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The Last Email
'Your story has left me gasping. Though I did not remember the ferocious details, I had a fairly strong recollection of the incandescent feelings expressed in it. But I wasn't prepared for the full burst of passion shown by the lovers, and the fitting, though brutal, end. [...] When did you write it? No, don't tell me. I know you wrote it soon after I left India. But let me assure you, dearest Maya, that the passion still abides with me... or shall I say, with us...'
Almost forty years after the end of their passionate affair in New Delhi of the late 1970s, Kevin, a vicar devoted to the political struggle for Scottish independence, and Maya, a reputed author of Hindi literary works, re-establish contact--this time over email. As they slowly re-weave the delicate tapestry of their connection with each missive, they share the stories of their histories, interests, desires and despairs with each other. Ultimately, Kevin and Maya must realize, each on their own, whether the strength of their remembered passion can match the four decades of quotidian life they have both since accrued.
Written with grace and sensitivity, The Last Email is a moving account of two lives lived with passionate intensity, and steeped equally in love and in memory.
Almost forty years after the end of their passionate affair in New Delhi of the late 1970s, Kevin, a vicar devoted to the political struggle for Scottish independence, and Maya, a reputed author of Hindi literary works, re-establish contact--this time over email. As they slowly re-weave the delicate tapestry of their connection with each missive, they share the stories of their histories, interests, desires and despairs with each other. Ultimately, Kevin and Maya must realize, each on their own, whether the strength of their remembered passion can match the four decades of quotidian life they have both since accrued.
Written with grace and sensitivity, The Last Email is a moving account of two lives lived with passionate intensity, and steeped equally in love and in memory.
234 pages, Paperback
Published December 10, 2017
3 people are currently reading
52 people want to read
About the author
Mridula Garg
62 books19 followersMridula Garg is an Indian writer who writes in Hindi and English languages. She has published over 30 books in Hindi – novels, short story collections, plays and collections of essays – including several translated into English. She is a recipient of the Sahitya Akademi Award.
She published her debut novel, Uske Hisse Ki Dhoop, in 1975. She was arrested for obscenity after her novel Chittacobra was published in 1979, in a case that extended for two years but did not result in prison. Several of her works have feminist themes, and she told The Hindu in 2010, "My writing is not feminist. One of the metaphors of womanhood is guilt, be it in sexual matters, in working woman or non-working. My women felt no guilt ever. It ruffled feathers. We have the cerebral part and the womb, which encompasses and empowers you but at the same time also tightens you. My kind of feminism is that each woman can be different."
She has been a columnist, writing on environment, women issues, child servitude and literature. She wrote a fortnightly column, Parivar in Ravivar magazine from Kolkata for five years between 1985-1990 and another column Kataksh (Satire) in India Today (Hindi) for 7 years, between 2003 and 2010. Her novels and stories have been translated into a number of Indian and foreign languages like German, Czech, Japanese and English.
She was a research associate at the Center for South Asian Studies in the University of California-Berkeley, USA in April 1990. She has been invited to speak on Hindi literature and criticism, and discrimination against women, at universities and conferences in erstwhile Yugoslavia (1988), the USA (1990 and 1991), and was a delegate to Interlit-3, Germany(1993). She was invited to and Japan (2003), Italy (2011), Denmark and Russia (2012). She traveled widely and lectured and read from her works there.
She published her debut novel, Uske Hisse Ki Dhoop, in 1975. She was arrested for obscenity after her novel Chittacobra was published in 1979, in a case that extended for two years but did not result in prison. Several of her works have feminist themes, and she told The Hindu in 2010, "My writing is not feminist. One of the metaphors of womanhood is guilt, be it in sexual matters, in working woman or non-working. My women felt no guilt ever. It ruffled feathers. We have the cerebral part and the womb, which encompasses and empowers you but at the same time also tightens you. My kind of feminism is that each woman can be different."
She has been a columnist, writing on environment, women issues, child servitude and literature. She wrote a fortnightly column, Parivar in Ravivar magazine from Kolkata for five years between 1985-1990 and another column Kataksh (Satire) in India Today (Hindi) for 7 years, between 2003 and 2010. Her novels and stories have been translated into a number of Indian and foreign languages like German, Czech, Japanese and English.
She was a research associate at the Center for South Asian Studies in the University of California-Berkeley, USA in April 1990. She has been invited to speak on Hindi literature and criticism, and discrimination against women, at universities and conferences in erstwhile Yugoslavia (1988), the USA (1990 and 1991), and was a delegate to Interlit-3, Germany(1993). She was invited to and Japan (2003), Italy (2011), Denmark and Russia (2012). She traveled widely and lectured and read from her works there.
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
May 21, 2023
I picked this book on a hunch from a book shelf which had LOT of books and i got lucky :)!!
It is a story put as correspondence between two long lost lovers on 'e-mails'. Mature love is interesting as its intricacies are completely different from the young, carefree love which mostly comes in stories too!
The two protagonists are also very different, a Scotsman and an Indian woman,who had an affair when they were young, married with kids. After 40 odd years they try to contact each other via email and the book has very well put their feelings and thoughts which is something one can definitely relate.
It is an easy and fast read, as a conversational set-up usually is. I was looking forward for them to meet again but realized slowly with the story that this is not the end goal..... And the virtual world is better for them, without any troubles and expectations. It is easier to think and write and express than to meet and regret!!
It is a story put as correspondence between two long lost lovers on 'e-mails'. Mature love is interesting as its intricacies are completely different from the young, carefree love which mostly comes in stories too!
The two protagonists are also very different, a Scotsman and an Indian woman,who had an affair when they were young, married with kids. After 40 odd years they try to contact each other via email and the book has very well put their feelings and thoughts which is something one can definitely relate.
It is an easy and fast read, as a conversational set-up usually is. I was looking forward for them to meet again but realized slowly with the story that this is not the end goal..... And the virtual world is better for them, without any troubles and expectations. It is easier to think and write and express than to meet and regret!!
July 14, 2018
Mails written during 11 June 2008 - 24 August 2015, between two people gives the whole range of emotions, life, relationships to the forefront including the international relations.
April 17, 2018
This is the epistolary novel reinvented for the time of social media. Sahitya Akademi winning writer Mridula Garg has ventured into English with this love story in letters between a Scottish politician and an India writer. Separated for years by distance and families – both are married – they are brought together by the Internet. A series of emails rehash memories of their affair in the 1970’s gradually growing more intense as old passion resurfaces. Both characters are well beyond 60 but their romance has, despite everything, despite their demanding lives, outlasted decades.
Maya, the writer, seems to be Garg’s alter ego. The books attributed to her are all titles of Garg’s works, down to the translations and at the launch in Jaipur last year, Garg adeptly skirted the issue of whether there was a Kevin in her life or not. However Maya is arrested because her book Chittacobra is pronounced obscene and hurtful to the male ego and Garg’s life had a similar incident related to the same book.
Cross genre books are quite the trend these days with the memoir masquerading as fiction fairly often. Both Maya and Kevin agree that literature does not even reveal the whole truth – even in autobiographies like Kevin’s where he declares his wife to be the love of his life for his adoring fans.
Garg weaves in the thorny matter of Partition, the issues of Scotland’s attempting to break away from the UK which are discussed in intricate detail and hold up the progress of the book. The story, if it is a story, moves at the meaningless pace of real life; sometimes slow, sometimes meandering, sometimes fast. The Last Email breaks its pace with short stories sent for Kevin’s enlightenment and poems that display the writer’s unchanging love – the strongest statement perhaps being Recantation.
Garg also refers to Tagore’s Shesher Kobita, the Last Poem, where the poet’s protagonist leaves the woman he is passionately involved with for marriage and every day duty, simply because passion is something that does not belong to the quotidian but remains a wonderful concept that is relived through memories. There are spaces left in the text so that the reader can fill in between the lines though occasionally the reader might feel that he or she was eavesdropping on a conversation and getting somewhat left out. Those make for the dry periods in the book when the two are lost in their shared reminiscences.
In the end it is obvious that great passion is eternal but it does not have the power to change anything at all, regardless of what poets have to say – Emily Bronte knew that too. Every day duty goes on and hearts suffer or rejoice in silence. Garg chooses to end with that social media nugget of the Three Wise Women visiting the Christ Child with practical gifts. Women we all know are wise and practical and this book is certainly the writer’s gift to the long separated lover – however, in the interests of the fictional memoir perhaps something more spatial and meaningful could have been contrived, more true to the love, grief and forgiveness that comprises the book.
April 14, 2024
Interesting read. I learnt about a new genre – epistolary. The book is in the form of e-mail conversation between two old lovers. It takes you down the memory lane, to the India of 70s as the two reminisce about the past. A poignant reminder of good times had. Even though it doesn’t reach a ‘conclusion’ by the end as there is no scandal or big secret waiting at the end, the book characterizes the love that is preserved through the years. Likely because it remains untouched, cherished in the hearts of two people as they move on with their separate lives. It conveys a lot without actually saying it. That love remains pure when it is not polluted by everyday struggles.
The conversation does feel a bit one-sided at times, with the woman describing her life as a writer, describing her various books, the name and fame, whereas the man has nothing else to say except to express his love for her.
The short story Recantation is impressive. Specially the end jolts you and stays on your mind for days. It is a slap on the social inequality. An extramarital affair destroys the life of a woman whereas the man “drifted into a very sound sleep indeed.” That's the power of Mridula Garg's writing - to convey a lot without using any words.
My only regret is that I found Mridula Garg so late in life. She has been writing for 50+ years and this is the first book I read by her. I don’t know how that happened since in the 70s and 80s I devoured every Saptahik and Dharmyug. Perhaps, like so many of her writings, it was censored by my parents. She was certainly ahead of her times. Now that I have found her, I intend to read everything written by her. Off to Nayaab Aurtein…
The conversation does feel a bit one-sided at times, with the woman describing her life as a writer, describing her various books, the name and fame, whereas the man has nothing else to say except to express his love for her.
The short story Recantation is impressive. Specially the end jolts you and stays on your mind for days. It is a slap on the social inequality. An extramarital affair destroys the life of a woman whereas the man “drifted into a very sound sleep indeed.” That's the power of Mridula Garg's writing - to convey a lot without using any words.
My only regret is that I found Mridula Garg so late in life. She has been writing for 50+ years and this is the first book I read by her. I don’t know how that happened since in the 70s and 80s I devoured every Saptahik and Dharmyug. Perhaps, like so many of her writings, it was censored by my parents. She was certainly ahead of her times. Now that I have found her, I intend to read everything written by her. Off to Nayaab Aurtein…
November 9, 2018
A sweet read. Enchanting, romantic & a quiet read. Long to read Mridula Garg's other works now. If you want to fall in love all over again, or at least pretend to, this is the book for you. Two characters alone have kept the pace of this book interesting & peaceful. A pleasure to read, sweet as sugar coated marzipan cakes - but better !
January 17, 2018
The Last Email by Mridula Garg is a poignant interaction over email of two lovers who have reconnected after a gap of forty years. Sometimes slow and repetitive, it is an account of bittersweet memories as the two share their lives and their thoughts with each other.
December 13, 2020
Always been a fan of epistolary novels. The Last Email being one such, certainly speaks to me. The interaction between two people reminiscing their past, the present and ... I wanna say future but that's where the book comes to an abrupt end.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews