Sheila Dhar’s autobiographical stories, essays, and memoirs are classics of modern Indian prose. An accomplished singer, the world she inhabited included renowned north Indian classical musicians such as Begum Akhtar, Siddheshwari Bai, Fayyaz and Niaz Ahmed Khan, Kesar Bai Kerkar, Bade Ghulam Ali Khan, and Bhimsen Joshi. No writer has ever conveyed the ethos of this world and the quirks of its denizens with such wit, irreverence, perceptiveness and empathy.

Sheila Dhar’s writing straddles many worlds. Once a part of Delhi’s political elite, she is inimitably observant about celebrities as diverse as Indira Gandhi, Joan Robinson, Richard Attenborough, and the Queen of Tonga. In other parts of this book she returns to the Old Delhi she grew up in—its sprawling bungalows, its labyrinthine households with their complicated domestic politics, its bygone musical ambience.

Incisive intelligence, comic effervescence, self-deprecating humour, and a fascinating ability to manipulate the English language for Indian contexts—all combine to make this book an absolute delight.

Many of these writings have been unavailable or out of print for some time. The present book provides, for the first time within the covers of a single volume, Sheila Dhar’s collected shorter writings, including all her memorable stories and essays.