Susham Bedi (1 July 1945 – 20 March 2020) was an Indian author of novels, short stories and poetry. She was a professor of Hindi language and literature at the department of Middle Eastern and Asian Languages and Cultures (MEALAC) at Columbia University, New York. She wrote predominantly about the experiences of Indians in the South Asian diaspora, focusing on psychological and 'interior' cultural conflicts. Unlike other prominent Indian American novelists she wrote mainly in Hindi rather than in English. She has been widely translated into English, French, Dutch and other languages by artists, academics, and students.

She was an actress in India in the 1960s and early 1970s. In the United States, she appeared on such shows as True Crime: New York City, Third Watch, and Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, and in movies such as The Guru (2002) and ABCD (1999).

Career

Early years

Bedi began her writing career in high school and college, entering local competitions and writing articles and stories for magazines. She also worked as an actress and commentator on Indian television in the late-1960s and 1970s.

She attended Delhi University and Panjab University in India and taught Hindi literature. Her PhD dissertation was published in 1984 as Innovation and Experimentation in Contemporary Hindi Drama by Parag publications in India.

From 1974 to 1979 she wrote for The Times of India as one of their correspondents from Brussels, Belgium. In 1979 she came to the United States with her husband.

Academia

Bedi was involved in exploring questions of identity, authenticity, and transformation, in her cultural criticism and academic work, and these themes are reflected as well in her fiction writing. She was the author of eight major Hindi language novels, as well as collections of Hindi short stories and poetry. These have been widely translated and have been the subject of academic dissertations and debates on the South Asian diaspora experience.

She was also involved in Hindi language pedagogical research and developed original reading and listening comprehension materials in Hindi. Many of these materials are available on the internet. Her "Using Authentic Materials in the Language Classroom: A Case in Hindi" was included in the anthology Teaching and Acquisition of South Asian Languages (University of Pennsylvania Press).

From 1990 to 1991, she contributed to a BBC weekly program, Letters from Abroad, in which she discussed day to day issues about life in New York.

Fiction writing

Her most well-known novel is Havan (1989), which was translated into English by David Rubin and published by Heinemann International under the title The Fire Sacrifice in 1993. Her novels and short stories often feature female protagonists who are in the process of negotiating new identities which are neither fully old nor new, often finding identity and strength in the impurities in their lives. Bedi's narrative focus tends to be on the negotiative and transformative process itself, the pain and tragedy of cultural loss, but also the sense of hope and opportunity in forging new and stronger identities if one is willing to endure the transformative process. Her works are thus located squarely in the South Asian diaspora and immigrant experience.

Acting

Bedi appeared on True Crime: New York City (credited as Sushami Bedi),^[1] Third Watch, and Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, and in movies such as The Guru (2002) and ABCD (1999).

Personal life

She died on 20 March 2020 at the age of 74.^[2]

Actress Purva Bedi is her daughter.

Awards and recognition

In 2007, she was awarded 100,000 rupees by Uttar Pradesh Hindi Sansthan for her contributions to Hindi language and literature.

In January 2006, she was honored by Sahitya Academy in Delhi for her contributions to Hindi literature.