The twenty-eight stories in The Greatest Marathi Stories Ever Told represent some of the finest short fiction in Marathi literature. Selected and edited by writer and translator Ashutosh Potdar, this collection features established literary masters such as Gangadhar Gadgil, G. A. Kulkarni, Baburao Bagul, Kamal Desai, Vilas Sarang, Anna Bhau Sathe, Urmila Pawar, Jayant Narlikar, Hamid Dalwai, and others.
In ‘Divine Intervention’, Chintaman Vinayak Joshi uses a touch of magic to transform the pain of the common man; ‘King Maruti’ by Vyankatesh Madgulkar and ‘Hari’s Laughter’ by Jayant Pawar underline the cruelty and carelessness of humans towards other life forms; Anna Bhau Sathe’s ‘Gold From the Graves’ tells the story of a desperate migrant worker who is forced to rob graves to make ends meet; Bhaskar Chandanshiv’s ‘Red Muck’ depicts the struggles of rural poverty; Yogiraj Waghmare takes an interesting look at superstitions in ‘Crows’; ‘Relationships’ by Asha Bage and ‘And then it Poured’ by Gauri Deshpande are telling and poignant explorations of human relationships; and Vilas Sarang explores complex truths about nations and borders in ‘Kalluri’s Radio’.
The stories in this collection are melancholic, sarcastic, humorous, elegant, and experimental—together, they showcase the range, variety, and vibrancy of the Marathi short story and famed Marathi literary tradition.