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4.22 

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Nature Sao Tome and Principe
~~~Once Upon a time in Malgudi~~~
Sep 21, 2009 11:30 PM 78113 Views
(Updated Sep 21, 2009 11:39 PM)

Readability:

Story:

Malgudi is an imaginative town where lives the imaginary characters created by the genius writer RK Narayan. You will find only very ordinary people in this village. For one who read the book closely will realize that Malgudi to a miniature of world where people of all characters co-exist. On the other hand, you can take this miniature to your village or city and will find it all there. Yes, such is the power of writing by RK Narayan. It has fun, story, life and messages!!


It is a known fact that I am no follower of short stories but novels. Any day I will prefer to read a novel ahead of short stories. So, I was a bit skeptical to buy the book since it is a collection of short stories. My doubt only lasted till I finished reading the first story of the book, ‘An Astrologer’s day’. The book contains 16 short stories from the story collection ‘An Astrologer’s day’ 8 stories from the story collection ‘Lawley Road’ and 8 new stories.


Ordinary people, extra ordinary events:That’s right. All the characters in the stories are very common. All they are guided by basic instincts and thoughts. When an extra ordinary event hit their expectations, how they will react? This is what RK Narayan observes for the readers. R K Narayan’s stories will remind us of the hypocrisy we maintain to change events in our favor in our own way but only to find that natural events have a pattern which we do not expects.


Stories of confidence and optimism:RK Narayan is a good advocate of optimism. Optimism can turn a disastrous situation to one of hope, as we can read in the story ‘the doctor’s word’ it is the hope which gives life to the patient. In astrologer’s day, the protagonist turns an adverse situation for the welfare of both parties. On the other hand, for those who live pessimism, even if everything is right, it can end up as a disaster, as told in the story of ‘Isharan’. The student who actually passed the exam, but end up in suicide since he even could not imagine such a success.


It is an imperfect world:There is a story called ‘Such perfection’ where the perfection comes as a villain and the author visualize that even God doesn’t want such perfection in this world. No wonder we cannot find idols in these short stories. In more than one story, we can see that people who try to go for perfection end up in imperfection in their personal life. (Read ‘Gateman’s gift’)


Nobody gets rich by gambling:You will find people who try hard to win lottery tickets, crossword puzzles and all in those stories. (Read ‘Out of business’) However, nobody wins those prizes. Even if they win those Bumper prizes (As told in the story ‘Engine Trouble’) it may be a disaster.


Lazy children, ignorant youth:There is a child who doesn’t want to study and go to school fearing beating from his class teacher. He revisit in more than one story. He is ‘Isharan’, ‘Swami’& the son. He fails regularly in his exams and fearing punishment all the time. He doesn’t want to get marry when grown up. There is a Hippy who is none other than ‘Swami’. He may be ignorant to school classes, but he reads a lot and has knowledge on many things. He has a different opinion and tries to live with it. He doesn’t mind taking a ‘second opinion’. There is a prodigal son as well who too revisit in many stories some times as child, and some times as an elder.


Cunning people:Yes, we will find them often in the stories. Let it be the ‘astrologer’, the cunning father who sent a letter to the head master, the journalist in Lawley road – the author demand brevity from us to live this world.


Don’t enslave ourselves:While there are images of unconditional love and surrender in its name, the author clearly states that we should not give our unconditional love for those who don’t value it or deserve it. We can find a dog which helps a blind man, but the blind man punishes the dog once he got control of him. There is an image of this dog returning to the punishing master who doesn’t value his service. The same image is visible in another story ‘Naga’. In ‘Leela’s friend’ too there is a shade of this slave. In stories like ‘A willing slave’ and ‘Selvi’, however, the author shows us a ‘slave’ who turns against the master when they get face to face with reality.


Inspired films:In Manichithrathazu (later remade as Bhool Bhulaiya), the influence of ‘Cat within’ is visible in one scene (Where a cat put its head a pot and it managed to create an impression as a ghost). Story of ‘Engine trouble’ has its influence on the film ‘Vellanakalude


Vellanakalude Nadu’ (Where a road roller is receiving a bumper prize and the person who receive it had to spend a lot just to keep it) and one award winning film (I think it is ‘Chamaram’) is influenced by ‘Naga’ where in the film, a tiger instead of snake is been released out of cage but it come back to the cage. These are all I managed to recover without much effort…but yes, if we think closely, there may have many others.


Any Negatives?I completely endorse the first 24 stories where they have my exact pace. All were short and direct focused on the story and they are simply awesome. However, in the new stories few of them were little lengthy and were lacking focus. RK Narayan himself have mentioned in the introduction that for writing novels is not an easy task for him and I think he got a point there.


Overall, the book is a must read. If you are not so fond of reading, Google/Yahoo for 'Malgudi days' videos and you can watch them. I preferred reading where I create my own images as guided by the author where by watching I am watching images created by others.


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