Gaban

Premchand · 1880–1936 · India

Originally Gaban (Hindi) · translated by Christopher R. King

Why it matters

A charming, weak-willed clerk feeds his wife's craving for jewelry into embezzlement, then a spiraling cover-up of debt and blackmail. Premchand turns his rural conscience on the aspirational Hindu middle class and finds it just as compromised.

At a glance

Straightforward chronological realism, easy to follow despite its darkening plot.