| Firdaus Kanga | |
|---|---|
| Born | 1960 Mumbai |
| Occupation | Author, Journalist and, Actor. |
| Language | English language  |
Firdaus Kanga, born in Mumbai 1960 to a Parsi family, is an Indian writer, journalist and actor who currently lives in London. He has written a novel Trying to Grow a semi-autobiographical novel set in India and a travel book "Heaven on Wheels", which shares about his experiences in United Kingdom where he met Stephen Hawking. A film was based on his novel Trying to Grow with the name of Sixth Happiness, where he himself played the role of a screenwriter and the lead character. Kanga was born with a rare disease called Osteogenesis imperfecta or brittle bones disease.[1][2] Scholars have examined Trying to Grow as a reflection of the Parsee community’s decline; Anjali Raman (2026) situates the novel within debates on nostalgia, secularism, and majoritarian politics in contemporary India.[3]
References
- "Growing up Parsi and gay in Bombay". DNA India. Retrieved 21 March 2024.
- "Firdaus Kanga". veethi.com. Retrieved 21 January 2023.
- Raman, Anjali (March–April 2026). "Longing, Loss and the Diminishing Parsee Community in Trying to Grow". International Journal of Language, Literature and Culture. 6 (2). doi:10.22161/ijllc.6.2.9.
External links
- Firdaus Kanga biography and credits at the BFI's Screenonline
- Article by Kanga on the BBC website
- Sixth Happiness -- a BBC-BFI film that won the EMMA award
- Article about Kanga and his film on the website for The Independent newspaper
- Trying to Grow by Kanga -- republished in November 2008 by Penguin India
- New York Times review of Kanga's film Sixth Happiness
- Kanga in a New York Times review of the history of homosexuality in Indian literary history