: गौरी देशपांडे) (1942–2003) was a novelist, short story writer, and poet from Maharashtra

Maharashtra

Maharashtra is a state located in India. It is the second most populous after Uttar Pradesh and third largest state by area in India...

, India

India

India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

. She wrote in Marathi

Marathi language

Marathi is an Indo-Aryan language spoken by the Marathi people of western and central India. It is the official language of the state of Maharashtra. There are over 68 million fluent speakers worldwide. Marathi has the fourth largest number of native speakers in India and is the fifteenth most...

 and English

English language

English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...

.

She was born in Pune

Pune

Pune , is the eighth largest metropolis in India, the second largest in the state of Maharashtra after Mumbai, and the largest city in the Western Ghats. Once the centre of power of the Maratha Empire, it is situated 560 metres above sea level on the Deccan plateau at the confluence of the Mula ...

 in 1942 to Irawati Karve

Irawati Karve

Irawati Karve was an Indian anthropologist, educationist, and a writer from Maharashtra, India. She was born at Irawati to G. H. Karmarkar, engineer in Myingyan, Burma, so as to commemorate birth place secrede river iravati, she was given name 'Iravati'...

 and Dinkar Karve, her father being one of the sons of Dhondo Keshav Karve

Dhondo Keshav Karve

Maharshi Dr. Dhondo Keshav Karve was a social reformer in India in the field of women's welfare. In honour of Karve, Queen's Road in Mumbai was renamed to Maharishi Karve Road...

. After finishing her high school education at Ahilyadevi School in Pune, she attended Fergusson College

Fergusson College

Fergusson College is a degree college in western India, situated in the city of Pune. It was founded in 1885 by the Deccan Education Society and at that time was the first privately governed college in India. It is named after Sir James Fergusson, the Governor of Bombay, who donated a then...

, also in Pune, to receive an M.A. in English Literature. She then received her PhD in English from Pune University.

Works

The following are the titles of some of Deshpande's books:

• Ekek Pan Galawaya (1980)
• Teruo Te Ani Kahi Door Paryant (1985)
• Ahe He Ase Ahe (1986)
• Niragathi Ani Chandrike Ga Sarike Ga (1987)
• Dustar Ha Ghat Ani Athang (1989)
• Mukkam (1992)
• Vinchurniche Dhade (1996)
• Goph (1999)
• Utkhanan (2002)
• The Lackadaisical Sweeper (1997) (in English)
• --and Pine for What Is Not (English translation of Sunita Desapande's Ahe Manohar Tari...)
• Diary of a decade of agony (English translation of Avinash Dharmadhikari's Aswastha dashakachi diary)
• She also translated the ten volumes of "Arabian Nights" written by Sir Richard Burton from English to Marathi. The volumes were published in 1976-77.

Collections of poems (in English)

• "Between Births" (1968)
• Lost love (1970)
• Beyond the Slaughterhouse (1972)

Family

Deshpande had two daughters with her first husband, Avinash Deshpande; and one daughter with naval architect Surindar Singh.