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India Ink was a literary label that burst on the India publishing scene with the Indian edition of the era-defining novel for Indian writing in English (IWE). The God of Small Things, 1998 by Arundhati Roy (featured below). Sometimes, the photographs (by Sanjeev Saith, publisher, India Ink) get the job done on their own, and sometimes, free-spirited illustrations step in. It was a collaboration that entertained a great degree of quirkiness. Some of these are unlikely to have passed muster with a mainstream publisher.

A shared agenda was the avoidance of overtly ‘Indian’ references with a Eurocentric gaze, The India depicted is faithful to subject, time and place. This is in contrast to the US or UK editions of these novels where the urge to signal ‘Indian novel’ via spice boxes, saree borders, turbaned men, forts, and palm trees proved irresistible.

The logo in the cover is also by ICD—the crow takes its place aside the penguin, the mark of the other leading publisher of IWE at the time.

This is the second compilation of book covers. The other one is here.

The God of Small Things, 1998 Arundhati Roy

This is really a cover made by Sanjeev Saith’s cover photo. ICD contributed some messaging and a quiet announcement. The picture manages to convey the locale and the general tenor of the novel, though it was shot in a man-made pond in New Delhi.

Listening now, 1998 Anjana Appachana

A snippet of text from the novel flows over the elegant ear of ICD principal Lisa Rath and translates the title directly, The lighting in the ear was made possible by a direct scan of the ear, with Lisa physically bending over the flatbed scanner in our office,

The Romantics, 2000 Pankaj Mishra

A novel of hope and despair set in Varanasi. Reflected in another picture by Sanjeev Saith, the owner of India Ink. We treated the picture to appear as a magical mirror, in which distortion occurs in an unreal way, and a bicycle disappears in an eccentric way. Like memory.

A Married Woman, 2002 Manju Kapur

This cover is based on a picture in a picture. Sanjeev Saith’s photograph shows a flower vase with another photograph in the background by the Surrealist and Dadaist Man Ray. It was treated in silver and black, as a faint suggestion of age and recollection.

Something Barely Remembered, 2000 Susan Visvanathan

Fifteen stories by Susan Visvanathan are literally threaded together in this cover. The work is a connected collection of stories set in a variety of locales. To us they seemed to recall a diary. Playful illustrations appear to remove the need to use photography. A portrait of Susan looms in the background, as the connecting figure behind it all.

The Professor of Light, 2000 Marina Budhos

This illustration of the father-daughter relationship is at the centre of this novel set in the West Indies. The imagery is layered, with drawn and 3D rendered shapes together in a strange dream.

The Trotter-Nama,1999 Irwin Allan Sealy

A comic take on the key incident in Trotter Nama, a slow-motion recounting of the first Trotter (in a line of Trotters) falling from a balloon. The twist is to treat him as the balloon. Period trimmings complete the gag. The floral Mughal border speaks to the Indian setting of the novel and a jocular ‘Nama’ or account from Mughal times. As with several of our covers, the placement and meaning of the smaller elements in the cover and the landscape become evident as the reader progresses.

The Everest Hotel, 1998 Irwin Allan Sealy

Allan Sealy’s ornately lyrical evocation of life in a town at the foothills of the Himalayas. The central character is an old man towards the end of his years but with a baleful influence in the novel. The old man’s feet in the drawing belong to Itu Chaudhuri. The cloudy sky with tiny cracks of lightning is a portentous symbol of the dramatic turmoil in a calm, ethereal landscape.