27 July,2026 09:11 AM IST | Mumbai | The Guide Team
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Mukunda Rao's telling of the extraordinary story of Dr BR Ambedkar's life - from a child facing daily humiliation, to a scholar, reformer and the architect of the Constitution of India - makes for a compelling read, especially for young adults in today's times. Written in simple, sharp language, this inspiring biography is beyond history, and more about an icon who laid the foundations for liberty and equality. Rao's play, Babasaheb has been staged across Karnataka that reflects the life and times of one of India's greatest minds.
In this book, former resident Paramita Sen hits the rewind button about how a tiny Czech town, ZlÃn, where Tomáš Bata grew his family's modest shoe shop into a veritable empire, led to the creation of one of India's favourite shoe brands. It takes the reader through timelines from when the foundation stone of one of India's earliest company towns was laid in 1934 near Kolkata, and how in the following decades, the town grew into a bastion of innovative thinking, cosmopolitanism and community as it was linked with the brand.
Translated by Cat Anderson, this novel by Japaneseauthor Ito Ogawa, trails Hatoko's life. She returns to Kamakura in Kanagawa, to helm the stationery store left to her by her late grandmother. As its custodian, she also inherits being the local public scribe, a role she trained for as a child under her strict grandmother's guidance. As residents seek her help, she accepts varied requests: writing letters of greeting, farewell, and love, for those who come to her, as she also discovers the multi-hued dynamics of her role.
