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Meira Chand

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Meira Chand (born 1942) is a novelist of Swiss-Indian parentage and was born and educated in London. She has spent many years in Japan and in India, but is now a Singaporean citizen and lives in Singapore.

Life

She was born and grew up in South London. Her mother, Norah Knoble was of Swiss origin, and her Indian father, Habans Lal Gulati came to London in 1919 to study medicine. He was Britain's first Indian GP, a pioneer of early NHS services and the Socialist Medical Association, and first Indian Labour member of the London County Council for South Battersea, standing as a parliamentary candidate. She attended Putney High School and later studied art at St Martin's School of Art & Design and Hammersmith Art School.

In 1962 she married Kumar Chand, and went with him to live in the Kobe/Osaka region of Japan, where his family had business interests. In 1971 she relocated with her husband and two children to Mumbai in India, but returned to Japan in 1976. She remained in Japan until 1997 when she moved to Singapore, where she now permanently lives, becoming a Singapore citizen in 2011. She has an MA in creative writing from Edith Cowan University, Perth, Australia, and a PhD in creative writing from the University of Western Australia.

Writing

Chand is a 2023 recipient of the Cultural Medallion, Singapore’s highest cultural accolade. She is the author of 9 novels and one collection of short stories.  Five of her eight novels are set in Japan. The Gossamer Fly, Last Quadrant, and The Bonsai Tree, are all set in contemporary Japan, while The Painted Cage explores Victorian era Yokohama and a famous murder trial that took place in the British community there. The Pacific war is the setting for A Choice of Evils, a novel that investigates the Japanese occupation of China, and questions of war guilt and responsibility.

Contemporary India is the location of House of the Sun that, in 1990, was adapted for the stage in London where it had a successful run at Theatre Royal Stratford East. It was the first Asian play with an all-Asian cast and direction to be performed in London. The play was voted Critic's Choice by Time Out magazine. Also set in India, but in Calcutta during the early days of the Raj, A Far Horizon considers the notorious story of the Black Hole of Calcutta.

Written after her move to Singapore, A Different Sky takes place against the backdrop of colonial times before independence in the country. Based on meticulous historical research, the novel follows the lives of three families in the 30 years leading up to Singapore's independence. The book fictionally examines an era that includes the Second World War and the subsequent Japanese occupation of Singapore, and also the rise of post-war nationalism in Malaya. On its publication in 2010 it was chosen as a Book of the Month by the UK bookshop chain Waterstones. The novel was also on Oprah Winfrey's recommended reading list for November 2011, and long listed for the Impac Dublin literary award 2012.

A further novel of Singapore, Sacred Waters, published in 2018, is an exploration of two women’s struggle to assert themselves in male dominated societies of both the past and the present. Moving between Singapore and Burma, it follows the rise of the Indian National Army and its famous leader, Subhas Chandra Bose.

In 2024 she published The Pink White and Blue Universe, a collection of early short stories written while she lived in Mumbai, India in the 1970s.

Chand also wrote the story from which the 2015 popular Singaporean theatre production,The LKY Musical, was developed. A tale of high drama, intrigue, betrayal, love and loyalty, the musical centres on the early life of Lee Kuan Yew, his struggles and enduring relationship with his wife. It offers insights into the emotional conflict faced by Singapore's founder and his friends at a time when the island's history balanced on a knife-edge. The musical returned to the stage again in 2022 with further great success. In all approximately 120,000 people saw the production.

In Singapore, Chand is involved in programmes to nurture young writers and to develop literature.

Selected works

  • The Gossamer Fly (1979, John Murray, UK / Ticknor and Fields, USA) ISBN 978-0-89919-002-0
  • Last Quadrant (1981, John Murray, UK / Ticknor and Fields, USA) ISBN 978-0-89919-079-2
  • The Bonsai Tree (1983, John Murray, UK, Ticknor and Fields, USA) ISBN 978-0-7195-4007-3
  • The Painted Cage (1986, Century Hutchinson, UK) ISBN 978-0-7126-1274-6
  • House of the Sun (1989, Hutchinson, UK) ISBN 978-0-09-174003-0
  • A Choice of Evils (1996 Weidenfeld & Nicolson, UK) ISBN 978-0-297-81743-7
  • A Far Horizon (2001, Weidenfeld & Nicolson, UK) ISBN 978-0-297-81748-2
  • A Different Sky (2010, Harvill Secker/Random House, UK) ISBN 978-1-84655-343-1
  • Sacred Waters (2018, Marshall Cavendish, Singapore) ISBN 978-981-4779-50-0
  • The Pink White and Blue Universe (2024, Marshall Cavendish, Singapore) ISBN 978-981-5169-00

References

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