The shortlist for the 2015 DNA-OUT of PRINT Short Fiction Special

Violence manifests in frightening ways as perceptions of rationality shift and erode. Confronted with yet another tragic attack on society just hours before we post the shortlist of the 2015 DNA-OUT OF PRINT Short Fiction Special themed around ‘Erosion’ I am driven to reflect on the role that literature plays in making sense of who we are. We addressed the question in the context of sexual and gender violence in the Editorial Note of the March 2015 issue of Out of Print. In her weekly column in the Bangalore Mirror, former Out of Print editor, Samhita Arni has been examining why writers write. At the Chandigarh Literature Festival, where Out of Print held a writing workshop last week, the politics of the responsibility of writers and of literature was keenly evident, particularly when Nayantara Sahgal was wildly and publicly attacked during the opening ceremony of the festival.

The impact of fiction on the way society thinks and acts lies in its ability to set a cultural tone that, in the long term, must have an influence. This is, of course, most significant when writing is strong, stories well crafted, and when subtlety and nuance layer the work.

With that in mind, we are pleased to announce the shortlist of the 2015 DNA-OUT OF PRINT Short Fiction Special. The 17 stories, listed below in order of submission date are brave and bold and deal with the theme, Erosion, in complex and interesting ways. Congratulations to all the writers on the shortlist!

Every story on the longlist was read multiple times by each of the Out of Print editors before we determined the stories that made it to the next level. We thank all the authors on the longlist for sending us their interesting and well-considered work and wish the writers on the shortlist luck for the next stage.

The winner and four finalists of the 2015 DNA-OUT OF PRINT Short Fiction Special will be announced on Sunday, November 22, and their stories will appear in the DNA supplement, Just Before Monday.

Out of Print Editors: Indira Chandrasekhar, Leela Levitt, Ram Sadasiv

Dipika Mukherjee	A Heirarchy of Grief
Indu Suryanarayan	Clay
Mathangi Subramanian	Half Wild
Sowmya Aji	August 15, 2012
Farah Ahamed	Life Will be Better
Suresh S	Pardesi
Abha Iyengar	The Marshlands
Trisha Bora	How to Lose a River
Nabina Das	The Trains Came Back
Pravin Vemuri	The Last Rain
Meghna Pant	The Good Husband
bhavani	Rock, Paper, Scissors
Kanchana Doraiswamy	Hummingbirds
Zui Kumar-Reddy	Anagrams and Barbed Wire Jesus
Devika Rajan	Post Apocalypse
Tanuj Solanki	Reasonable Limits
Prashila Naik	Like the Sun Disappeared Behind the Clouds