THE ENCHANTER OF LANDOUR

Ruskin Bond, national treasure and one of India’s most beloved authors, is back with The Enchanted Cottage, a short book that reads like a greatest hits package

Aditya Mani Jha

Q. The role of the owl in this book is fascinating. Readers may remember your poem ‘The Owl’. Could you tell us more about the bird’s role here? I have a soft corner for owls. In The Enchanted Cottage, I felt that the owl and the crow would be a good way to get into the story. Of course, there’s a lot of superstition around owls, but they’re useful, they keep the rat population down. On the one hand, the owl is considered wise in folklore but in India, we also often call a foolish person ‘ullu’. Q. About the character David Fennimore, there’s this sense that for the hill people, he represents every plains-dweller who comes up for a vacation, screws up their lives and hightails it out of…

You're reading a preview of

India Today (Digital) - 1 Issue, 24 October 2022

DiscountMags is a licensed distributor (not a publisher) of the above content and Publication through Zinio LLC. Accordingly, we have no editorial control over the Publications. Any opinions, advice, statements, services, offers or other information or content expressed or made available by third parties, including those made in Publications offered on our website, are those of the respective author(s) or publisher(s) and not of DiscountMags. DiscountMags does not guarantee the accuracy, completeness, truthfulness, or usefulness of all or any portion of any publication or any services or offers made by third parties, nor will we be liable for any loss or damage caused by your reliance on information contained in any Publication, or your use of services offered, or your acceptance of any offers made through the Service or the Publications. For content removal requests, please contact Zinio.