A man-eater and his exploits!

It was a boring and rainy evening on a Friday in Caracas. Maybe it was the fact that my Internet connection had gone kaput or that I was seriously not in the mood to watch any more Television. Either way, I found the book, ‘Man Eater of Malgudi’ at the back of my tie closet (Yes! I used to have one. Sigh.) which had somehow made its way into my abode all the way from India. But somehow, thanks to the various diversions today’s world throws so generously at us, I hadn’t managed to find that precious little window of time where I could finally open one of RK Narayan’s many classics.

As is the case with many books, the title has no literal meaning. As in, there isn’t really a tiger or lion or any other man eater in this story. This, you realize, after having thumbed off a good dozen pages while taking the journey of leading a simple printer in Malgudi (Narayan’s famous + fictitious town) – Nataraj. He lives in his grandmother’s ancestral home and has a good rapport with locals who come by to get their orders completed or other motor mouths who basically come to drive him nuts with their meaningless noon banter. The prominent ones in this close knit group are Sen, an aspiring politician who doesn’t necessarily condone Nehru politics and Sastri, an elderly gentleman and Nataraj’s assistant at the printing unit. With things looking like this in walks a hurricane called Vasu – a taxidermist, or so he claims. His boorish ways and overwhelmingly overbearing demeanor doesn’t suit Nataraj one bit. Vasu demands that a 100 visiting cards be printed with his name on them and also bullies his way into the attic in Nataraj’s residence. Maybe it is the fact that a man with such a non-stereotypical attitude comes to Malgudi or maybe it is that maybe at some level, Nataraj secretly envies the public display of confidence Vasu projects, he goes along with the new comer.

A wrinkle is thrown into this concoction when Nataraj slowly starts to realize that Vasu is in no mood to pay him for the cards he got printed. In fact, every time Nataraj, cowed by the ridiculously goon like attitude of Vasu, so much as attempts a conversation in that direction, a distraction takes place and Nataraj ends up swallowing his intent. This, Nataraj deduces, is why Vasu should be called the ‘man eater’. Dangerous and unpredictable. Someone impossible to be with for long periods of time.

Things continue to be this way until the day Nataraj’s friend – a poet – decides to publish his work. To commemorate this event Nataraj organizes a grand procession with the author atop a dear temple Elephant. It is then that Nataraj comes to know that Vasu, hiding behind a silent and dark window, plans to kill the elephant for his taxidermy reasons. Nataraj now gets ready for a showdown with Vasu only to find him dead when he gets to the attic. What happens then? Is Nataraj framed for Vasu’s death? What does the police say about this after the autopsy? Can Rangi, whom Vasu had befriended quite well in his tenure, help in some way to solve the death of this man eater? These are questions that find the light of truth towards the end.

The consistent comparison of Vasu to a mythological Rakshasa (demon), sheds some light on the point Narayan is trying to make in this book. Vasu, despite the obnoxiousness he vehemently portrays, is still someone to loath and admire. His absolute conviction to laugh at things like religion and faith is something that makes you wonder. His histrionics of patriotism that he had displayed during the Independence movement makes you ponder. Nataraj, on the other hand, represents the hopelessly decent and “good” people in society. Through their genuine affection to things they hold dear, they try to make others happy. Their selflessness lies in their adherence to the basics of simple living. Something which is quite in contrast with Vasu’s self absorbed and selfish attitude.

‘The man eater of Malgudi’ is a great case study to observe human behavior in the backdrop of a simple town. This could easily be any town anywhere in the world which is why its conclusions are quite universal. A theme I found very close to myself. A must read from the master story teller.

..ShaKri..

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Bombay - a haven for everyone

Boy oh boy! Have you ever felt like a book could have used some serious editing by the sheer volume it might have? Or was it the case that the sum of its grandeur was so commensurate to the size of its weight that there was just no way to delete even a word! Well, let me elaborate. After having spent 3 glorious weeks at the rate of about 5-6 hours per day, I have finally managed to complete this mammoth of a book called ‘Shantaram’ which appears to be an example of the pondering above.

But let me start from the beginning. Much like the protagonist, Lin Baba does. A good friend of mine recommended this book during one of our conversations about a month ago. She said it was a book about India, nay, about Mumbai written by a foreigner. Now, being the cynical monster I can be I immediately dismissed it as one more clichéd tribute to every possible thing there is to say about our revered financial capital. But then she continued ‘…its about this guy, you know, who escapes from a prison in Australia, I think, and comes to Bombay haan. And there he joins the mafia!’

There was something quite delightfully sinister about this two sentence fabric that made me pause to reflect. Not only was this set up intriguing but it suddenly began transforming into questions – Who is he? How did he manage to get away from Australia? Why did he do it? And why Mumbai? How did he get there? How was he not caught? I immediately asked her to lend me the book after her husband was done with it.

And she did. A week later. I was just about to start my 3 week hiatus called the Xmas break and there seemed nothing more pleasing than to submerge myself into this mysterious character who had the audacity to escape a high security prison to end up in a place, which I am sure of, was probably much worse.

And so we start looking at this magnificent journey through the eyes of an Australian, Contrary to her mixed up version of the tale, although the central character – Lindsay Ford (later dubbed ‘Lin Baba’ and then ‘Shantaram’) – is indeed from down under, he is not fleeing a prison from there. He is in fact heading out of New Zealand on his way to Germany. On the way, he has a stop over in Mumbai where, as it turns out, he ends up staying for good.

The book’s main source is the author himself – Gregory David Roberts – who quite candidly confessed that the tales in the book were true episodes that he had had to go through. Save for murder, he said, he had committed almost all other kinds of cons like theft, armed robbery et al. Hence, there is immense detail in the way the narration picks up. I specially loved the first few lines that pretty much summarize his journey right away.

"It took me a long time and most of the world to learn what I know about love and fate and the choices we make, but the heart of it came to me in an instant, while I was chained to a wall and being tortured. I realised, somehow, through the screaming of my mind, that even in that shackled, bloody helplessness, I was still free: free to hate the men who were torturing me, or to forgive them. It doesn’t sound like much, I know. But in the flinch and bite of the chain, when it’s all you’ve got, that freedom is an universe of possibility. And the choice you make between hating and forgiving, can become the story of your life. "

It was in this deep seeded sense of humanity that I decided to go head first into this 900+ page Herculean venture that took me a good 3 weeks to wrap up.

The story, as mentioned above, starts with Lindsay arriving in Mumbai. Clueless about the kind of life he can expect here and conscious about the fact that he is a ‘wanted’ criminal at large, he wanders into the bustling cacophony of the metro. He meets Prabhakar. A local fellow who he befriends almost immediately and who later on becomes one of Lin’s closest friends. He then ends up in a slum where he takes on an almost demi-God status for being a white man. He is looked at by many as a doctor and a healer. He helps in slum fires and slowly starts getting involved in the lives of those who have given him shelter despite being low on it themselves. In this essence of basic human emotion, Lin finds his new home – his Mumbai. It is from here, that his journey into a dozen other places – including the likes of the Mumbai mafia, into the life of the much esteemed Godfather Khader Khan, the confused yet poignant eyes of Karla – the green eyed Swiss American immigrant and even the now famous Leopold Café where most of their meetings take place. ‘Shantaram’ documents the lives of non-Indian migrants who have made Mumbai their home. Their adherence to everything from Mumbai’s famous hangouts to its infamous drug world is documented in all its glory. Everyone from the ‘standing babas’ to the colorfully neurotic world of Bollywood makes its appearance in Lin’s story. He learns, teaches, suffers, gets beaten up, is cheated, falls in love, finds friends, and even makes a trip with his mentor Khader Khan to Afghanistan to help mujahadeen fighters in their combat. It is then, after Khader’s untimely demise, that Lin realizes the cesspool of sins that he had involuntarily wallowed into. It is then, with the shrapnel still fresh on his face that he decides to turn his life around. It is here, that he truly starts becoming what he had been christened a long time ago – Shantaram.

At the end of the 900+ pages, it becomes apparent why this story is so personal to Gregory. It oozes of his love to India and everything it has meant for him in life. Every thing he says about it is a result of pure affection and love to the one place that finally turned him into a human being. The one place, he calls, ‘the only proof that love exists’ in the world. Simply put, ‘Shantaram’ goes beyond being a big fat novel after its half way journey. It becomes a spiritual adventure that a convict takes nestling in the arms of a city that for long as been the epitome of solidarity and undeniably immaculate spirit. ‘Shantaram’ is a definite read to those who are alien to either Mumbai or India.

..ShaKri..

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