her child’s future while the world around her rots. The emotional power of the book lies not in grand confessions, but in the silences between them.
The author's confession of his queer inclinations is handled with remarkable honesty, not as a bold declaration, but as an aching truth. His queerness is not presented as rebellion but as confusion, loneliness, and an extension of his alienation. Growing up amidst sensuality and performance, he learns early that gender and desire are fluid. Yet, the world demands labels.
The author's writing is clean, cinematic, and unapologetically honest. He doesn’t romanticize the filth of the kotha, nor does he drown it in pity. There’s restraint in his storytelling, a refusal to exaggerate. He writes as if he’s walking barefoot over shards of his past, bleeding quietly with every memory. His alternating tone, lyrical when he writes about his mother, detached when he writes about his schooling, mirrors his emotional dislocation. The transitions between these worlds are often abrupt, yet they serve the book’s truth: life doesn’t offer neat transitions.
✍️ Strengths :
🔸There’s no pretension in his voice. Every emotion, shame, longing, defiance, feels lived rather than written.
🔸The book humanizes courtesans without romanticizing them, peeling away the cinematic gloss to reveal their humanity.
🔸The interplay between Rekhabai’s fading world and Manish’s evolving one captures generational conflict with striking sensitivity.
🔸Few writers allow themselves to be this exposed. The author's candour about his sexuality, fear, and guilt is what makes the book linger.
✒️ Areas for improvement :
▪️The book occasionally drifts in chronology. The shifts between childhood memories, reflections, and adult observations feel uneven, sometimes diluting emotional momentum.
▪️While its open-endedness feels true to life, it may frustrate readers seeking narrative resolution. The memoir ends where understanding begins, abruptly, almost mid-breath.
▪️His queerness, though mentioned, feels like a thread left hanging. One wishes he delved deeper into that part of his identity and how it intersected with his upbringing.
▪️For readers unfamiliar with tawaif culture, certain details of Bowbazar and its socio-historical texture remain underexplained.
In conclusion, it is not an easy book to read, nor should it be. It drags you through the narrow, suffocating lanes of Bowbazar, through classrooms filled with prejudice, and into the quiet ache of a son who has lived too many lives in one lifetime. It is tender without being sentimental, brutal without being cynical. In the end, it is not just a story about escaping the kotha, it is about never truly escaping. About how love, shame, and resilience can coexist within the same heart. About how some dances never end; they just shift stages. In short, this is not merely a memoir, it is a confession, a cultural document, and above all, a son’s love letter to a mother who refused to let society define her worth. It deserves to be read, not for the glamour of its setting, but for the grace of its truth.
At its heart, this book is a haunting meditation on identity, the kind that’s not chosen but inherited, and the lifelong struggle to make peace with it. The book oscillates between two worlds, the glittering yet decaying kothas of Bowbazar, and the rigid, ‘civilized’ world of boarding schools in the hills. These contrasting spaces are not just geographical; they are moral and emotional divides.
The author's s mother, Rekhabai, embodies the resilience of women trapped between desire and duty. Her kotha is both her stage and her prison. Her son, meanwhile, becomes the site of her redemption, the proof that she can break the cycle of shame. But what happens when that very shame becomes a part of the boy’s marrow? The author's writing navigates that silent inheritance of trauma, the unspoken guilt of being born from a body society refuses to sanctify.
Rekhabai is not a conventional mother; she is both the nurturer and the performer, both fiercely protective and emotionally absent at times. Her love isn’t expressed in lullabies but in sacrifices, in the quiet determination to send her son away even if it means loneliness for herself. There’s a raw tenderness in how Gaekwad recalls her, not saintly, not flawless, but real.
In one sense, the book is her elegy. Every page throbs with her unspoken pain, a woman fighting to preserve her child’s future while the world around her rots. The emotional power of the book lies not in grand confessions, but in the silences between them.
The author's confession of his queer inclinations is handled with remarkable honesty, not as a bold declaration, but as an aching truth. His queerness is not presented as rebellion but as confusion, loneliness, and an extension of his alienation. Growing up amidst sensuality and performance, he learns early that gender and desire are fluid. Yet, the world demands labels.
The author's writing is clean, cinematic, and unapologetically honest. He doesn’t romanticize the filth of the kotha, nor does he drown it in pity. There’s restraint in his storytelling, a refusal to exaggerate. He writes as if he’s walking barefoot over shards of his past, bleeding quietly with every memory. His alternating tone, lyrical when he writes about his mother, detached when he writes about his schooling, mirrors his emotional dislocation. The transitions between these worlds are often abrupt, yet they serve the book’s truth: life doesn’t offer neat transitions.
✍️ Strengths :
🔸There’s no pretension in his voice. Every emotion, shame, longing, defiance, feels lived rather than written.
🔸The book humanizes courtesans without romanticizing them, peeling away the cinematic gloss to reveal their humanity.
🔸The interplay between Rekhabai’s fading world and Manish’s evolving one captures generational conflict with striking sensitivity.
🔸Few writers allow themselves to be this exposed. The author's candour about his sexuality, fear, and guilt is what makes the book linger.
✒️ Areas for improvement :
▪️The book occasionally drifts in chronology. The shifts between childhood memories, reflections, and adult observations feel uneven, sometimes diluting emotional momentum.
▪️While its open-endedness feels true to life, it may frustrate readers seeking narrative resolution. The memoir ends where understanding begins, abruptly, almost mid-breath.
▪️His queerness, though mentioned, feels like a thread left hanging. One wishes he delved deeper into that part of his identity and how it intersected with his upbringing.
▪️For readers unfamiliar with tawaif culture, certain details of Bowbazar and its socio-historical texture remain underexplained.
In conclusion, it is not an easy book to read, nor should it be. It drags you through the narrow, suffocating lanes of Bowbazar, through classrooms filled with prejudice, and into the quiet ache of a son who has lived too many lives in one lifetime. It is tender without being sentimental, brutal without being cynical. In the end, it is not just a story about escaping the kotha, it is about never truly escaping. About how love, shame, and resilience can coexist within the same heart. About how some dances never end; they just shift stages. In short, this is not merely a memoir, it is a confession, a cultural document, and above all, a son’s love letter to a mother who refused to let society define her worth. It deserves to be read, not for the glamour of its setting, but for the grace of its truth.
December 31, 2025
When I picked up this book, I was curious and had no expectations, but by the end, I was utterly absorbed and moved.
Born out of wedlock, Manish Gaekwad's memoir is a deeply moving personal account of his mother, Rekhabai's, efforts to shield her son from the dangers and violence lurking around Kothas. The life of the Tawaifs carries a sense of beauty, yet the stark reality of what life in a kotha entails for a child is equally raw. It's like a beautiful building with a drain in its backyard, whose stench slowly erodes its grandeur, unnoticed by most.
At its heart, Nautch Boy is the story of a queer boy growing up in a man's world but surrounded by women. These aren't just any women, but those of Bowbazaar Kotha in Bundook Gully, where his mother, Rekhabai, was a courtesan. The title Nautch Boy, however, is a slight hook if one's expecting the literal male equivalent of 'nautch girl', a boy dancing for male onlookers. Instead, it is a metaphor for several interconnected allusions: growing up in a kotha, a space coded as feminine, erotic, and taboo, especially for a boy who's at home with the ambient music and dance even as he's discomfited by his inner femininity; his time at boarding school where he's labelled a 'sissy' even as boys dally with him for their pubescent pleasures; and ultimately his journey — born in, and moulded by, hardship — into manhood and self-acceptance.
Manish grows up acquiring a brittle exterior, shunning any show of affection yet yearning for it. When he says that acts of tenderness, love and care do not shine through the fog of memories; when he tells us of his maternal kin who belong to the Kanjarbhat nomadic tribe living in utter squalor; when he mentions that when her in-laws sold her to the Bowbazar, Kolkata, kothi, Rekhabai settled in without demur; when he talks about how he danced and danced, at the kothi, at his boarding school; when he speaks of words "nourishing his soul, helping him deal with the chaos both inside and outside; "when he describes how the 1993 bomb blasts wipe out the Bowbazar kothas and forced the tawaifs to turn the corner ("when skin replaced song in a dance bar "); when he tells us his mother had lived several quiet years immersed in prayer and longing; when he discusses sex while recording his mother's years in the kotha and it's the reader who flinches not the writer, that is when Nautch Boy fairly shines.
Manish's writing is lucid, and his vocabulary quietly reflects his covert education and his status as a voracious reader. He knows how to captivate audiences, hook them, and, when they get too comfortable, shock them. His descriptions of places are so starkly descriptive that they wallop you and shake you. The narration is poignant and clever, striking a balance between the dramatic, dazzling life of the kothas and the crazy world beyond their high walls, both contrasting and stark realities. There are certain portions in the book that remind me of the book Born A Crime by Trevor Noah. I found ounces of similarities in the relationship with the mother.
This book is not for everyone, but if you decide to get out of your comfort zone, this is the book I highly recommend.
Born out of wedlock, Manish Gaekwad's memoir is a deeply moving personal account of his mother, Rekhabai's, efforts to shield her son from the dangers and violence lurking around Kothas. The life of the Tawaifs carries a sense of beauty, yet the stark reality of what life in a kotha entails for a child is equally raw. It's like a beautiful building with a drain in its backyard, whose stench slowly erodes its grandeur, unnoticed by most.
At its heart, Nautch Boy is the story of a queer boy growing up in a man's world but surrounded by women. These aren't just any women, but those of Bowbazaar Kotha in Bundook Gully, where his mother, Rekhabai, was a courtesan. The title Nautch Boy, however, is a slight hook if one's expecting the literal male equivalent of 'nautch girl', a boy dancing for male onlookers. Instead, it is a metaphor for several interconnected allusions: growing up in a kotha, a space coded as feminine, erotic, and taboo, especially for a boy who's at home with the ambient music and dance even as he's discomfited by his inner femininity; his time at boarding school where he's labelled a 'sissy' even as boys dally with him for their pubescent pleasures; and ultimately his journey — born in, and moulded by, hardship — into manhood and self-acceptance.
Manish grows up acquiring a brittle exterior, shunning any show of affection yet yearning for it. When he says that acts of tenderness, love and care do not shine through the fog of memories; when he tells us of his maternal kin who belong to the Kanjarbhat nomadic tribe living in utter squalor; when he mentions that when her in-laws sold her to the Bowbazar, Kolkata, kothi, Rekhabai settled in without demur; when he talks about how he danced and danced, at the kothi, at his boarding school; when he speaks of words "nourishing his soul, helping him deal with the chaos both inside and outside; "when he describes how the 1993 bomb blasts wipe out the Bowbazar kothas and forced the tawaifs to turn the corner ("when skin replaced song in a dance bar "); when he tells us his mother had lived several quiet years immersed in prayer and longing; when he discusses sex while recording his mother's years in the kotha and it's the reader who flinches not the writer, that is when Nautch Boy fairly shines.
Manish's writing is lucid, and his vocabulary quietly reflects his covert education and his status as a voracious reader. He knows how to captivate audiences, hook them, and, when they get too comfortable, shock them. His descriptions of places are so starkly descriptive that they wallop you and shake you. The narration is poignant and clever, striking a balance between the dramatic, dazzling life of the kothas and the crazy world beyond their high walls, both contrasting and stark realities. There are certain portions in the book that remind me of the book Born A Crime by Trevor Noah. I found ounces of similarities in the relationship with the mother.
This book is not for everyone, but if you decide to get out of your comfort zone, this is the book I highly recommend.
September 20, 2025
As I read the last scenes of ‘Nautch Boy’, I felt like I was falling from a great height. I was scared to turn the page where the author’s mother succumbs to her illness…
Even as Manish’s own story is inextricably linked to his mother’s, and even as we meet her in ‘Nautch Boy’ almost as often as in her own memoir—written by her son—here the narrator re-calibrates the game.
Manish describes at length his days in Kurseong and Darjeeling boarding schools. The hills shrouded in mists serve as the backdrop of his first dalliances with the veiled liberties of accepting himself as a nautchboy. How could a queer child not be enamoured by the ghunghroos and adaas of the women in the kothas he grew up surrounded by?
In Manish’s books we are confronted with the last days of the kotha. An institution that we think of with curious judgement (at our best) in our “cultured” ghettos, but an institution that was perhaps the last surviving nazeer of a Herland. I swooned every time Manish described the mogra-scented rooms mujra was performed in—so visual, visceral, vivid. Despite the grime of every day living in Bandook Gully, the kotha retained its grounded aesthetic—so easily romanticised but more often than not misunderstood.
What truly moved me were the author’s self-reflections on masculinity and sexuality in the book. In one passage he describes his walk. Something like Meena Kumari’s in ‘Pakeezah’—hips involved, hands in unconscious mudras; ready to spring into song and dance any moment, waist leaning into the curves of her body. A walk that most queer children must be familiar with, since it’s also their own.
I strongly believe there’s nobody better out there to write about this intersection of cultural history and personal experience than Manish. His greatest skill: staccato, bathetic, ingenious sentences that read like untame/d/able music. That pirouette, segue, perspectivise their own being. That live easily, a life of their own, despite everything.
I cried and laughed reading this stunning book, which made me think about love and forgiveness in challenging, but rewarding ways.
Go and read his books.
Even as Manish’s own story is inextricably linked to his mother’s, and even as we meet her in ‘Nautch Boy’ almost as often as in her own memoir—written by her son—here the narrator re-calibrates the game.
Manish describes at length his days in Kurseong and Darjeeling boarding schools. The hills shrouded in mists serve as the backdrop of his first dalliances with the veiled liberties of accepting himself as a nautchboy. How could a queer child not be enamoured by the ghunghroos and adaas of the women in the kothas he grew up surrounded by?
In Manish’s books we are confronted with the last days of the kotha. An institution that we think of with curious judgement (at our best) in our “cultured” ghettos, but an institution that was perhaps the last surviving nazeer of a Herland. I swooned every time Manish described the mogra-scented rooms mujra was performed in—so visual, visceral, vivid. Despite the grime of every day living in Bandook Gully, the kotha retained its grounded aesthetic—so easily romanticised but more often than not misunderstood.
What truly moved me were the author’s self-reflections on masculinity and sexuality in the book. In one passage he describes his walk. Something like Meena Kumari’s in ‘Pakeezah’—hips involved, hands in unconscious mudras; ready to spring into song and dance any moment, waist leaning into the curves of her body. A walk that most queer children must be familiar with, since it’s also their own.
I strongly believe there’s nobody better out there to write about this intersection of cultural history and personal experience than Manish. His greatest skill: staccato, bathetic, ingenious sentences that read like untame/d/able music. That pirouette, segue, perspectivise their own being. That live easily, a life of their own, despite everything.
I cried and laughed reading this stunning book, which made me think about love and forgiveness in challenging, but rewarding ways.
Go and read his books.
September 22, 2025
I read this memoir soon after I finished his The Last Courtesan... so the set-up was quite fresh in my mind. And I was able to relate more with this sequel-of-sorts book.
The first book satiated my curiosity on the life of the courtesans back in the 80s and 90s, but had left me thinking how did the writer grow up to be who is he right now in all this. Nautch Boy told me how. While this second book does speak of Manish's story, how he grew up, the life he lived in boarding school, his relationship with his father, and lack of acceptance as a queer, but ngl, both the books, however, have one main character—the author's mother. It was amazing to see how, even when they were not so lovey-dovey and close as a mother and son, their lives were still tethered to each other in a beautiful way. The tenderness with which the writer wrote about his mother in the last few pages stirred me quite a bit. Especially their bonding over Hindi film industry.
I did, however, wanted to read more of the author's professional life, how he came to write his debut novel, his career in the film industry, and so on. I wanted more than the quick vignettes he presented. Maybe, some day, I will get my answers.
To read about such a challenging life is one thing, but to live it is another. And to describe it in these many simple yet beautiful words with such depth and generous seasoning of cheeky humor, is downright charming. I laughed and teared up at the same time while reading a few pages.
When I finished the book, I looked up the song "Tu Mere Saath Rahega Munne" from the movie Trishul on Spotify. I teared up as I again went back to the page where the author shares this same poem; I tried to understand how he connects with it. The next song that I played was "In Ankhon ki Masti me.." from the film Umrao Jaan. I smiled thinking that from now on, I would associate this song with Rekha bai, not the actor but the main character of this author's life and both these lovely memoirs.
The first book satiated my curiosity on the life of the courtesans back in the 80s and 90s, but had left me thinking how did the writer grow up to be who is he right now in all this. Nautch Boy told me how. While this second book does speak of Manish's story, how he grew up, the life he lived in boarding school, his relationship with his father, and lack of acceptance as a queer, but ngl, both the books, however, have one main character—the author's mother. It was amazing to see how, even when they were not so lovey-dovey and close as a mother and son, their lives were still tethered to each other in a beautiful way. The tenderness with which the writer wrote about his mother in the last few pages stirred me quite a bit. Especially their bonding over Hindi film industry.
I did, however, wanted to read more of the author's professional life, how he came to write his debut novel, his career in the film industry, and so on. I wanted more than the quick vignettes he presented. Maybe, some day, I will get my answers.
To read about such a challenging life is one thing, but to live it is another. And to describe it in these many simple yet beautiful words with such depth and generous seasoning of cheeky humor, is downright charming. I laughed and teared up at the same time while reading a few pages.
When I finished the book, I looked up the song "Tu Mere Saath Rahega Munne" from the movie Trishul on Spotify. I teared up as I again went back to the page where the author shares this same poem; I tried to understand how he connects with it. The next song that I played was "In Ankhon ki Masti me.." from the film Umrao Jaan. I smiled thinking that from now on, I would associate this song with Rekha bai, not the actor but the main character of this author's life and both these lovely memoirs.
August 19, 2025
”A kotha is for entertainment. And to tawaifs, sex work is not entertaining.”
- Manish Gaekwad, Nautch Boy
Early in the memoir, Rekhabai is pictured as fiercely protecting her new born from the father, Rehmat Khan - a married man with two children. Rekhabai was sold off to an older man by her family for clearing debts who brutally raped her. She found solace in Kothas, where patrons thronged and seeked her. A piece of mother's freedom was a son's caged sorrow, bound by unspoken expectations and the weight of love unconditionally given.
”She felt at home in this new environment—for a girl who had by now begun to understand she had no permanent home, she was learning to adjust and make any new nest her temporary home.”
As Gaekwad recalls his childhood in the Kothas, watching Rekhabai and other tawaifs dolled up to receive patrons, the memories are tinted with the hues of Bollywood songs.
”Violence was a form of care and protection for my mother.”
’Nautch Boy’ is a courtesan's story of shielding her son from the privy Kothas and her resilience to push him towards a better tomorrow. His earliest memories of the place perceive it to be colourless, dark, grim and filled with dead air. What makes the read compelling is its refusal to separate love from suffering, or resilience from loss. Gaekwad’s narrative unsettles the reader by forcing us to look beyond cinematic fantasies and confront the lived realities of women who inhabited these spaces.
- Manish Gaekwad, Nautch Boy
Early in the memoir, Rekhabai is pictured as fiercely protecting her new born from the father, Rehmat Khan - a married man with two children. Rekhabai was sold off to an older man by her family for clearing debts who brutally raped her. She found solace in Kothas, where patrons thronged and seeked her. A piece of mother's freedom was a son's caged sorrow, bound by unspoken expectations and the weight of love unconditionally given.
”She felt at home in this new environment—for a girl who had by now begun to understand she had no permanent home, she was learning to adjust and make any new nest her temporary home.”
As Gaekwad recalls his childhood in the Kothas, watching Rekhabai and other tawaifs dolled up to receive patrons, the memories are tinted with the hues of Bollywood songs.
”Violence was a form of care and protection for my mother.”
’Nautch Boy’ is a courtesan's story of shielding her son from the privy Kothas and her resilience to push him towards a better tomorrow. His earliest memories of the place perceive it to be colourless, dark, grim and filled with dead air. What makes the read compelling is its refusal to separate love from suffering, or resilience from loss. Gaekwad’s narrative unsettles the reader by forcing us to look beyond cinematic fantasies and confront the lived realities of women who inhabited these spaces.
September 15, 2025
Memoirs have always been intimate recollections of a life lived, sometimes — a journey endured. Nauth Boy is something in between.
It is a heart- rendering account of a wearying life, portraying the struggles and resilience of Rekhabai and her son Manish Gaekwad. Gaekwad centers his narrative on his childhood and upbringing, with his mother as the focal point. His home was the kotha of Bowbazar, Bandook Gally— where life revolved around his mother, the tawaifs, mujara-mehfil, and their children. His formal education took him to boarding schools in Kurseong and Darjeeling, shaping his worldview. Despite continuous challenges Rekhabai's fierce love shielded her son from worldy evils. A tough endeavour where violence and gloom were always around the corner.
Gaekwad, elaborates about his conflicting queer tendencies over the course of this poignant life story. It's mentioned with a maturity layered with grief and void when one doesn't feel belonged.
This memoir is an ode a mother's foresight and sacrifices to build a better life for her son to the best of her potential and a mirror to a dying culture of entertainment which is mistaken as a taboo or a shameful trade.
The narration is poignant and clever, striking a balance between the dramatic-dazzling life of the kothas and the crazy world beyond its high walls, both contrasting and stark realities. You must read it.
It is a heart- rendering account of a wearying life, portraying the struggles and resilience of Rekhabai and her son Manish Gaekwad. Gaekwad centers his narrative on his childhood and upbringing, with his mother as the focal point. His home was the kotha of Bowbazar, Bandook Gally— where life revolved around his mother, the tawaifs, mujara-mehfil, and their children. His formal education took him to boarding schools in Kurseong and Darjeeling, shaping his worldview. Despite continuous challenges Rekhabai's fierce love shielded her son from worldy evils. A tough endeavour where violence and gloom were always around the corner.
Gaekwad, elaborates about his conflicting queer tendencies over the course of this poignant life story. It's mentioned with a maturity layered with grief and void when one doesn't feel belonged.
This memoir is an ode a mother's foresight and sacrifices to build a better life for her son to the best of her potential and a mirror to a dying culture of entertainment which is mistaken as a taboo or a shameful trade.
The narration is poignant and clever, striking a balance between the dramatic-dazzling life of the kothas and the crazy world beyond its high walls, both contrasting and stark realities. You must read it.
October 24, 2025
The story begins in a room filled with mirrors and music, and somewhere in between, a boy learns how beauty can both protect and wound. Nautch Boy is not a tale told from a distance. It feels written from inside the pulse of memory, where every song his mother once danced to still trembles through his veins.
Manish Gaekwad does not reconstruct the past to make it respectable. He lets it stay raw, shimmering, unapologetic. The courtesan’s world here is not spectacle but survival, not shame but art. In that space, a mother teaches her son to dream of something beyond it, even as the same world continues to shape him. That contradiction gives the book its quiet brilliance.
There is something raw in how Gaekwad navigates gaze, class, and performance, without ever turning them into theory. The personal becomes political here, not by intention but by inevitability. His writing questions the boundaries of purity and inheritance, revealing how identities are neither erased nor escaped, only rewritten through understanding.
I finished it feeling as though I had read not one life but many, the mother’s, the child’s, the artist’s, the society’s. It is rare to find a book that carries both tenderness and critique so seamlessly. Nautch Boy doesn’t ask to be admired. It asks to be seen, fully and without hesitation.
A necessary, unforgettable read.
Manish Gaekwad does not reconstruct the past to make it respectable. He lets it stay raw, shimmering, unapologetic. The courtesan’s world here is not spectacle but survival, not shame but art. In that space, a mother teaches her son to dream of something beyond it, even as the same world continues to shape him. That contradiction gives the book its quiet brilliance.
There is something raw in how Gaekwad navigates gaze, class, and performance, without ever turning them into theory. The personal becomes political here, not by intention but by inevitability. His writing questions the boundaries of purity and inheritance, revealing how identities are neither erased nor escaped, only rewritten through understanding.
I finished it feeling as though I had read not one life but many, the mother’s, the child’s, the artist’s, the society’s. It is rare to find a book that carries both tenderness and critique so seamlessly. Nautch Boy doesn’t ask to be admired. It asks to be seen, fully and without hesitation.
A necessary, unforgettable read.
October 16, 2025
A memoir like no other.Nautch Boy is the life story of Manish Gaekwad, the son of a reigning courtesan, Rekhabai. Born in a Kotha, Manish's life is surrounded by young women with powdered faces, lined eyes and shimmering clothes. The rhythm of tabla and sitar played through his childhood, running through his veins.
His mother dreamt of a better life for him, and he was sent to a boarding school in the hills. And the experiences he narrated from there are deeply personal and bold.
Manish Gaekwad, now a reporter, screenwriter and novelist, shares his life story with honesty. The memory is laced with classic old Bollywood songs and iconic film stars that shaped Manish's life and identity. Sridevi, in particular, becomes his news. Her expressive dance steps give him the confidence to express his own flair. Bollywood becomes a refuge for him where he can dream, imitate and find joy.
Gaekwad's writing is witty, bold and playful. Uses film references and humour to soften the heavier memories. He does not shy away from writing about his life in Kotha and his desires with utter boldness.
Nautch Boy celebrates truth in all its beauty – gritty, glamorous and simply human.
His mother dreamt of a better life for him, and he was sent to a boarding school in the hills. And the experiences he narrated from there are deeply personal and bold.
Manish Gaekwad, now a reporter, screenwriter and novelist, shares his life story with honesty. The memory is laced with classic old Bollywood songs and iconic film stars that shaped Manish's life and identity. Sridevi, in particular, becomes his news. Her expressive dance steps give him the confidence to express his own flair. Bollywood becomes a refuge for him where he can dream, imitate and find joy.
Gaekwad's writing is witty, bold and playful. Uses film references and humour to soften the heavier memories. He does not shy away from writing about his life in Kotha and his desires with utter boldness.
Nautch Boy celebrates truth in all its beauty – gritty, glamorous and simply human.
September 26, 2025
Book Review Ahead»»
Book - Nautch Boy
Author - Manish Gaekwad
Pages - 216
Published - August 14 2025
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐/5
A boy born to a courtesan. A boy parented by one. A boy who grows up to understand how women have been the victims of all crusades towards a brighter tomorrow. Manish Gaekwad let's readers into his life with this vulnerable book that's part memoir, and part social commentary.
Mind you, though. This is as much as Manish's story as it is of his mother, Rekha Devi ji. Gaekwad is honest in his writings, and with his memories. Be it from his schools or the kothas. What makes Nautch Boy deep is it's decision to not separate love from darkness, and the dark alleys. Gaekwad's recollection of the past is a stark reminder of how the men around us, our favourite ones too, have some part of themselves that only the ones pushed into the void fall prey to.
Nautch Boy is someone's life; a book that makes us realise that beyond the cinematic grandeur of tawaifs that Sanjay Leela Bhansali ever so beautifully put, there exists similar settings near open sewers and claustrophobic alleys.
Book - Nautch Boy
Author - Manish Gaekwad
Pages - 216
Published - August 14 2025
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐/5
A boy born to a courtesan. A boy parented by one. A boy who grows up to understand how women have been the victims of all crusades towards a brighter tomorrow. Manish Gaekwad let's readers into his life with this vulnerable book that's part memoir, and part social commentary.
Mind you, though. This is as much as Manish's story as it is of his mother, Rekha Devi ji. Gaekwad is honest in his writings, and with his memories. Be it from his schools or the kothas. What makes Nautch Boy deep is it's decision to not separate love from darkness, and the dark alleys. Gaekwad's recollection of the past is a stark reminder of how the men around us, our favourite ones too, have some part of themselves that only the ones pushed into the void fall prey to.
Nautch Boy is someone's life; a book that makes us realise that beyond the cinematic grandeur of tawaifs that Sanjay Leela Bhansali ever so beautifully put, there exists similar settings near open sewers and claustrophobic alleys.
December 30, 2025
Once again, I heard the book and it is a long one.. But worth it~~
Gaekwad tells his own story — born in a courtesan’s quarters in India, navigating life between the kotha and English-medium boarding schools, and growing up queer in a world that didn’t have the language or space for him. The book pulls you into the rhythms of a world most of us only imagine — the music, dance, stigma, humour, pain, and the deep bond with his mother, a strong and complex woman who shaped him in ways that only become clear with time.
What I loved most was how the memoir blends tenderness with raw reality — it’s funny and deeply touching, beautiful and heartbreaking, all at once. Gaekwad writes with such clarity and courage that you feel every moment with him — from schoolyard marginalisation to the complicated dignity of life in the kothas.
If you care about identity, resilience, love, and stories that expand your view of the world, this is a book I genuinely think everyone should read.
Gaekwad tells his own story — born in a courtesan’s quarters in India, navigating life between the kotha and English-medium boarding schools, and growing up queer in a world that didn’t have the language or space for him. The book pulls you into the rhythms of a world most of us only imagine — the music, dance, stigma, humour, pain, and the deep bond with his mother, a strong and complex woman who shaped him in ways that only become clear with time.
What I loved most was how the memoir blends tenderness with raw reality — it’s funny and deeply touching, beautiful and heartbreaking, all at once. Gaekwad writes with such clarity and courage that you feel every moment with him — from schoolyard marginalisation to the complicated dignity of life in the kothas.
If you care about identity, resilience, love, and stories that expand your view of the world, this is a book I genuinely think everyone should read.
December 21, 2025
Nautch Boy is not an easy read, but it is an important one. Written with raw honesty, this memoir takes you into a world most of us only whisper about, let alone understand. Manish Gaekwad’s childhood inside the kothas is narrated without drama, yet every page carries emotional weight.
What stayed with me was how quietly painful the story is. There is no self-pity, only truth. It made me uncomfortable at times, but also deeply empathetic. This book doesn’t ask for sympathy; it asks for acknowledgement. A brave, necessary read that stays with you long after you close it.
What stayed with me was how quietly painful the story is. There is no self-pity, only truth. It made me uncomfortable at times, but also deeply empathetic. This book doesn’t ask for sympathy; it asks for acknowledgement. A brave, necessary read that stays with you long after you close it.
November 19, 2025
I read Manish’s book about his mother and couldn’t help thinking that no matter how much he admires her, his unusual childhood must have been a difficult one. This book throws some light but not enough and returns to the story of his mother. I look forward to more from this talented and perceptive voice.
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