And then what happened...?: Poonam Saxena, on incomplete tales, published posthumously

They thrill and frustrate me, Saxena says. A recent such work by Marquez reminded me of Mangalsutra by Premchand, and of so many others.

Recently, an unfinished novel by the Nobel Prize-winning Colombian author Gabriel Garcia Marquez was published, sparking great literary curiosity. Titled Until August, it was unfinished in the sense that, although Marquez had finished writing the book, he wasn’t done revising it. It could, in that sense, be more accurately described as an advanced draft.

It is always thrilling but frustrating to me, when this kind of posthumous publishing occurs. Unfinished novels by major writers released in this way have included