Monsoon Feelings : A History of Emotions in the Rain

The monsoon is the season of pouring rain and intense emotions: love and longing, hope and fear, pleasure and pain, devotion and joyous excess. Through a series of evocative essays that explore the rain-drenched worlds of poetry, songs, paintings, architecture, films, gardens, festivals, music, and medicine, this lavishly illustrated collection examines the history of monsoon feelings in South Asia from the twelfth century to the present. Each essay is written by a specialist in the field of South Asian arts and culture, investigating emotions as reflections and agents of social, cultural, and political change across the borders of language and religion, as well as between different arts and cultural practices. This history of emotions in the rain is as rich, surprising, beautiful, and devastating as the thundering monsoon clouds, and will delight both general and scholarly audiences alike.