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Post |
| sally |
Posted
on 05-Feb-02 09:15 AM
Has anyone else read Manjushree Thapa's "Tutor of History"? I ordered it thru india.com, and highly recommend it.
I had a bit of a wrestling match with my husband about who'd get to read the book when ... I won (ahhhh, the advantages of not being a student!) and finished it first :-) ... Interestingly, we both independently had the same observation: that Thapa has done an amazing job of creating tension and making her readers keep turning the page without recourse to the usual plot devices of death and sex.
Not that death and sex are necessarily cheap plot devices per se. Samrat Upadhyay uses sex as his main page-turner, while some of my favorite writers--Arundhati Roy, Barbara Kingsolver, and Annie Proulx--all use the threat of impending death. None of these writers are exactly dimestore novelists, and Kingsolver in particular has reduced me to tears. (Of course, I've also been known to cry at Shirley Temple movies ... but still, it's quite a feat when a writer can engage the reader that much.)
Nevertheless, here is Thapa, writing about POLITICS for gosh's sake (a real snore-inducer for most people who read in English), and we end up really caring about her characters. I understand that politics and the question of "who will win the election" is not an uncommon device in Nepali literature, but it's rare in English, and frankly I do think it's hard to pull off effectively cuz it's abstract and time-bound. But she manages it, and also manages to turn the election into a kind of microcosm of society so that caring about who will win becomes, in a way, tied in with caring about the future of democracy in Nepal.
There were a few details I picked apart in the beginning--I'll be happy to discuss them if anyone else has read the book--but in the end I was quite won over. I really hope this book is published in the US and gets the attention it deserves.
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| Achilles |
Posted
on 05-Feb-02 11:59 AM
While I found parts of "Tutor of Hsitory" to be enjoyable, I was rather unimpressed, on the whole. Part of that might be because (my name here notwithstanding :)) I am a Nepali who grew up in similar environment and place where the story takes place. And while I admired the author's controlled and nuanced empathy for many characters(especially female characters), I found much of it to be rather unrealistic and journalistic. And writing in English, for all its glorious vocabulary and the author's mastery of it, is rather a poor vechile to capture workings in a Nepali town. There are pharases like 'May I eat a cow' (meaning "Gaiko Masu Khane" in Nepali) which comes as stone in a soup.
Oops, my lunch hour seems to be over. Back to work :)
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| sally |
Posted
on 05-Feb-02 02:56 PM
I don't agree that English is a poor vehicle for capturing the workings of a Nepali town. It's imperfect, but to think of it as an inherently poor vehicle implies that describing Nepali culture to a non-Nepali speaker is a lost cause from the start. I think that's way too defeatist and pessimistic. Are you then saying, also, that Samrat Upadhyay should give up trying to convey a picture of urban Nepali life? What about others writers whose works aren't set in an English-speaking culture, such as Chinua Achebe and Ha Jin? Or people like Gabriel Marquez or Milan Kundera, who are read in translation?
I’m also curious what you mean by it being both "unrealistic" AND "journalistic." To me, one thing that "journalistic" implies IS realism--perhaps superficial, perhaps descriptive at the expense of nuanced or revealing, but generally realistic. Another hallmark of journalistic prose could be glibness, like "Video Night in Kathmandu," a brilliantly and cleverly written but superficial collection of travel essays by Pico Iyer. I don't find Thapa's style glib; nor do I find that it is particularly concerned with surfaces at the expense of inner feelings. But perhaps I'm not sure what you mean by journalistic.
In general, the Englishized use of Nepali phrases didn't seem particularly awkward to my ear. It reminded me a bit of the way that Achebe uses Ibo phrases in his work. Even if it's mildly stilted on occasion, it does add some of the flavor of the speech. The alternative would be to avoid it completely, or (much worse) put in an English version, so that you end up with townspeople having conversations like, “I’m gonna vote for Nayan Raj, he’s so awesome.” “Dude, you are such a turkey butt. He’s totally plastic.”
Anyway, I agree that Thapa did make some strange choices in the details, such as repeatedly implying from context that "ulu" means turnip (probably because owl has connotations of wisdom in English). Also, Achilles, if you're from that area, perhaps you can enlighten me as to whether "fariya" is really used so much there, or whether that was an effort to avoid the word "sari" and give the book a tet Nepali rather than Indian flavor. My husband and his family are from the mid-West, though not specifically the area described, and that's one of the things that didn't ring true to either of us.
Another unrealistic element (more important than word choice): I feel it was a big mistake to make Sani illiterate. I can go on and on about THAT issue!!! I'd be curious to know if you agree, and what other "unrealistic" elements you found. Were they mostly in the details (such as particular phrases) or in the plot itself?
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| Achilles |
Posted
on 05-Feb-02 07:37 PM
>I don't agree that English is a poor vehicle
>for capturing the workings of a Nepali town.
>It's imperfect, but to think of it as an
>inherently poor vehicle implies that
>describing Nepali culture to a non-Nepali
>speaker is a lost cause from the start. I
>think that's way too defeatist and
>pessimistic.
I don't think it's a lost cause but one has to recognise the inherent limitations when attempting to write (especially fiction) in a borrowed language (and often times, forms). Even when we are reading in English, we realise all too clearly that the characters are actually speaking in Nepali. For a Nepali reader, there are translations happening twice, from Nepali to English(in the book) and then back to Nepali(in her head). Much can be lost within this dual processes. Perhaps that's why I find translations of the wholesale Nepali phrases rather jarring. "big-big people" for 'Thula-Bada manchhe', "thirty two qualities of unblemished womanhood" likely for 'Battis lachhin yukta,"black letters were as good as buffaloes" for 'kalo achher bhaisi barabar' "mother of my sons" for ?. (There are others). It's almost like looking in a faded mirror in a dimly lit room and it takes a while to figure out that the image on the mirror is your own.
>Are you then saying, also, that
>Samrat Upadhyay should give up trying to
>convey a picture of urban Nepali life?
That would be for Samrat to decide :) I didn't find his work (Arresting God in Kathmandu) particularly arresting. Or compelling. I found the Kathmandu he describes rather difficult to recognise and his use of sex in almost all his stories both forced and unnatural.
>What
>about others writers whose works aren't set
>in an English-speaking culture, such as
>Chinua Achebe and Ha Jin?
That's an interesting point . When speaking of 'English-speaking culture' do you include India and other former British colonies as well ? I haven't read Ha Jin but I have found Chinua Achebe's non-fiction to be more compelling than his novels set in Africa. Achebe's "Things Fall Apart" is interesting,(and is probably more famous for its being the first English fiction by an African) but also rather sanitized (not unlike the india one finds in R.K. Narayan). For a non-Nigerian like me, it was both educational and informative but I wouldn't look to Achebe to "explain" the Africa of today. I would be curious how a Nigerian would feel about Achebe or a Chinese about Ha Jin.
Speaking of Indian writing in English, I feel that the most successful works are still those which are set in English-speaking middle class or in a cosmopolitan Bombay. Rohinton Mistry's "Such a Long Journey "(btw, the movie,with Roshan Seth, is equally good) evokes well the creeping sense of general malaise in India, in large measure, because the story is set in English speaking middle class Bombay of the seventies. But when Mistry takes on the lower classes and life outside of Bombay ,as in "A Fine Balance", he appears unconvincing and rather trite. Perhaps 'language ' has something to do with it.
There are exceptions, of course. Amit Chaudhary's "A Strange and Sublime Address", captures, in its measured, almost elegiac prose the pathos and joys of a Calcutta household. But it's just that, an exception in a sea of mediocre India writing in English.
>Or people like
>Gabriel Marquez or Milan Kundera, who are
>read in translation?
>
That is altogether a different question. These are writers using their own languages to capture the societies they live in. Personally, I find both Marquez and Kundera unreadable but perhaps the loss is mine.
>I’m also curious what you mean by it
>being both "unrealistic" AND "journalistic."
>To me, one thing that "journalistic" implies
>IS realism--perhaps superficial, perhaps
>descriptive at the expense of nuanced or
>revealing, but generally realistic.
For me"journalistic" doesn't imply "realism". Much of 'journalistic' writings, perhaps having to work on the pressure of the clock, is rather full of trites, unexamined thoughts and therefore unrealistic.
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| Achilles |
Posted
on 05-Feb-02 07:39 PM
>Another
>hallmark of journalistic prose could be
>glibness, like "Video Night in Kathmandu," a
>brilliantly and cleverly written but
>superficial collection of travel essays by
>Pico Iyer.
I think Iyer's work is more than just a "journalist prose". And while some of it might be safely described as 'glib' (say the one on Nepal or Thailand), there is plenty in "Video Night" that will endure. To see it more than just a "cleverly written", you just have to read his piece on Burma. It is at par with Orwell.
>I don't find Thapa's style glib;
>nor do I find that it is particularly
>concerned with surfaces at the expense of
>inner feelings. But perhaps I'm not sure
>what you mean by journalistic.
>
>In general, the Englishized use of Nepali
>phrases didn't seem particularly awkward to
>my ear. It reminded me a bit of the way that
>Achebe uses Ibo phrases in his work. Even if
>it's mildly stilted on occasion, it does add
>some of the flavor of the speech. The
>alternative would be to avoid it completely,
>or (much worse) put in an English version,
>so that you end up with townspeople having
>conversations like, “I’m gonna
>vote for Nayan Raj, he’s so awesome.
>221; “Dude, you are such a turkey butt.
> He’s totally plastic.”
>
This is clearly a dilemma and I don't claim to have an answer and in any case I am not a writer. :)
>Anyway, I agree that Thapa did make some
>strange choices in the details, such as
>repeatedly implying from context that "ulu"
>means turnip (probably because owl has
>connotations of wisdom in English). Also,
>Achilles, if you're from that area, perhaps
>you can enlighten me as to whether "fariya"
>is really used so much there, or whether
>that was an effort to avoid the word "sari"
>and give the book a tet Nepali rather than
>Indian flavor.
I think "fariya" is the more commonly used word. I could be wrong here but my understanding is that "saris" are more formally used, perhaps in Teej or Dashain.
>My husband and his family are
>from the mid-West, though not specifically
>the area described, and that's one of the
>things that didn't ring true to either of us.
>
>
>Another unrealistic element (more important
>than word choice): I feel it was a big
>mistake to make Sani illiterate. I can go on
>and on about THAT issue!!! I'd be curious to
>know if you agree, and what other "
>unrealistic" elements you found. Were they
>mostly in the details (such as particular
>phrases) or in the plot itself?
More than just the details, I found that most of the male characters are just ciphers. So there is Giridhar Adhikary, who occupies so much of the novel, but we are told little of his inner dilemmas. We are led to believe that he is self-aware, but he seems to be an alchholic, give it up and then go back to being one again, for no apparent reason. Om Gurung an ex-British Gurkha and Jimmawal-baaje an old Brahmin are both a caricature of their caste and profession. Same goes for Nayan Raj, the candidate. And the climax of the election campaign is covered more like in a rushed journalist style.
That said, the author attempted to write a serious peice of work. That her success (in my opinion) is qualified speaks better than had she attempted trifle and succeded.
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| arnico |
Posted
on 05-Feb-02 08:24 PM
I will join the discussion once I have passed my research proposal (scheduled for tomorrow). Read the book, and enjoyed it a lot.
Arnico.
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