- Published: November 14, 2021
- Updated: November 14, 2021
- University / College: Vanderbilt University
- Language: English
- Downloads: 13
Khushwant Singh was born on Feb.
2, 1915 in West Punjab. He got hisschoolings in Delhi, Lahore and London. He was appointed information officerof the government of India at Toronto and Canada and Press attaché andpublic officer for the High Commission of India in the United Kingdom and theembassy in Ireland in 1948-50. In 1950 The Mark of Vishnu was published. He attended UNESCO Sixth General Conference in Paris in 1951 as themember of the Indian delegation. During 1952-53 he edited periodicals of thegovernment of India. In 1956 Train To Pakistan was published and receivedaward of the Grove India Fiction prize.
The Voice of God and Other Storieswas published in 1957 and then followed his second novel I Shall Not HearThe Nightingale in 1959. In two volumes A History of the Sikhs was publishedin 1963 and received Rockefeller Foundation grant for extensive travel andresearch on Sikh history and religion. He got teaching and researchassignment of Princeton in 1966. He was made visiting professor atSwathmore College, Pennsylvania and later joined as the chief editor of ‘ TheIllustrated weekly of India’. As a journalist he has written on a variety ofthemes on the world of fact, men and affairs. His narrative ability distinguisheshis writing from that of the other leading journalists of India.
As a novelist Khushwant Singh is famous for Train To Pakistan and IShall Not Hear The Nightingale. Train To Pakistan made him internationallyknown, though he had made a literary reputation with publication of his shortstories The Mark of Vishnu and other stories. Khushwant Singh is what his43British education made him, a cultured humanist.
He gladly confessed that heis the product of both East and the West. The Punjab countryside, UrbanDelhi, and the liberal, the sophisticated city of London are the three dominantfactors that influenced Khushwant Singh. Thus exposed to the ideas andattitudes of the West, Singh is essentially an orientalist in outlook who hasIndian self and individuality of personality. His journey is not without travailsand tribulations, it is a ceaseless quest for identity which is reflected throughthe medium of his literary career and art.
