The Bowl Full of Blood

＂Today, I will inflict evil on a good woman and faithful wife. If I do a good job of it, I will become prime minister tomorrow. ＂In the kingdom of Haripur, an unknown assassin plots in the dark...Soon, the noble Birsingh finds himself accused of murdering the Prince. Meanwhile, the elusive bandit Naaharsingh is on a vendetta against the King. Will good beget good, and evil beget evil?Published in 1895, The Bowl Full of Blood is a historical adventure novel. It is a story of intrigues and betrayal, of brotherhood and honour by a pioneer of Hindi fiction.

Devakinandan Khatri (1861-1913) was a pioneer of Hindi fiction. He is remembered for his fantasy thrillers Chandrakanta, Chandrakanta Santati and Bhootnath, but his role in shaping an important part of modern Indian culture is not well known. He used Hindi in the nagari script, and his works were so popular in the 1890s that people learned the script just to be able to follow them. Later, Mahatma Gandhi adopted Hindi as a vehicle for his independence struggle. Devakinadan Khatri founded a literary magazine, Upanyaas Lahari, and ran a publishing house, Lahari Press. Interestingly, his son, Durgaprasad Khatri completed Bhootnath after his death in the form of Rohtaas Math, and his great-grandson Vivek Khatri has written a sequel to Rohtaas Math.