R.K.Narayan, or RKN as he was popularly referred to among his peers was probably the first Indian author to make a full fledged career out of writing novels and short stories. Born in 1906, he surprisingly failed to clear his BA exams in several attempts and took to full time writing after realizing that he wouldn’t be happy pursuing any other profession. All but one of his 15 novels are set in the fictional south Indian town of Malgudi.

Having first used Malgudi as a backdrop in 1935 for “Swami and Friends”, RKN found himself unerringly being drawn again and again towards the magical town. There are various books associated with Malgudi, mostly assorted collections of the many short stories penned by RKN. To write on all of them would be tantamount to writing a short doctoral thesis. I will therefore limit myself to “The Magic of Malgudi” (part of the “Malgudi Days” series), a collection of three “short novels”, and my all time favourite among all his books pertaining to Malgudi. The book comprises of “Swami and Friends”, “The Bachelor of Arts” and “The Vendor of Sweets”.

Swami and Friends

The first among his many literary achievements, the novel is about the adventures of “Swaminathan”, the hero and his motley band of friends. Brevity was a great virtue of RKN as was amply demonstrated in all his works. The novel deals with the many adventures of Swami and his chums at school, the initial antagonism towards “Rajam” – a well to do new comer at school and culminates in a poignant situation where Swami lets down his cricket team by running away from home and comes to know at the last instant that his dearest friend, Rajam, is leaving Malgudi for good.

RKN looks at the world of a ten year old child and narrates incidents from his life as it revolves around him. The joys, sorrows and the realization of what true friendship is all about are described in a very simple language that would appeal to a young boy and adult alike. I first came across Swaminathan and Malgudi in my 6th class English textbook and the fascination for both has remained undiminished since.

The Bachelor of Arts

This is a brilliant account of the confusions and frustrations that abound in all our lives when we finish college. RKN beautifully narrates the story of “Chandran”, a graduate who hopelessly falls in love with a girl (Malati) he doesn’t know at all. He observes his “object of affection” from a distance every evening on the banks of the river for days on end without mustering the courage to approach her. Faced with a sense of urgency from his family to get married, he leaves Malgudi to take up a job elsewhere and comes back with a clear solution to his problems. Unfortunately, he finds on his return that Malati has already got married to another man…

The slow metamorphism in a young man from one who is hopelessly in love and hell bent on marrying one with whom he is besotted into a mature man who realizes his responsibilities towards his family and accedes to their wishes is brought out in a very subtle manner. The narration is so smooth that one wishes that the story would never end!

The Vendor of Sweets

The Vendor of Sweets showcases RKN’s literary skills as he masterfully handles the generation clash between Jagan (a sweet vendor) and his good-for-nothing motherless son who returns from abroad with a “female companion”. The beauty of this tale lies in the way RKN highlights and compares the beliefs and value systems of the old order which slowly make way for the americanised and supposedly broader outlook prevalent in those years. Particularly touching are those portions where Jagan comes to terms with the fact that his son has married an American woman without his permission and the shock he gets when he realizes in the end that they were never married in the first place…

Thus spake TiC

All three stories convey the numerous aspects of lifestyle of a typical Indian in a small town set in the pre-independence era in a compact, yet all-encompassing manner. The works are made more enjoyable for the manner in which RKN captures with subtle humour, the quirks of ordinary people of those times. What is notable is the fact that he does not tamper with the ideological system of those days by suggesting radical changes in the societal setup. Instead, he prefers to show India and its people as they are, without painting false colours. What set RKN apart in these works from his peers of those days (most notably Mulkh Raj Anand), was his flair for simplistic narration, a copiousness of refreshing ideas for his stories and his ability to delicately portray the oddities of human relationships intermingled with an irony that is typically indian in nature.

Why Malgudi will always find a mention in the history of Indian literature
In its depiction of ordinary life, the slow paced momentum of its residents, its unflappable humour, its myriad hues of satire and its indifference to the fragility of human life, Malgudi speaks out in a million voices that seek to convey something unique.
For those who read it even once, the strong attraction that one feels for its various localities, be it Kabir Street, Lawley Extension or Market Road or the memorable characters like Swami’s granny and the tea shop owner at the corner of kabir street are sure to draw them back over and again to turn the pages of this marvelous literary masterpiece. Indeed, Malgudi dwells so much upon the mind of the reader that one ceases to consider it as a mere place and begins to treat it like one of the characters in these stories. That is why even after nearly 70 years after it was created, Malgudi continues to mesmerize and bewitch readers, both young and old all over the world.

Plot Revealed In The Review:	Somewhat revealed
Purchase Price (INR):	325
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