“man of God’s
peace”—the moniker reflecting how people see the unassuming
Australian. What they don’t know is that he is former convict,
escaped from an Australian prison where he had begun serving a 19
year sentence.
Linbaba, as he is also known, lives an Indian life
and narrates it in all its gore and glory. Among occupations as
the resident “doctor” in a Mumbai slum, a stint in the
Bollywood scene, a career as a mafia fore-runner and a fighter in
Afghanistan, Lin assumes many aspects of a very surreal, yet very
real, life in India. Through all this, we learn that the most complicated
aspect of his life is that which we believe ought to be so simple—falling
in love.
Although a daunting 944 pages, it is a page-turner!
This is one of those books that you wait for years to read—the
prose is beautiful, the story captivating.
“I realized, somehow, through the screaming
in 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 a universe of possibility. And the choice you make, between
hating and forgiving, can become the story of your life.”
—Shantaram
English, August: An Indian Story
by Upamanyu Chatterjee
With the brutal summer heat of a place called Madna, “the
hottest town in India” in middle-of-nowhere India, as its
motivator, English, August is the story of a newly minted
Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer. August—real name
Agastya—nicknamed because of his Anglophile tendencies, is
thrown into an office filled with problems and is told to work.
Well, “work” could be the term. Agastya finds himself
surrounded by a bureaucratic muddle and a side of India that can
easily be termed, “very Indian.” With laconically detailed
depiction, the reader can almost feel the heat of Madna in a most
crudely comical sense. The story is undoubtedly believable and timeless.
Having just recently been released in the United
States, Chatterjee’s novel has been around India since the
1980s, but the story seems timeless. Many have called it the Indian
Catcher in the Rye, as it is story of self-discovery told
in often crude language. Unique and unconventional, English,
August is interesting to say the least. Dubbed “comical”
and “hilarious” by many, it provides a sense of colonial
satire rarely found in modern literature. The book certainly proves
India to be a by-product of the British empire—read deeply
and lightly at the same time or you will miss the story.
One Night @ The Call Centre by Chetan Bhagat
Why is India one of the fastest developing countries in the world
today? Because of great minds like that of author Chetan Bhagat,
who also wrote former Indian bestseller Five Point Someone,
centered on the lives of IIT students.
Certainly not a book for those looking of the romance
of old-time India, One Night is a story set around a group
of six who work at a call center just outside the Indian capital
of Delhi, in Gurgaon—home of call centers. Five of the characters
epitomize modern Indian youth—finding themselves, finding
their own love and learning things the hard way. One is a former
military “uncle,” an older gentleman whose America-resident
son and daughter-in-law have disowned him. All are a part of the
new genre of Indians, those who are in stages of losing their traditional
identities and are initially unsure of how to find new ones that
embrace but distinguish both the old and the new Indian.
The story itself centers on the events of one night, during which
God calls the six in the midst of their muddled lives, and tells
them that everything will be all right.
Dark and incredibly witty, Bhagat displays an enormous sense of
genius in his characterization of the at-once lost, at-once found
group working together in this call center. Outrightly insulting
American intellect and manners, he shows how American influence
has changed the Indian scenery for better or for worse.
For all the insults they throw, the characters
secretly appear to admire America. That is, until one of the girls
chooses her own groom from the group—a call center worker
just as poor as herself—over an arranged marriage with an
American resident Silicon Valley wealth-machine—who wants
her to choose the color of “their” new Lexus.
It is a story of identity. The book is one that shows a beating
from life can be overcome, in the strangest of senses. Bhagat is
a genius in his conceptualization and unfolding of the story. Quick
to read, hard to put down.
Ambika Behal is a journalist, currently based in New Delhi.
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