V.S. Naipaul, A House for Mr. Biswas

Written by a Nobel laureate. Winner of the Nobel Prize in literature. Nobel Prize winning author's most prominent work. Such words on the cover of a novel do not serve to heighten expectations of most readers unlike the words 'Oscar winning' do to films. This is an impulse floating around most of my friends and relations. I guess the requirement of shorter attention spans, the associated glamor, a relative lack of profundity are some possible reasons for opinionated movie-goers. With the level of advertising for films, the engagement of film celebs in activities outside their profession (read exercise, IPL, link-ups, near imminent break-ups, nude pics on Twitter), easy scope for commodification of women, it is easier to sell films to every Tom, Sadiq and Hari. This makes it easier for almost everyone around me to comment on the slew of films 'coming to a theater near you'. Of course there are those creditable film aficionados who follow the best cinema has to offer, they will cherish the lens of Herzog, they will note the flow of scenes in Coppola's "The Godfather", they will love the adventurous Bigelow, they will not be surprised by Almodovar's effeminate men. (Start minor digression) Others will look to such folks as pretentious people. (End minor digression) Cinema does enjoy a great share of exploring adventurous followers while books often don't. To be considered an avid reader all one has to do is carry along a David Baldacci, John Grisham, and the likes. Rarely will one across a Dickens, Faukner, Kafka in between gates in an airport terminal. Rarely too will one come across Vidyadhar Surajprasad Naipaul in between gates in airport terminals. A Nobel laureate's work is almost never 'coming near you' like an Oscar winning director's film. I decided to go out, go looking for Nobel laureate Naipaul's most prominent work (trying to package this novel like a blockbuster movie here). Fortunately for me it was in my university library.

I loved the novel. There is no semblance of a plot here. Perhaps this will bother some readers but it didn't bother me. One change in my thinking I must thank a close friend and Roger Ebert for is that I now feel the story. Like Mr. Ebert says, it's not what it is about, it's how it is about it. With this perspective I must admit Mr. Biswas and the Tulsi clan is an embodiment of me, my father and my friends in some way or the other.

Mr. Biswas. What a character. An average artist, a pathetic husband, a hypocritical father, a knowledgeable reporter, an insatiable individual. Mrs. Biswas; a woman whose objectives are a series of negatives. Anand; an intelligent but estranged son. The old hen, the Gods,.......the list is endless. In which Dan Brown novel do we find such a plethora of characters?

Reading Naipaul is experiencing smells and sounds. It's about the vivid description of fish the size of your fingernails in flowing brooks, flaking walls in houses. It's a look in the myriad means of livelihood of Indian migrants in Trinidad. It's about the quest for education among Indians, the belief that milk and prunes will enhance intelligence. It's about boys paraphrasing an adult's opinions on Gogol and communism. It's about the feeling of having your first family car. It's about making promises and then breaking them. It's about flogging children. It's about fierce competition to go to college. It's about making monthly payments. Marriages. Aging. Eating. Fitness. Sugarcane farming. Corrugated roofing. Diving. Forging birth certificates. Intercaste unions. Neglected daughters. Multiplication tables. Breaking down of joint families. Bus rides. Cricket. Suits. Bicycles. Nicknames. Superiority complex. Inferiority complex.

How can a story be about everything yet be about nothing? In this it is similar to Nobel laureate Gabriel Garcia Marquez's most prominent work 'One Hundred Years of Solitude' in this sense of encompassing everything yet being about nothing. 'A House for Mr. Biswas' is like life. It poses questions like what did Mr. Biswas achieve? Why was he born? Why did his life fly by the way it did?

Amid this organized chaos of a novel I found one character in Mr. Biswas that will shape my life, I think. Mr. Biswas is not too educated but is very very well read. With the best of intentions he starts a correspondence program in writing which doesn't go far for Mr. Biswas is a lazy man, like many of us are. He joins a local literary club where his writing doesn't go down too well. His escapist writings are merely unfinished unpublished novels. Mr. Biswas doesn't create a sensational stir in the field of literature but still achieves a big feat. Anand, his brilliant but arrogant son, takes father's liking for books and goes to abroad for (literary, I think) studies on a scholarship. I like this turn of events. It makes me believe that if I expose my kid to Beethoven's symphony he may become a musician, if my wife reads Kuvempu to my child he may take to poetry, if I keep the papers of Perelman my child may choose geometric topology. Could such thoughts have come out of a Robert Ludlum?

Aravind Adiga, The White Tiger

A book that won the Man Booker Prize with Amitav Ghosh's "Sea of Poppies" for competition better be one helluva book. Such were my thoughts when I started reading Aravind Adiga's "The White Tiger". Unfortunately, word of mouth around this book, although encouraging, was not exhilarating except from, of course, the jury which handed Aravind Adiga the Booker Prize. Cousins who'd read it didn't go out and out singing praises. A close well read friend said it's "good but not award worthy". Surprise surprise, a certain septagenerian, my well-read grandmother, read it twice in a week! She was disappointed in not being able to convince a certain under attack (by this very novel!) software engineer, a distant cousin, of its greatness. This cousin of mine apparently was upset with the scathing portrayal of India. My wife, presently in the middle of "Sea of Poppies", feels Ghosh Babu should have won the Booker. To sum up, my granny is only person I know who the jury would have no problem convincing. Will I side with the second most important woman in my life, my granny, or not upset the woman I have never upset (I swear!), my wife?

Having read the first chapter I felt my cousin was right (another woman). Adiga starts the book proclaiming he will show the real India. It just didn't feel right that a thirty-five year old who'd spent a major part of the nineties and this decade in Australia, England and the US would show the rest of the world what the real India is. Even I can't claim to know the real India. Who am I? Nobody! IFS officer Vikas Swarup's "Q and A" (am starting this tomorrow) adapted into the Oscar winning (and worthy in my opinion) 'Slumdog Millionaire' raised hues and cries among Indians I know, they were telling all Americans here, "India is not like that man." I told them, "Man! If a government official doesn't know India who does?". I looked up Adiga's profile: journalist, south Asian correspondent for Time, free lance journalist, now residing in Mumbai. Seemed okay. Even then I didn't want to let this pass. Somehow someone actually he will show the real India in an award winning novel at first seemed filmy, yeh hai asli India (even Jamaal says something to this affect to American tourists in 'Slumdog Millionaire'). I feel such statements should not be made in novels or movies since some ignoramus may take them to be true or close to true. Not a good start Mr. Adiga, am leaning towards Revathi here.

My granny wins. 'The White Tiger' is a very good novel Paati. Even I want to read it again Paati. Here's why:

1. In my life I have read quite a few novels and watched many many films. I'd like to believe I can spot a new theme in a work of fiction. Here one theme is Indian servitude and is new to me. The White Tiger keeps referring to the premier of China as 'sir' right through the novel. Don't we do it all the time? My PhD advisor makes fun of me all the time for saying too many ma'ams in our conversations. I have a friend who works for Infosys and won't hear a word against Infosys. He'd treat Narayan Murthy with more respect than his own father! Indian women have resigned themselves to lives of servitude, catering to the slightest whims of the men in the house. Even our entrepreneurs, as Adiga writes, are not really like Apple or Microsoft or Google, they merely write software for retailers. Adiga presents a fresh theme in his novel making his arguments through our favorite Gods (Krishna the charioteer, Hanuman the perfect servant), the 'Rooster Coop' and even through the gaudy fortune telling cum weighing machines in railway stations. Adiga believes in this theme so much that he has Mr. Ashok and the Mongoose (this name and Vitiligo Lips reminded me of Salman Rushdie) speak in a language the driver understands, go as far as criticizing him openly. A new theme and I think I agree with Mr. Adiga here. Sir, Aravind sir, you are right sir.
2. The character of the White Tiger seems to me to be a microcosm for entrepreneurs. Actually this is what I'd like to believe. A few documentaries and recent financial events have made me suspicious of private firms. The White Tiger's start-up, as he types it if I am correct, has a foundation of blood. He says it's okay since he has committed only one murder while other men in his position have killed many many on their way to the apex. Even the murder his driver commits towards the end of the novel is taken care of with no emotion by the White Tiger. There is no judicial process that he has to go through. He doesn't care for the judiciary or even the government. His experiences have proven both to be incompetent, I have had no experiences of my own but the news gives me the same feeling. Corporations too, I believe, think they are above the law or the government. They make their own rules, complicated and in very very fine print, which work perfectly for them. The White Tiger too has his own rules.
3. A good novel will immerse readers in a new world. Adiga's debut is surely not as stylish as Rushdie's bilingual prose or Naipaul's descriptive detailing but it works to a large extent. I felt like a driver reading the book, the long waits, Balram's best efforts at eavesdropping, socialising outside malls with other drivers, the servants' quarters in apartments, smuggling foreign liquor and golf balls for masters, being blamed for theiving petty cash, passengers going into PVR and drivers going to the PVR opposite PVR, coming across the clear demarcation of human feces between the rich and the poor, dogs cooling off in sewage water. I liked them all because I have wondered how drivers kill time while masters party (Bhandarkar's "Page 3" provided some answers, may even have been some kind of inspiration for this novel), what do they do if masters decide to spend the night away from home (do they actually sleep in the car?), what do they eat when unexpected drives have to be made, etc.
4. There is one other major theme which has me divided. The Indian family. Aravind says this is the reason why many servants will never cheat their masters. To become an entrepreneur the White Tiger has to make peace with the fact that his entire family (of seventeen!) will be killed for his mistake. I hear similar reasons from friends who (claim) they can't grab the opportunities in front of them because they have to think of their family. V.S. Naipaul's "A House for Mr. Biswas" is also about Mr. Biswas' lifelong efforts to become independent of his family. We've known people around us who out of respect for their parents had to choose certain careers, choose certain spouses, live a certain (clandestine) way. Dharmendra had to run away from his family to pursue his dream of being a film star, go against his family's wishes. So, is Adiga's point valid? I know people who have achieved great things despite this reason, I also know others who couldn't. Rahul Dravid once said of Narain Karthikeyan something to affect, can we imagine the discussion at the dinner table when a child says he wants to be a Formula 1 driver.
   

At 276 pages this book breezes through. The English is simple (I didn't know what rampart meant, forgot what erstwhile meant, etc.). For a book whose strength is brevity and simplicity I found it to be quite profound. Chetan Bhagat can learn a few lessons from this novel if you ask me.

Rating: 5/5