“All my life, I have struggled to demystify the hidden self and selves and agendas” – Sabarna Roy

If you love to play with literary riddle, let us pose a question! What is it that the readers always look for in the novels? Suspense! Yes, this is the answer. The element of suspense becomes much more meaningful when it tries to demystify the human life and all its complexities. The answer, however, may be simple but to create suspense in the novel to keep the readers glued to the pages of it is very difficult. It requires master craftsmanship of weaving words with imagination which is not easy. Success of most famous classical writers of English lay in the fact that they could provoke the thought of the readers through the suspense that they created. And that is what makes Sabarna Roy a sought after writer in the lines of master storytellers like Thomas Hardy, Charles Dickens and Robert Louis Stevenson. Interestingly, our beloved Sabarna weaves the novels with words of marvel that also convey realism in their finest senses like what Dickens wrote in David Copperfield or Hardy composed in Mayor of Casterbridge. Even in a thriller like The Treasure Island, Stevenson had blended realism with super success. In fact, Sabarna’s works brings optimism from the dark dungeon of hopelessness just as these three English novelists did in the 19th century. At the end of all his novels that shook the world, Sabarna made the readers find a hope, a hope of after all nothing is lost completely. Our very own Sabarna made a wonderful blend of one long story and four short yet classy poems in the Pentacles. It is not wrong to say that Sabarna, as a writer, is our very own as his wordy creations makes a unique readership engagement. It requires immense creative sense to hide meaning in a suspense which also is a note of interrogation in a novel. Those meanings turns much more relevant if portrayed through innuendoes. We know indirect narration is much more powerful than plain, direct narratives. It is here where the acceptability of an author lies. And Sabarna had done it with supreme dexterity be it Pentacles, Frosted Glass, Abyss or Winter Poems. Again in Random Subterranean Mosaic 2012 – 2018, the readers can read between the lines. While turning over the pages of his creations, one really wonders at times at the success of Sabarna in igniting the intellect of the readers. Pentacles, a superb example of it, most realistically bridges the gap between the mundane and arcane writings of today and provides an interesting, yet intellectually stimulating, treat for the discerning reader. Similarly, the long story New Life portraying the void in the life of a successful adult whose mother had deserted the family for another man is something that makes an indelible impact upon the mind of the readers. The 14 stories and 21 poems of the Frosted Glass too deserve a special mention as they too create hidden meanings in the paragraphs of suspense. What to talk of the full length play Abyss in two acts with an interval in between? Sabarna sketched the crescendo of conflicts between personalities and ideas finally to end with an unnatural death before the interval. Is it a suicide or a murder? Here, you find suspense. The lyrical versatility of Sabarna took its best expression in Winter Poems. The Winter Poems, albeit, is for all seasons and the way Sabarna made his lyrics rhythmic is something that can only be compared with the song created by the fall of cascading water from a spring. The weaving of human emotion is superbly portrayed in it. In Random Subterranean Mosaic 2012-2018, we find hidden meanings of life in a kaleidoscope of random, yet mysteriously structured to a pattern, fiction, semi-autobiographical, and autobiographical pieces, covering poems, short-shorts, opinions, observations, and conversations. Incidentally, Sabarna once said during an interview: “All my life I have struggled to achieve an optimal lucidity in language and expression that is required to demystify the hidden self and selves and agendas. I hope I have achieved this in a large measure in this fifth book of mine!”

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