H. S. Bhabra
Encyclopedia
Hargurchet Singh Bhabra was a British Asian
writer
and broadcaster
who settled in Canada
.
Bhabra was born in Mumbai
, India
and moved to England
with his family in 1957. The family eventually settled in Beare Green
, Surrey
. From 1966 to 1973, Bhabra attended Reigate Grammar School
. He was the only boy of Asian origin in the school, was highly regarded by his teachers, and an accomplished actor in school productions such as Much Ado about Nothing
. Regarded by his teachers as the most exceptional member of an exceptional year, he won a scholarship to Trinity College, Oxford
where he studied English Literature
.
. In 1984, he resigned to complete Gestures, a novel on which he had been working for years. He travelled and worked as a correspondent for a few years, which provided material for his career as a writer of fiction, under his own name and also as A M Kabal and John Ford. Gestures won a Betty Trask Award
in 1987. It has been described thus: "With extraordinary force and subtlety, Gestures conducts the 'funeral rite over an entire way of life. . . a liberal, human, European culture which has finally disappeared'. The lines could stand as an epitaph for Bhabra himself. Infused with his own erudition, elegance and empathy, it was also - and to a great degree - an expression of his own sense of displacement." Indeed, although he published in quick succession three thrillers — The Adversary (1986) and Bad Money (1987), and Zero Yield — the next few years were spent largely on travels to Egypt
, Mexico
and Latin America
.
Fellowship in Spy and Detective Fiction Writing. This prize included a post as writer-in-residence at the University of California, Los Angeles
for one year. Bhabra stayed on in Los Angeles
from 1991 to 1993, hoping to earn money as a scriptwriter. That did not work out, however, though his fund of esoteric knowledge did help him win a handsome sum as a contestant on a television quiz show, Jeopardy, an accomplishment of which he remained proud. While there, he also developed an obsession with climbing bridges, which led to his arrest while making an assault on the Golden Gate
, San Francisco. Bhabra also taught at Amherst College
in Massachusetts
.
, where his parents now lived. In Canada, Bhabra was perceived as an Asian-Canadian writer and broadcaster. He taught at the Humber School for Writers at Humber College
and then joined TVOntario
as host of the book program Imprint
from 1995 to 1997. Knowledgeable and intelligent, Bhabra had interests ranging from food and fashion to films and books. His contract with Imprint was not renewed after the 1997 season.
After leaving Imprint, Bhabra struggled to make ends meet with occasional freelance magazine and television work. Television projects included the show Starting Up!, about the challenges and rewards of opening a business, which he created and produced for TVO. Bhabra also embarked on an ambitious fiction quartet: South, West, North, and East. By the spring of 1999, Bhabra had completed a draft of the first chapter of the first novel, South, a draft which failed to lead to the publishing contract he hoped for and much needed, in order to support himself financially. When opportunities at TVO dried up, Bhabra joined TFO
, the French language channel, where he worked, for a short time, on a new arts show, Ôzone. Bhabra left TFO in late 1999 as a result of artistic differences. He was sustained, during these years, by the support of his partner, Vee Ledson, daughter of educator Sidney Ledson. Bhabra had encouraged Ledson to pursue her dream of running her own school, Laurel Academy, which she established in Toronto in 1995.
On 1 June 2000, a week before his 45th birthday, he killed himself by jumping off the Prince Edward Viaduct
on Toronto's Bloor Street
. Alas, none around him knew of his debilitating writer's block; in the months and weeks leading up to his death, Bhabra had lead some of those closest to him to believe he had, at last, completed the first novel and secured a book contract for it, and that he had begun work on the second book.
His death contributed to the argument for the Luminous Veil
, a suicide barrier fence over the viaduct. In 2001, Bhabra, was posthumously nominated for a Gémeaux Award
(Prix Gémaux), for his work on Ôzone. In 2003, the Luminous Veil was finally completed and in the same year Gestures was reprinted.
British Asian
British Asian is a term used to describe British citizens who descended from mainly South Asia, also known as South Asians in the United Kingdom...
writer
Writer
A writer is a person who produces literature, such as novels, short stories, plays, screenplays, poetry, or other literary art. Skilled writers are able to use language to portray ideas and images....
and broadcaster
Presenter
A presenter, or host , is a person or organization responsible for running an event. A museum or university, for example, may be the presenter or host of an exhibit. Likewise, a master of ceremonies is a person that hosts or presents a show...
who settled in Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
.
Bhabra was born in Mumbai
Mumbai
Mumbai , formerly known as Bombay in English, is the capital of the Indian state of Maharashtra. It is the most populous city in India, and the fourth most populous city in the world, with a total metropolitan area population of approximately 20.5 million...
, 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...
and moved to England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
with his family in 1957. The family eventually settled in Beare Green
Beare Green
Beare Green is a small village in Surrey, England. It is located about south of Dorking on the A24, Beare Green's roundabout is the start of the A29 road to Worthing. Holmwood railway station is on the Mole Valley Line....
, Surrey
Surrey
Surrey is a county in the South East of England and is one of the Home Counties. The county borders Greater London, Kent, East Sussex, West Sussex, Hampshire and Berkshire. The historic county town is Guildford. Surrey County Council sits at Kingston upon Thames, although this has been part of...
. From 1966 to 1973, Bhabra attended Reigate Grammar School
Reigate Grammar School
Reigate Grammar School is an independent co-educational day school located in the town of Reigate, Surrey, United Kingdom. Intake is from 11 to 18, with the majority of its pupils entering at the age of 11, and others entering at 13 and 16.- History :...
. He was the only boy of Asian origin in the school, was highly regarded by his teachers, and an accomplished actor in school productions such as Much Ado about Nothing
Much Ado About Nothing
Much Ado About Nothing is a comedy written by William Shakespeare about two pairs of lovers, Benedick and Beatrice, and Claudio and Hero....
. Regarded by his teachers as the most exceptional member of an exceptional year, he won a scholarship to Trinity College, Oxford
Trinity College, Oxford
The College of the Holy and Undivided Trinity in the University of Oxford, of the foundation of Sir Thomas Pope , or Trinity College for short, is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. It stands on Broad Street, next door to Balliol College and Blackwells bookshop,...
where he studied English Literature
English literature
English literature is the literature written in the English language, including literature composed in English by writers not necessarily from England; for example, Robert Burns was Scottish, James Joyce was Irish, Joseph Conrad was Polish, Dylan Thomas was Welsh, Edgar Allan Poe was American, J....
.
Publication
Bhabra worked for six years in international banking in the City of LondonCity of London
The City of London is a small area within Greater London, England. It is the historic core of London around which the modern conurbation grew and has held city status since time immemorial. The City’s boundaries have remained almost unchanged since the Middle Ages, and it is now only a tiny part of...
. In 1984, he resigned to complete Gestures, a novel on which he had been working for years. He travelled and worked as a correspondent for a few years, which provided material for his career as a writer of fiction, under his own name and also as A M Kabal and John Ford. Gestures won a Betty Trask Award
Betty Trask Award
The Betty Trask Prize and Awards are for first novels written by authors under the age of 35, who reside in a current or former Commonwealth nation. The awards were established in 1984 by the Society of Authors, at the bequest of the late Betty Trask, a reclusive author of over thirty romance novels...
in 1987. It has been described thus: "With extraordinary force and subtlety, Gestures conducts the 'funeral rite over an entire way of life. . . a liberal, human, European culture which has finally disappeared'. The lines could stand as an epitaph for Bhabra himself. Infused with his own erudition, elegance and empathy, it was also - and to a great degree - an expression of his own sense of displacement." Indeed, although he published in quick succession three thrillers — The Adversary (1986) and Bad Money (1987), and Zero Yield — the next few years were spent largely on travels to Egypt
Egypt
Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...
, Mexico
Mexico
The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...
and Latin America
Latin America
Latin America is a region of the Americas where Romance languages – particularly Spanish and Portuguese, and variably French – are primarily spoken. Latin America has an area of approximately 21,069,500 km² , almost 3.9% of the Earth's surface or 14.1% of its land surface area...
.
The United States
In 1989, Bhabra was awarded the first Fulbright ChandlerChandler
A chandler was the head of the chandlery in medieval households, responsible for wax, candles, and soap.Chandler may also refer to:- People :* Chandler , the surname of various people...
Fellowship in Spy and Detective Fiction Writing. This prize included a post as writer-in-residence at the University of California, Los Angeles
University of California, Los Angeles
The University of California, Los Angeles is a public research university located in the Westwood neighborhood of Los Angeles, California, USA. It was founded in 1919 as the "Southern Branch" of the University of California and is the second oldest of the ten campuses...
for one year. Bhabra stayed on in Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
from 1991 to 1993, hoping to earn money as a scriptwriter. That did not work out, however, though his fund of esoteric knowledge did help him win a handsome sum as a contestant on a television quiz show, Jeopardy, an accomplishment of which he remained proud. While there, he also developed an obsession with climbing bridges, which led to his arrest while making an assault on the Golden Gate
Golden Gate
The Golden Gate is the North American strait connecting San Francisco Bay to the Pacific Ocean. Since 1937 it has been spanned by the Golden Gate Bridge...
, San Francisco. Bhabra also taught at Amherst College
Amherst College
Amherst College is a private liberal arts college located in Amherst, Massachusetts, United States. Amherst is an exclusively undergraduate four-year institution and enrolled 1,744 students in the fall of 2009...
in Massachusetts
Massachusetts
The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. It is bordered by Rhode Island and Connecticut to the south, New York to the west, and Vermont and New Hampshire to the north; at its east lies the Atlantic Ocean. As of the 2010...
.
Canada
In 1994 Bhabra moved to TorontoToronto
Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the largest city in Canada. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A relatively modern city, Toronto's history dates back to the late-18th century, when its land was first purchased by the British monarchy from...
, where his parents now lived. In Canada, Bhabra was perceived as an Asian-Canadian writer and broadcaster. He taught at the Humber School for Writers at Humber College
Humber College
Humber College Institute of Technology & Advanced Learning is a polytechnic college in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Humber offers more than 150 programs including: bachelor’s degree, diploma, certificate, post-graduate certificate and apprenticeship programs, across 40 fields of study. Humber serves...
and then joined TVOntario
TVOntario
TVOntario, often referred to only as TVO , is a publicly funded, educational English-language television station and media organization in the Canadian province of Ontario. It is operated by the Ontario Educational Communications Authority, a Crown corporation owned by the Government of Ontario...
as host of the book program Imprint
Imprint (TV series)
Imprint was a Canadian television series that aired on TVOntario, BookTelevision, Knowledge and, for one season, on PBS.Inspired by Bernard Pivot's French literary programme Apostrophes, the series featured interviews with prize-winning authors and journalists, and examined the latest trends in...
from 1995 to 1997. Knowledgeable and intelligent, Bhabra had interests ranging from food and fashion to films and books. His contract with Imprint was not renewed after the 1997 season.
After leaving Imprint, Bhabra struggled to make ends meet with occasional freelance magazine and television work. Television projects included the show Starting Up!, about the challenges and rewards of opening a business, which he created and produced for TVO. Bhabra also embarked on an ambitious fiction quartet: South, West, North, and East. By the spring of 1999, Bhabra had completed a draft of the first chapter of the first novel, South, a draft which failed to lead to the publishing contract he hoped for and much needed, in order to support himself financially. When opportunities at TVO dried up, Bhabra joined TFO
TFO
TFO is a Canadian French language educational public television network in the province of Ontario. It is the only French-language television network in Canada whose operations are based entirely outside of Quebec....
, the French language channel, where he worked, for a short time, on a new arts show, Ôzone. Bhabra left TFO in late 1999 as a result of artistic differences. He was sustained, during these years, by the support of his partner, Vee Ledson, daughter of educator Sidney Ledson. Bhabra had encouraged Ledson to pursue her dream of running her own school, Laurel Academy, which she established in Toronto in 1995.
On 1 June 2000, a week before his 45th birthday, he killed himself by jumping off the Prince Edward Viaduct
Prince Edward Viaduct
The Prince Edward Viaduct System, commonly referred to as the Bloor Viaduct or the viaduct, is the name of a truss arch bridge system in Toronto, Ontario, Canada that connects Bloor Street East, on the west side of the system, with Danforth Avenue on the east...
on Toronto's Bloor Street
Bloor Street
Bloor Street is a major east–west residential and commercial thoroughfare in Toronto, in the Canadian province of Ontario. Bloor Street runs from the Prince Edward Viaduct westward into Mississauga, where it ends at Central Parkway. East of the viaduct, Danforth Avenue continues along the same...
. Alas, none around him knew of his debilitating writer's block; in the months and weeks leading up to his death, Bhabra had lead some of those closest to him to believe he had, at last, completed the first novel and secured a book contract for it, and that he had begun work on the second book.
His death contributed to the argument for the Luminous Veil
Luminous Veil
The Luminous Veil is an anti-suicide barrier that was added to the Prince Edward Viaduct in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. First approved by the Toronto City Council in 1998, the construction of the Luminous Veil was delayed for years because of concerns about funding. During the delays in...
, a suicide barrier fence over the viaduct. In 2001, Bhabra, was posthumously nominated for a Gémeaux Award
Gémeaux Award
The Prix Gémeaux or Gémeaux Awards honour French Canadian achievements in Canadian television. It has been sponsored by the Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television since 1985. In 2005 the Prix Gémeaux celebrated its 20th anniversary. Its English-language counterpart is the Gemini Awards.-External...
(Prix Gémaux), for his work on Ôzone. In 2003, the Luminous Veil was finally completed and in the same year Gestures was reprinted.
External links
- http://brannan.org/2000/bhabra.html
- http://www.ryerson.ca/library/events/asian_heritage/bhabra.html
- http://www.rediff.com/us/2000/jun/07us2.htm
- http://www.toronto.ca/legdocs/2001/minutes/committees/wks/wks010221.pdf