PVLF 2025

Interview with Samyuktha Nair, Author Of “The Ballad of Jew Town

In this interview, Samyuktha Nair shares the inspiration behind The Ballad of Jew Town, a powerful tale of love and heritage.
on Feb 13, 2025

Samyuktha Nair Discusses The Ballad of Jew Town

Samyuktha Nair has been writing since the age of 6. She has written more fiction and poetry since then, and her second collection of poems, After Hours, was nominated for the Sahitya Akademi Yuva Puraskar 2023. She also won first runner-up at the Lit Digital Awards 2020 for her maiden anthology of poems, Sanitised Hallucinations.

Armed with an MA in English Literature from the English and Foreign Languages University, Hyderabad and a Diploma in Creative Writing in English, she currently runs her own publishing house, Paper Lantern Books (formerly Woolf Press).

Frontlist: Love in the 1950s, set against cultural and religious divides, is at the heart of your novel. What inspired you to write this story of forbidden love?

Samyuktha: Ever since I was a child, I have been fascinated by Cochin’s Jew Town. I’ve been there on countless visits with my family, but always visited only the Jewish quarters in Mattancherry, and believed that the Paradesi or European-origin Jews were the only Jews in Cochin. It was only in 2017, when I chanced upon the book The Last Jews of Kerala by Edna Fernandes, that I learned that there were two more Jewish communities in the city—the Malabari Jews with Middle Eastern and Malayali roots and the Meshuchrarim, who were descended from manumitted mixed-race Afro-European slaves who had been brought to Kerala when the Paradesis had fled Spain during the Spanish Inquisition. This led me to read more about the interactions between these communities and interview the members who were willing to share their history with me, and my eyes were opened to the centuries-long apartheid that has existed between Kerala’s Jewish communities and how the initial ‘mixed’ marriages in the 1950s faced a great deal of backlash and disapproval. This led me to wonder what it must have been like for such couples and resulted in the birth of this novel.

Frontlist: Yehuda and Esther’s love story challenges centuries-old traditions and prejudices. What message do you hope readers will take away about love transcending boundaries?

Samyuktha: Though the novel is set in the 1950s, the prejudices of caste, religion, language, and skin color are still very much prevalent in India. I hope this book will help readers understand that such prejudices are pointless and that it is the character of a person that matters the most. We live in a highly divided society even today, and somewhere along the way, we forget that we are all human.

Frontlist: The title, The Ballad of Jew Town, evokes a sense of nostalgia. How did you decide on the title, and what significance does ‘Jew Town’ hold in the story?

Samyuktha: One of the first things about this book that came to me was the title. I decided to call it a ‘ballad’ because it is essentially a love story, a tale of longing and forbidden love, much like the ballads of old. Jew Town is significant because much of the story is set in Cochin’s Jew Town in Mattancherry.

Frontlist: The novel intertwines romance with themes of identity and belonging. How did you balance the personal love story with the larger historical and cultural narrative?

Samyuktha: The lives of the Cochini Jews—irrespective of their origin—are deeply tied to their religious identity. They have a strong emotional attachment to their culture and history, and ever since they arrived in Kerala, they have been plagued by the question of belonging—where do they truly belong? To Kerala, where they have lived for centuries? Or to Israel, which calls for all Jews, irrespective of origin, to ‘return’ to their religious roots? While this love story, which is set in the 1950s, soon after the call to emigrate to Israel was sounded, deals with the question of whether Kerala’s Jews belong to India or Israel, the clash between the Paradesis and the Malabaris—the communities the heroine and hero belong to, respectively—also brought in the troubled history which shaped their personal prejudices even in the 20th century. It was impossible to set a love story in Cochin’s Jewry without exploring its historical and cultural past.

Frontlist: What role do the synagogues, silk, and spice trade play in enriching your book's romantic and historical setting?

Samyuktha: The Jewish community of Kerala was built around spices, silk, and synagogues. Many of the early Jews—both Malabari and Paradesis—were traders affiliated to the anjuvannam or ‘foreigners’ trade guild,’ whose members were essentially non-Hindus. They built immense wealth and influence by trading in silk, spices, and other luxury commodities and had the favour of the local mahajaras. Where there was a Jewish settlement, there was also a synagogue, and at one point, synagogues dotted the length of Kerala. The synagogues are central to Jewish life in Kerala, and every milestone in the life of a Kerala Jew happens in the synagogue. The apartheid also drew lines between the different Jewish communities, prohibiting non-white Jews from entering the Paradesi synagogue in Mattancherry for the longest time—a theme explored in my novel. Only a couple of synagogues are actively used for worship now—the rest have been converted into museums or heritage sites.

Frontlist: Yehuda and Esther face the choice of starting anew in Israel or staying in Cochin. How does this dilemma shape their relationship and highlight the sacrifices love demands?

Samyuktha: Ultimately, both choices come with sacrifices. If they choose to emigrate to Israel, they must leave all material comforts behind and start afresh in the desert, with the threat of war looming over them. If they choose to stay behind in Cochin, they must face the censure and disapproval of the Jewish elders and possibly ostracism from the synagogue as well. Finally, the decision comes down to what kind of life they want for themselves.

Frontlist: The story delves into the complexities of the Malabari and Paradesi Jewish communities. Did your archival research uncover any real-life love stories that inspired Yehuda and Esther’s journey?

Samyuktha: Yes, the story of Yehuda and Esther is loosely based on that of Balfour Salem and Ruby ‘Baby’ Koder—he a son of the prominent freedom fighter Abraham Barak Salem and a member of the Meshuchrarim, and she the daughter of a wealthy and influential Paradesi business family. They faced several trials during their courtship and marriage in the mid-20th century, some of which have been loosely recreated in the book.

Frontlist: How does The Ballad of Jew Town explore the idea of love as an act of rebellion or courage, especially in a time of societal constraints?

Samyuktha: In the early 1950s, a marriage between the Paradesi and Malabari communities was unthinkable—both largely kept to themselves and viewed each other with suspicion. Against such a backdrop, Yehuda and Esther’s love was an act of rebellion, one that could possibly have cost them everything. It was also a time of political turmoil and upheaval, fresh on the heels of the Second World War, Indian Independence, and the formation of Israel. All these factors play into the novel and complicate Yehuda and Esther’s love story.