Which novel won Arundhati Roy the Booker Prize in 1997?
- A.The Inheritance of Loss
- B.Tomb of Sand
- C.The God of Small Things
- D.A Suitable Boy
Correct answer
Explanation
The correct answer is C, The God of Small Things. Arundhati Roy's first novel, set in Ayemenem in Kerala and built around the twins Rahel and Estha, won the Booker Prize in 1997, the fiftieth year of Indian independence. Option A is wrong because The Inheritance of Loss is by Kiran Desai and won the Booker in 2006; candidates often swap the two Desais, Anita and Kiran, and the two Booker years. Option B is wrong because Tomb of Sand is Daisy Rockwell's English translation of Geetanjali Shree's Hindi novel Ret Samadhi, and it won the International Booker Prize in 2022, a separate prize for translated fiction. Option D is wrong because A Suitable Boy is by Vikram Seth, a man, and it never won the Booker. Remember that Roy's later books, such as The Ministry of Utmost Happiness, were not the prize-winning title.
Read the full article: Famous Indian Women Writers and Their Works: Exam Notes
Practice Questions
View allWho was the first woman to be awarded the Jnanpith Award?
- A.Amrita Pritam
- B.Mahadevi Verma
- C.Ashapurna Devi
- D.Mahasweta Devi
Show answer
She received the Jnanpith Award in 1976 for the Bengali novel Pratham Pratishruti, the first part of a trilogy that follows three generations of women in a Bengali household, and she was the first woman to receive the award in its history.
Read the full explanation →The poetry collection The Golden Threshold was written by which Indian writer?
- A.Toru Dutt
- B.Sarojini Naidu
- C.Kamala Das
- D.Pandita Ramabai
Show answer
The Golden Threshold, published in 1905, was her first collection of poems in English, and it was followed by The Bird of Time in 1912 and The Broken Wing in 1917.
Read the full explanation →Interpreter of Maladies, which won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2000, was written by whom?
- A.Jhumpa Lahiri
- B.Kiran Desai
- C.Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni
- D.Anita Desai
Show answer
Interpreter of Maladies is a collection of nine short stories about Indian and Indian-American lives, and it won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2000, making Lahiri the first writer of Indian origin to win that prize for fiction.
Read the full explanation →The first book originally written in Hindi to win the International Booker Prize was:
- A.Zindaginama
- B.Ret Samadhi
- C.Pratham Pratishruti
- D.Aag Ka Darya
Show answer
Geetanjali Shree's novel Ret Samadhi, translated into English by Daisy Rockwell as Tomb of Sand, won the International Booker Prize in 2022 and became the first book written in Hindi, and the first from any Indian language, to take that prize.
Read the full explanation →Amrita Pritam, who received the Jnanpith Award in 1981, wrote mainly in which language?
- A.Urdu
- B.Bengali
- C.Punjabi
- D.Assamese
Show answer
Amrita Pritam is the best known woman writer of modern Punjabi, and the Jnanpith Award of 1981 was given to her for the Punjabi poetry collection Kagaz Te Canvas.
Read the full explanation →