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  • Published: 30 September 1993
  • ISBN: 9780140185508
  • Imprint: Penguin Classics
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 144
  • RRP: $32.99

The Vendor of Sweets



While the colourful sweetmeats are frying in the kitchen, Jagan immerses himself in his copy of the Bhagavad Gita. A widower of firm Gandhian principles, Jagan nonetheless harbours a warm and embarrassed affection for his wastrel son Mali. Yet even Jagan's patience begins to fray when Mali descends on the sleepy city of Malgudi full of modern notions, with a new half-American wife and a grand plan for selling novel-writing machines. From different generations and different cultures, father and son are forced to confront each other, and are taken by surprise . . .

  • Published: 30 September 1993
  • ISBN: 9780140185508
  • Imprint: Penguin Classics
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 144
  • RRP: $32.99

About the authors

R K Narayan

R K Narayan's writing spans the greatest period of change in modern Indian history, from the days of the Raj - Swami and Friends (1935), The Bachelor of Arts (1937) and The English Teacher (1945) - to recent years of political unrest - The Painter of Signs (1976), A Tiger for Malgudi (1983), and Talkative Man (1987). He has published numerous collections of short stories, including Malgudi Days (1982), and Under the Banyan Tree (1985), and several works of non-fiction.

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