Information about Leslie de Noronha

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Cielo Griselda Festino

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Oct 15, 2024, 11:35:15 AM10/15/24
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Dear Friends,
I am looking for biographical  information about the Goan writer, Leslie de Noronha.
Looking forward to your contact.
Thank you!
Cielo

Carlos Peres da Costa

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Oct 15, 2024, 5:47:21 PM10/15/24
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Cielo:
     I have never come across a writing by a person by the name of Leslie de Noronha.  Perhaps as you call him a writer, you could tell us about his publications. Year he wrote and published.  Do you know from which City or Village in Goa  he comes from  ? did he migrate ?  Some of these cues would be useful to help you find info you are looking for.
                                               Carlos Peres da Costa MD PhD


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Frederick Noronha

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Oct 15, 2024, 6:23:05 PM10/15/24
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This is what is in the public domain (Wikipedia):

Leslie de Noronha

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Leslie de Noronha was a writer of Goan origin. He is one of the early Indian writers in English.[1] He was also a medical doctor and a music critic.[2]

Noronha has himself described The Dew Drop Inn as "not a political or historical story, neither a love story" and has said that he conceived of the idea and planned it in 1958, while in New York. He added: "Then, on December 18th, 1961, the Indian militia entered Goa and, after 36 hours that electrified the world, the mighty Portuguese Empire came crashing down with the maximum of drama possible. And I found myself with the MS [manuscript] of what was overnight virtually a historical novel."[3]

Critic Peter Nazareth, who wrote a review of The Dew Drop Inn that was published in World Literature Today writes, "The Dew Drop Inn is a sequel to The Mango and the Tamarind Tree, published in 1970 though completed a decade earlier. The protagonist of Leslie de Noronha's first novel, a journalist living in England and reporting on events such as the assassination of Mrs. Gandhi, the Bhopal tragedy, and AIDS in India, reappears in "The Book of Raoul Albuquerque," which summarizes what happened earlier, including the breakup of the love of Raoul and Estelle, born in Nairobi."[4] The Dew Drop Inn significantly covers the homosexuality as the theme of desire which appears in the book through a Character named Steven, who later commits suicide after he is drugged and raped by Edwin, Claude and Jake.

Sandeep Bakshi describes the novel thus, "set in both independent India and Britain, it ("The Dew Drop Inn") intertwines the stories of a wide array of people, and functions, in a manner akin to Scott’s novels, as an archive of the end-of-the-Raj society."[5]

The author was a doctor in England. He believes in the advice he once received there: that a trivial incident can change a life. This happens in the book too. Shantimarg is a fictitious montage of "all Himalayan hill stations". Medical colleges at Bombay and London get featured here too. This book in part is "to a great extent autobiographical, if highly dramatized". The Mango and the Tamarind Tree was Noronha's earlier novel.

Another of his publications, Poems, was published by the Writers' Workshop in 1965.

Agarwal and Sinha comment: "With a growing interest in Indian English literature, there has been a sudden spurt of fiction, many of them first novels during the nineteen seventies. Notable among those novelists are — BK Karanjia, Leslie de Noronha, Timeri Murari, ...".[6]

Donna J Young describes his novel The Mango and the Tamarind Tree as offering an "insight into the feelings of Goans who had a Portuguese identity that changed into a Goan one after the end of the colonial period. On the surface, the novel deals with the affluent but disintegrating Albuquerque family. In reality, De Noronha is showing the disintegration of Portuguese identity in Goa by having the novel’s main character Raoul break with many traditions. He refuses to go through an arranged marriage, falls in love with a woman from a lower class, and he sells the family home after his mother’s death. Raoul’s heritage is his enemy. It kept him from marrying the woman he loved and from the international career he loved. By giving up his traditions Raoul symbolizes Goans giving up Portuguese traditions and shows the upheaval that frequently accompanies major political change and the reaction to it...."

His work is included in The Golden Treasury of Indo-Anglian Poetry, 1828-1965, edited by Vinayak Krishna Gokak.[7]

Works

His works include:

  • The Dew Drop Inn, Writers Workshop greenbird book. 1994. Original from the University of Michigan digitized on 29 May 2008. ISBN 8171897304, 9788171897308. 297 pp.
  • "FROM 'THE MANGO AND THE TAMARIND TREE'." Journal of South Asian Literature (1983): 7-13.

External links

References


Vinayak Krishna Gokak, ed. (1970). The Golden Treasury of Indo-Anglian Poetry, 1828-1965. Sahitya Akademi. ISBN 9788126011964. Retrieved 28 Oct 2015.

Frederick Noronha

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Oct 15, 2024, 6:25:03 PM10/15/24
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Frederick Noronha

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Oct 15, 2024, 6:29:59 PM10/15/24
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FROM A POST VIA EUGENE ON GOA-RESEARCH-NET

eugene.correia (eugene....@gmail.com)
Re: [GRN] Information about Leslie de Noronha
I didn't know him but knew about him, as a distant relative of mine worked as his cook. Once in Bandra, I decided to visit him. On the wall I saw a photo and recognized it. Then I asked him if he was working for Leslie de Noronha, and he replied "yes". Leslie worked for Glaxco, as I think so. A bachelor, It was known in certain circles  he was gay. He had parties at his house with gays. Better to ask Peter Nazareth .... He wrote theatre reviews, I think for The Examiner, the Catholic Weekly from Mumbai.

Eugene Correia

fredericknoronha

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Oct 15, 2024, 6:31:50 PM10/15/24
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Goan writing has been published all over the place, scattered across in different geographies and crafted in diverse languages (22 or 23 in my count). Therefore, it is easy to miss one author's work, or not know one or the other entirely. Leslie de Noronha wrote in English around the 1960s and 1970s and got published in the Writer's Workshop, a quaint publishing initiative by P. Lal from Calcutta, when "Indo-Anglian" writing in India was still seen as an oddity.  When in college in the 1980s, I did come across his work and have one or two books of his in my collection. FN

sandra lobo

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Oct 16, 2024, 3:12:01 AM10/16/24
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Hi Cielo,

Check the bibliography on him offered at wikipedia - Leslie de Noronha - Wikipedia

Best wishes,

Sandra





Sandra Ataíde Lobo  

         

Home (gieipc-ip.org)                              https://praticasdahistoria.pt/

tmn. ++351 930690459



De: goa-rese...@googlegroups.com <goa-rese...@googlegroups.com> em nome de Carlos Peres da Costa <cperesd...@gmail.com>
Enviado: 15 de outubro de 2024 22:47
Para: goa-rese...@googlegroups.com <goa-rese...@googlegroups.com>
Assunto: Re: [GRN] Information about Leslie de Noronha
 

sandra lobo

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Oct 16, 2024, 3:28:32 AM10/16/24
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As you are certainly aware the references to his work are immense,you will probably need to dig among them. He seems to have been based in Bombay and studied for some time in the uk

good luck




Sandra Ataíde Lobo  

         

Home (gieipc-ip.org)                              https://praticasdahistoria.pt/

tmn. ++351 930690459




De: goa-rese...@googlegroups.com <goa-rese...@googlegroups.com> em nome de Carlos Peres da Costa <cperesd...@gmail.com>
Enviado: 15 de outubro de 2024 22:47
Para: goa-rese...@googlegroups.com <goa-rese...@googlegroups.com>
Assunto: Re: [GRN] Information about Leslie de Noronha
 

Leroy Veloso

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Oct 16, 2024, 2:17:54 PM10/16/24
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Leslie de Noronha, was a medical doctor, he had roots in Soccoro , a village in Bardez, Goa. He studied/ lived in the USA and Mumbai. He has written two novels , Dew Drop Inn and the Mango and the Tamarind Tree and at least one on Poetry.

All the best.....

Leroy Mario Veloso
Email : leroy...@yahoo.com
Mob: 9881333927/ 8999711709

Cielo Griselda Festino

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Oct 16, 2024, 2:18:04 PM10/16/24
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Dear Friends,
Thank you  for your answers and the information you provided.
Does anybody  have any information about his family history in Goa?
Warmly
Cielo

Cielo Griselda Festino

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Oct 16, 2024, 2:31:19 PM10/16/24
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Thank you, very much, Mr. Veloso.
Cielo

Eugene Correia

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Oct 26, 2024, 3:41:05 AM10/26/24
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I found tbis book in my library. It was published by Writers Workshop. Calcutta. 

On Wed, Oct 16, 2024, 8:06 p.m. Eugene Correia <eugene....@gmail.com> wrote:
I.have read both his novels. I have to check my library if the books ate thete.However, I didn't hear much about him during my college days.
I also didn't know he was doEugetor, as he never used the prefix. He lived on Carter Road, Bandra. I have not seen him in person. 

Eugene



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