Chapter – III: A Thematic Study of R.K. Narayan's Novelsshodhganga.inflibnet.ac.in/bitstream/10603/111118/4/chapter 3.pdfAfter short, uninspiring stint as a teacher, an editorial

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Chapter – III: A Thematic Study of R.K. Narayan's Novels

R.K. Narayan, a product of British India, belongs to the earliest

generations of Indian Writing in English. Hailing from an academic

family, boasting also of the cartoonists R.K. Laxman, he started writing at

a very young age. He was a struggling artist and his reputation as an

author came gradually, a long career sprinkled generously with rejections.

The creator of the fictional South Indian town of Malgudi,

Narayan’s oeuvre includes travelogues, memoirs, essay, and retold

legends like the Ramayana and the Mahabharata. Although Narayan’s

Malgudi, his characters and situations are fictional, they are very

plausible, and contemporaneous of his time and location. He employs

every day characters on whom the story lives. The narrative, though not

descriptive of the scenes that it works in, is capable of painting in the

mind’s eye, the picture of a quaint town with the river banks and the

dusty streets.

A Portrayal of Women Characters in R.K. Narayan’s Novels: A Critical Study

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Narayan is duly respected as one of the strongest signature of the

new age in Indian English novel. He is primarily preoccupied with man's

filling of the life- role entrusted to him by tradition and environment.

Born and brought up in a traditional South Indian Family Narayan is a

true Indian both in spirit and thought. If Raja Rao is termed as a novelist

of Metaphysics, Narayan is often appreciated as a painter of vivid

Malgudi, a microcosm of Indian social milieu. He has always been

claimed as a novelist par-excellence in matters of social criticism of

India. But little has been written on how Narayan incorporates the

profound Indian thoughts, Philosophies and spiritualism in general the

theory of karma in particular in his fiction.

R.K. Narayan has translated and published shortened prose

versions of the two great Indian epics, the Ramayana and the

Mahabharata. He has also translated Hindu Mythical tales in Gods,

Demons and others. He used to start his day with meditation, a little bit of

reading of the puranas and recitation of Gayatri Mantra. His knowledge

of Indian Classical literature, philosophy, religion and ethics permeates

his writing. Such an easy man that he was he does not unnecessarily

burden his readers with discourse on abstract philosophy and

metaphysics. He does not employ the genre of political cause, nor does he

pour too much philosophy and theory in his writing.


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R.K. Narayan made a modest beginning of his career as a novelist

with Swami and Friends, in 1935. The Swami and Friends is the first of a

triology of novels. This first novel is set in pre-independence days in

India, in a fictional town called Malgudi. The second one is The Bachelor

of Arts and the third one is The English Teacher. The background of the

novel is pre-independence day of India. It was Graham Green without

whose recommendation to Hamish Hamilton, Narayan`s career as the

novelist would have ended abruptly for want of the publisher, then and

there , and the fame and popularity that he now enjoys as a prominent and

prolific writer would have been a distant possibility. Graham Greene

wrotes: “It was Mr. Narayan with his Swami and Friends, who

brought India, in the sense of the Indian population and the Indian

way of life, a live to me--- Swami is the story of a child written with

complete objectivity, with a humour strange to our fiction closer to T.

Checkov than to any English writer, with the same underlying sense

of beauty and sadness.”1 Born and brought up in a conservative Hindu

family Swaminathan has to move within the strict orthodox atmosphere at

home. It has a large bearing on his raw mind, which is unmistakably seen

when he is alone or in the company of his friends. Swami`s family,

1 Greene. Graham, Introduction to The Bachelor of Arts (Pocket Book Edition, London,

1951) p.7.


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neither indigent nor too well-off, is profoundly unified in its assumptions

about the ends and means of life.

Swami and Friends is a novel about children and childhood. All the

characters in this novel are realistic and convincing. Swami, Somu, Mani,

Samuel the Pea, Shankar and Rajam have been described in a comic way.

Swami’s experience at school, cricket and politics have been described

too. In the novel major landmarks like the river Sarayu, mango grove,

trunk road, Ralway station, Albert Mission School and certain lanes are

depicted. Narayan shows Swaminathan and his experience in Malgudi

town in a world of adult-parents and a world of innocent Swami’s friends.

The different themes like theme of relationship and rebellion move

around these characters.

After short, uninspiring stint as a teacher, an editorial assistant, and

a newspaper man. He invented the small south Indian city of Malgudi, a

literary microcosm that critics later compared to william Faulkner's

Yoknapatawpha country. More than a dozen fictions and many short

stories that followed were set in Malgudi, His Writing style has been

compared to that of Guy de Manupassant. They both have an ability to

compress the narrative without losing out on components of the story.

The Swami and Friends is the simple and charming story set in the

1930s of ten-year old Swaminathan and his experience of growing up in


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Malgudi, a town created by R.K. Narayan. Swami lives in a world of

“bossy adults” parents and teachers, as well as his friends in school.

Pleasing his demanding peers as well as the adults is a tough job indeed.

But Swami tries to manage it to the best of his ability. Swami is

impulsive, mischievous and innocent. And he has a very warm heart.

Through his eyes we get to see a complete picture of South India during

the pre-Independent era. We come to know how simple folk lived in the

colonial days and about the uprisings, the rebellions and the strange

mixture of resentment and reverence which ordinary people felt of the

British.

Swami is a student of the Albert Mission School established by the

British. So the main focus of the school is on “English education” and

Christianity. Swami has four friends Sonu, the monitor who carries

himself with an easy air, Mani, the good-for nothing, Sankar, the most

brilliant boy in the class and Samuel, known as the “Pea”. All four share a

common trait- their ability to laugh at everything.

Swami’s relationship with each one is different but they share a

genuine common friendship. Swami’s happy-go-lucky life changes

drastically with the arrival of Rajam, a symbol of colonial power. This is

how Narayan describes him. Rajam was a newcomer; he dressed very

well, he was the only boy in class who was socks and shoes, fur cap and


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tie, and a wonderful coat and knickers. He spoke very good English,

exactly like a European, which meant that few in the school could make

out what he said.

The Bachelor of Arts, set in Malgudi, is the second novel from

Narayan’s literary basket. It is a story about a young man, Chandran,

tracing his college days, a failed love, a flight, a stint of asceticism, a

revival and return, employment, and finally his marriage. The novel deals

with the theme of Chandran’s love affair with Malathi. It underlines that

Malgudi does not allow Chandran to communicate with Malathi before

marriage. When Chandran decides to marry Malathi the mismatch of

horoscope becomes the great problem. The novel is more an

autobiography of the author, which is true incident of Narayan’s life. This

work is the example of the author’s distinctive subtle humour and his

ability to draw his readers into the story. This story holds them there from

the beginning to the end. The story is in third person narration. It is

related through the perspective of the protagonist. During the course,

Chandran gets gradually transformed from an impulsive adolescent to a

natural adult. This is the story of any young man’s life.

“Chandran was just climbing the steps of the College Union

when, Natesan, the secretary, sprang on him and said, you are just


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the person I am looking for….”2 The story beings with Chandan being

asked by Natesan, to fulfill his promise by speaking in the motion of

“Historians should be slaughtered first” in a college debate. Beginning

from here Narayan goes on to trace the next few months, the last of

Chandran’s final year in college, stopping only with his marriage.

“Sitting in the dark he subjected his soul to a remorse less

vivisection, he had been living on charity, charity given in mistake,

given on the face value of a counterfeit. He ought not to feed his

miserable stomach with food which he had neither earned nor, by

virtue of spiritual worth, deserved.”3

In his trademark way of writing, the author steps clear from giving

the background details of the character or the story and challenges the

reader to judge by the present, running story. Narayan has described the

condition and background of Chandran. The novel is divided into four

parts. Practically, every aspect of college life is covered up to illuminate

the personality of the hero. If Swami and Friends presents the school days

of Swaminathan. The Bachelor of Arts tries to capture the feelings of

Chandran, a Youngman of twenty one. Chandran, a well-known college

debater, impresses the Secretary in debate. After passing his B.A. falls in

2 Narayan R.K., The Bachelor of Arts (Mysore; Indian Thought Publication, 1979), p.1. 3 Narayan R.K., The Bachelor of Arts (Mysore; Indian Thought Publication, 1979), p.111.


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love with Malthi whom he cannot marry because of opposition from his

mother. He soon gets frustrated with the world. He goes to the extent of

renouncing it and becomes a sanyasi. After a brief spell of sanyas, he

again enters domestic life, marries a girl chosen by his parent. After his

marriage with Sushila, Chandran joins as a newspaper correspondent, and

then he becomes the chief agent of the Daily Messenger. Thus he

becomes prosperous, and he explains to the people that people marry

because of the satisfaction of their sexual appetite and the management of

home, otherwise there is no sanctity in the institution of marriage.

In The Dark Room Narayan has realistically drawn the picture of

Indian middle-class family with all its complexities. He has displayed the

husband- wife relationship thematically in a more somber manner. It is an

authentic picture of a traditional Hindu house-wife, her silent suffering

and temporary rebellion ending in abject surrender is in keeping with the

Hindu culture dominating the Indian society. Savitri poignantly realizes

by way of self-evaluation: “We are responsible for our position. We

accept food, shelter and comforts that you give, and are what we

are...I don’t possess anything in this world.”4 The Dark Room is the

story of Ramani, the Branch Manager of the Englandia Insurance

Company, his wife Savitri and his mistress Shanta Bai, the probationary

4 Narayan R.K., The Dark Room (Mysore; Indian Thought Publication, 1979), p.112.


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insurance assistant. The whole story of the novel revolves around these

three characters. It deals with disharmony of domestic life. Ramani and

Savitri have a happy married life with three children.

The normal routine of happy life of Ramani’s family disturbs when

Shanta Bai enters in the novel. She is an Insurence Organiser and

personal assistant to Ramani the branch manager. Ramani has illicit

relations with her. Because of this torried love affair, Savitri’s life

becomes worst. The novelist has beautifully explored realistic picture of

the husband, wife and children. The wife is always a public prosecutor of

public affair. The novel is an account of marriage form the wife's point of

view in which, the image that has been projected is that of an Indian

woman as a victim. Savitri is a middle- class woman who is not well

educated and loaded with an immense weight of multifaceted duties as

the wife and the mother. She realizes her place in the society and says:

“What possession can a woman call her own except her body?

Everything else that she has is her father’s, her husband’s or her

son’s?”5

In this novel Narayan is very critical in presenting the relationship

between a devoted and submissive wife and a cruel husband. Savitri is an

outstanding representative of wifely devotion cited in the Indian myths

5 Narayan R.K., The Dark Room (Mysore; Indian Thought Publication, 1979) p.117.


98

and legends, but Ramani is very cynical and domineering. Finally Savitri

admits her defeat: “I am like a bamboo pole which cannot stand

without a wall to support it.”6

The perspective of Indo-Anglian novelists represents different

levels of the Indian consciousness: shaped by the tradition of Indian

humanism and Western enlightenment. The theme of emancipation of

women, a widespread and genuine concern for the amelioration of their

condition, for the first time became a social issue in the early twentieth

century.

The happiness of unhappiness, and the quiet or disquiet of the

house depends purely on his mood. But Ramani does not respect the

emotion and sentiments of his devoted and submissive wife. Ramani's

relationship with Shanta Bai compels Savitri goes directly against the

classical and traditional rule. She asserts individuality independent of her

husband. Savitri has revolted against her husband's brutality and cruelty

in bold manner. She does not remain in her devotional and submissive

temper throughout the novel. The inner-self of Savitri becomes conscious

and rebellious about her social as well as economic independence. But at

the same time she is aware of the sublime nature of the husband-wife

relationship.

6 Narayan R.K., The Dark Room, (Macmillan & Co. Ltd., London 1938), p.189.


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The novel, The English Teacher, published in 1945, is merely

autobiographical, concerning a teacher's struggle to cope with the death

of his wife. In 1953, Michigan state university published it under the title

Grateful to Life and Death, along with his novel The Financial Expert,

they were Narayan's first books published in the United States. The

English Teacher describes the life of Krishnan as a teacher of English in a

college. The main story of the novel centres round the love between

Krishna and his wife Sushila. They were living a very happy life when

suddenly Sushila died of tyophid. After her death Krishnan concentrated

himself on bringing up his daughter Leela. Then the novel takes a mystic

turn. Krishnan started receiving messages from his wife through a

medium, a cheerful gentleman of philosophic outlook. Every week he

used to go to the meadow for a sitting and he received minute instructions

about the things of the house, which convinced him that they could only

come from his wife’s spirit. The English Teacher put up his daughter

Leela at a school run by a devoted master. The master’s unhappy life and

his devotion to the school form a minor subplot of the novel.

The English Teacher is dedicated to Narayan’s wife Rajam. It is

not only autobiographical but also poignant in its intensity of feeling. The

story is a series of experiences in the life of Krishna, an English teacher,

and his quest towards achieving inner peace and self-development.


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Krishna is an English lecturer at the Albert Mission College. For several

years he has enjoyed a bachelor’s life, but the change came when his

wife, Susila, and their child, Leela, move in with him. Krishna’s life

expands to include the happy domesticity of living with his wife and

child. Nearly half the novel focuses on the mundane joy of his day-to-day

experiences with his family.

Narayan’s India is the real India and his Malgudi is a living

creation. The characters scene, situations, habits and customs are all real

and authentic. His Krishnan and Shushila, the head master and his wife

are all real and convincing. So is the old woman, the perfect stranger, on

hearing that Krishnan is a widower, insists on getting him married at

once:

“A man must marry within fifteen days of losing his wife,

otherwise he will be ruined. I was the fourth wife to my husband and

he always married with three weeks. All the fourteen children are

happy what is wrong.”7

In the end Krishnan resigns his job and joins the primitive school

so that he could talk directly to his departed wife, who, he believes, was a

spirit. Dr. Raghukul Tilak observes the first phase of R.K. Narayan and

aptly remarks: “The English Teacher, ends the first phase in the

7 Narayan R.K., The English Teacher (Mysore; Indian Thought Publication, 1979), p.1.


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evolution of Narayan’s genius. His period of apprenticeship is now

over and more finished and artistic novels will henceforth flow from

his pen.”8

The novel Mr. Sampath first published in 1949 in London,and in

1956 in India has been filmed both in Tamil and Hindi. Despite some

weakness, the rank of this novel is very high in the world of Indo-Anglian

fiction. In this novel, the protagonist Mr. Sampath is the owner of the

Truth Printing Press. He prints the weekly of Mr. Srinivas named The

Banner. The workers of his weekly The Banner go on a strike. Mr.

Sampath persuades Srinivas to write a film story for his new venture

Sunrise Pictures. He succeeds in getting the financial help from Somu and

Sohanlal. He knows better how to execute business matters. His

enchanting sales talks are charming indeed. He falls in love with the

heroine of his film, Shanti. Ravi, a young artist is also in love with her.

The novel deals with the complexities of human relationships and

circumstances. The two most important motifs of this novel are money

and sex. The theme of this novel is to uphold the social values and

restoration of the old order of our ancestors. Like his previous novels,

Narayan presents some of the important events of his life through the

8 Khatri C.L., R.K. Narayan: Reflections and Re-evaluation (Sarup and Sons New Delhi,

2008), p.173.


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character of Srinivas. He is an editor of The Banner, a journal with a two-

fold.

This is the story of Mr. Sampath, an unscrupulous rogue. It has

been written with delicacy and care. The personality of Mr. Sampath

going from one adventure to another, facing his failures with equanimity,

cheating some, obliging others, always optimistic, always unscrupulous,

always full of ready witted excuses and always at home with everybody,

towers over all other characters. “Every sane man needs two wives- a

perfect one for the house and a perfect one for the outside, for social

life…..I have the one why not the other?”9

Thus, Mr. Sampath portrayed in the beginning, as an ambitious,

hard working, and energetic printer, ends as a ruined man. Had Srinivas

seriously taken it on himself to warn Ravi beforehand, perhaps the

mishap would have been averted. But he chose himself to be a detached

observer and allowed the events to take their own course, little minding

that it would bring about a total ruin to Mr. Sampath who had given him a

name and fame as the editor. Srinivas had betrayed the printer, and lost

the readers’ interest in him for his fatalistic outlook. He spoke in Hindi

and could easily be mistaken for a North-Indian with his fur cap and the

scarf flung around his neck. Mr. Sampath is presented with this has his 9 Bhatnagar M.K. Indian Writing In English Vol. 7, (Atlantic Publishers and Distributer (P)

Ltd. New Delhi 2000), p.201.


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weakness and defects. But he is obliging and much prepared to take the

worries of others on his shoulders. We love this masterpiece creation of

Narayan.

The Financial Expert,(1952), is an extremely well-constructed

novel, in five parts, corresponding to the five Acts of an Elizabethan

drama. This is the story of Margayya, dealing in money transaction

business. It is the story of the rise and fall of Margayya the financial

expert. The main characters in the novel are little better than caricatures.

It is a delightful novel for the gentle irony used to bring out the rise and

fall of Margayya, the financial wizard. Margayya begins his career as a

petty money- lender doing his business under the banyan tree, in front of

the Central Co-operative Land Mortgage Bank in Malgudi. His business

is to help the shareholders of the bank to borrow money at a small interest

and lends it to the needy at a higher interest. In the process he makes

some money for himself. This sets him on the path of improving his

position. William Walsh rightly observes: “The Financial Expert is an

exact account of village usury and city deceit and a controlled

probing into the motives of money making.”10

Margayya, the ambitious absurd financial expert is perhaps the

most engaging of all Mr. Narayan’s character. In his ambitions for his

10 Ramteke S.R., R.K. Narayan and His Social Perspective (Atlantic Publishers and

Distributers (p) Ltd. 2008), P.40


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boy, his huge dreams, his unintended villainies, his small vanities and his

domestic tenderness, he has the hidden poetry and the unrecognised

pathos we so often find in Chekhov’s characters who in the last page

vanish into life.

Narayan next novel, waiting for The Mahatma, published in 1955

by Metheun London is a political novel based on Mahatma Gandhi’s

struggle for independence, the Quit India Movement of 1942 and ending

with the murder of Mahatma Gandhi in the Birla House garden at the

prayer meeting. This is a socio-political novel, and this novel seems to be

very much concerned with characters engaged in contemporary political

life. Narayan is least interested in the political affairs of the country. This

novel deals with the Gandhian ethics, Major political events and India’s

freedom struggle. Novelists chief concern seems to be with how the

adolescent Shriram reacts to the events with Bharti. Shriram is uneasily

conscious of the pointlessness of his life. He is a young man of twenty,

who lost his parents at an early age. Bharti is the leading character of the

novel, she is a young beautiful girl and the daughter of a patriot who died

at the hands of a policeman. She was adopted by the local Sevak Sangh

and was brought up and educated on Gandhian principles. She is a true

follower and devotee of Gandhi.


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Sriram meets Bharti when one day she approaches him for the

contribution to the fund which is being collected for the reception of

Mahatma Gandhi in Malgudi. “Your contribution? She asked?

Shaking a little tin collection box. Shriram’s throat went dry and no

sound came. He had never been spoken to be any girl before.”11

Driven by his love for her, he joins Gandhiji’s group of followers of

which she is a member.

There is no doubt that in Waiting for Mahatma the novelist has

touched the problem of untouchability the Mahatma has taken up for

social reformation in the country. Gandhi’s stay at a small hut in the

sweeper’s colony situated far away from the mainstream of life,points to

the fact. But it is unfortunate that Mahatma has nothing concrete to offer

for their upliftment. His advice only to the untouchables and also to the

million others is miserable. His leaving them to their fate, and enjoying

himself the priviledge and liberties of the high caste, does not appeal to a

fair and just mind.

The subsequent publications of his fictions, especially Mr.

Sampath, ‘Waiting For The Mahatma’, ‘The Guide’, ‘The Man Eater of

Mulgudi’ and ‘The Vendor of Sweets’, established Narayan's reputation

in the West. The Guide published in 1958, is Narayan's masterpiece. It is

11 Narayan R.K. Waiting For The Mahatma, (Mysore :Indian Thought Publication, 2007),

p.56.


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one of the author’s most critically acclaimed novels. It has won the

Sahitya Academy Award for 1960. It has been filmed also. Like most of

his works the novel is based in Malgudi. The novel begins with Raju’s

appearance as a railway guide. He is nicknamed as Railway Raju. He falls

in love with his client’s young and beautiful wife Rosie. To fulfil her

ambition of life Raju foolishly loses everything. He forges and gets a two

year sentence. After completing the sentence, Raju passes through a

village where he is mistaken for a Sadhu. He does not want to return in

disgrace to Malgudi, and stays in an abandoned temple. There is a famine

in the village and Raju is expected to keep a fast in order to make it rain.

After fasting for several days, he goes to the riverside one morning as part

of his daily ritual, where his legs sag down as he feels that the rain is

falling in the hills. The ending of the novel leaves unanswered question of

his martyrdom.

The novel ‘The Guide’ describes the transformation of the

protagonist, Raju from a town guide to a spiritual guide. The setting of

the novel, The Guide, as in most of his novels, is Malgudi. The novel is

told through a series of flashbacks. It is a romantic novel. Raju and Rosie

both behave romantically. Raju seems to be a character from

Shakespeare’s romantic comedies in which the heroes fall in love with

the heroines at first sight. Raju falls in love with Rosie at first sight. In


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order to win her favour and love he willingly takes interest in her interest

of dance. He readily agrees to show her the dance of king kobra. He

praises her art of dance, and encourages and inspires her to be a great

dancer.

Raju, the central character, grows up near a railway station, and

becomes a shopkeeper, and then a resourceful tourist guide. He meets

Rosie, a beautiful dancer and her husband, whom Raju nicknames Marco,

because the man dresses in a jacket and helmet as if undertaking an

expedition, like Marco Polo. Narayan portrays the helplessness of the

women in society. Rosie the heroine has been denied the privilege to

grow into a perfect womanhood. When she gets it at the hand of Raju, she

is once again deceived. In married life two partners of the opposite sex

develop a relation to give meaning to their personality, but this does not

happen in all the cases. The concept of this vital relationship between

man and a woman has been violated first by Marco and secondly by Raju

in the novel.

“Raju liked this rambling talk. He had been all alone in this

place for over a day. It was good to hear the human voice again.

After this the villager resumed the study of his face with intense

respect. And Raju stroked his chin thought fully to make sure that an

apostolic beard had not suddenly grown there. It was still smooth. He


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had his last shave only two days before and paid for it with the hard

earned coins of his jail life.”12

Raju is astounded to meet Rosie a beautiful dancer, at dance

practice. He sat thinking for a while, as if putting two and two together.

He suppressed any enquiry, regarding it as not his business, and said,

“what has come over you, Raju? You have not, paid my dues at all

for months and months, and you used to be so regular,”13 and her

husband, Rosie opened her eyes. They were swollen. She had large,

vivacious eyes, but they looked as if they had grown one round larger

now, and were bulging and fearsome, dull and red she was a sorry sight in

every way. She sat up and told me: “Don’t waste any more of your time

with us. You go back. That’s all I have to say’ in a tick, gruff,

Crackling voice.”14

Her voice shook a little as she spoke. “I mean it. Leave us now.”15

whom Raju nicknames Marco, because the man dresses in a thick jacket

and helmet as if undertaking an expedition, “He dressed like a man about

to undertake an expendtion with his thick, coloured glasses, thick jacket

and a thick halmet over which was perpetually stressed a green, sinny

12 William W., R.K. Narayan: A Critical Appreciation (Allied Publishers Limited New

Delhi 1995), p.116. 13 Narayan R.K., The Guide, (Modern Classics)Penguin Books New Delhi,2010), p.129. 14 Narayan R.K., The Guide, (Mysore: Indian Thought Publication 1958), p.108. 15 Ibid,p.151.


109

water proof cover giving him the appearance of a space traveller…. “But

I wanted to call this man Marco.”16 Like Marco Polo. “Marco

continued his rhapsody on Joseph: “I can never thank you enough for

finding me a place like this and a man like Joseph. He’s really a

wonder. What a pity he should be wasting his talent on this hill-

top.”17 Marco is scholar and anthropologist, who is more interested in his

research than in his young wife Rosie. “My philosophy was that while it

lasted the maximum has to be squeezed out…..It filled me with dread

that I should be expected to do with less.”18

The Man-Eater of Malgudi (1961) is again an important novel,

which revolves around the life of a printer named Nataraj, who lives in a

huge ancestral house. He leads a contented lifestyle, with his own circle

of friends, such as a poet, Sen a Journalist and Sastri, his assistant whom

Nataraj respect very much. One day a taxidermist named Vasu arrives at

the office of Natraj and demands the printing of 100 visiting cards.

Although Nataraj does this, Vasu seems to have no intention of paying

him.

As the title suggests, there is a Man Eater in the story, through it is

not tiger but Vasu, the ruthless taxidermist. Vasu is absolutely heartless.

16 Narayan R.K., The Guide, (Mysore: Indian Thought Publication 2008), p.152. 17 Ibid,p.133 18 Narayan R.K., Memories of Malgudi (Penguin Book New Delhi, 2002), p.593.


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He has no regard for gratitude or obligations. He is physically very

powerful. He could break stones with his bare hands. He comes to

Malgudi because of the attraction, of the Mempi forest, he wishes to live

with the wild animals. He is a money-minded person. He does not give

money to Natraj for whom he seems collecting funds. He does not even

pay the rent due to him. He does not believe in the institution of marriage

and brings women to his house. On the whole, The Man Eater of Malgudi

is a hilarious, charming and artistically successful novel. The novelist has

blended realism and romanticism, humour and irony in the novel. Vasu is

a type of a bully, a six feet tall, and is compared to a Rakesh (a Demon)

by Nataraj and Sastri. Vasu takes up residence in the attic of Nataraj’s

house, and does not pay him any money or sign any contract based on the

rent. “Vasu who symbolises negation and distinction and the most of

elemental forces of evil destroys, though only temporarily, the

established order of Natraj’s world, he is finally destroyed by

himself.”19

Vasu is a muscleman, proud of his physical strength. As the story

continues he encroaches on Natraj’s life, and scares away his friends his

customers and so on. The Vendor of Sweets (1967) is a light novel with

its humorous overtones. The protagonist of the novel is an eccentric

19 Narayan R.K., The Man Eater of Malgudi, (Mysore: Indian Thought Publication 2007),

p.81.


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widower of sixty with his high-minded Gandhian philosophy which he

appear to have been following to suit his own purpose. He is religious –

minded and has been considerably influenced by The Gita. It is a story of

Jagan or Jagannath a vendor of sweets. He is a rich widower whose main

object in life is to educated his motherless son Mali. But the son has his

own ideas and at last he decides to leave college and be a writer. With the

passage of time Mali is caught in some illegal activities and arrested. The

main characters are Jagan and his son Mali. It revolves around the issues

arising from the generation gap between father and son. Narayan in his

superb style narrates the principled life-story Jagan. “If you meet her,”

Jagan tells his cousin,” Tell her that if even she wants to go back to

her country, I’ll buy her a ticket, it is a duty we owe her.”20

Jagan, an orthodox Hindu Brahmin and runner of a sweet shop, is

simple and hard-working man. He is a follower of Gandhian principles

and is proud of his role in India’s freedom struggle during his youth. He

wears hand spun cloth that signifies purity to him. In his early days Jagan

loses his wife Ambika because of his belief in nature cures. He had never

spent much time with his wife that causes discontent in his son Mali.

“The world does not collapse even when a great figure is assassinated

20 Narayan R.K., The Vendor of Sweets, (Mysore: Indian Thought Publication 2007), p.141.


112

or dies of heart failure. I think that my heart has failed, that’s all.”21

Mali, without his father’s permission discontinues his education, and goes

to America. A few years later, he comes back very Westernised and

brings along an American girl, Grace. He tells his father that they are

already married, which causes great disappointment to Jagan. Jagan

however develops an affection for his daughter-in-law and feels Mali is

not giving her the attention she deserves. The conflict between the old

and young generation, their ideals and the generation gap makes ‘Vendor

of Sweets’ a memorable story.

This bittersweet novel is as fresh and charming today as it was

when originally published. “The remedy would be for our nation to

change its habits, for people eat off plates and not use leaves for the

purpose, The plates could be washed and kept, unlike the leaves

which are thrown out after dinner for vagrants to pick.”22 The story

presents a picture of a loving father who ultimately gets disillusioned by

his son’s ingratitude. Jagan in his own way is a philosopher. He believes

in giving his customers sweets made of pure ghee. He thus has own

standards in business. Through this character Narayan has dramatised a

picture of businessman with honesty and dignity. Here the novelist

highlights Jagan as a man of integrity.

21 Krishnan S., The Magic of Malgudi, (Penguin Books New Delhi, 2002), p.407. 22Ibid, p.280.


113

The Painter of Sign has been serialised in the July-September 1976

issues of the Illustrated weekly of India. Raman the protagonist of this

novel is foolish, absurd but sincere and good young painter of sign board

in Malgudi. Shop keepers, lawyers, bangle-sellers and others who always

haggled with him about his work on his payment. It is the story of

Raman, a conscientious sign-painter, who is trying to lead a rational life.

The novel is filled with busy neighbourhood life and gossip, the

alternating rhythms and sounds of the city from morning till night, and

the pungent smells and tantalizing flavours of home cooking. Narayan

portrays everyday life in Malgudi. The city is growing and changing, as

its inhabitants try to carve out some individual successes within the

juggernaut of progress.

Raman, a college graduate, brings a sense of professionalism to his

sign-painting, taking pride in his calligraphy and trying to create exactly

the right sign, artistically, for each client. Living with his aged aunt, a

devout, traditional woman whose days are spent running the house and

tending to her nephews needs and whose evenings are spent at the temple

listening to the old stories and prayers, Raman prefers a rational approach

to life, avoiding the explanations of life’s mysteries which religion

provides. As he begins to write his aunt’s biography, which she is

dictating, with all its portents and interventions by deities, Raman asks,


114

how could the Age of Reason be established if people were like this? For

his own life, he believes that ultimately he can evolve a scheme for doing

without money, and that he can get away from sex thoughts, which he

believes are too much everywhere.

A Tiger for Malgudi, is a novel told by a tiger in the first person.

Deeply moving is the attachment of tiger to the monk and the monk’s

care for the tiger. R.K. Narayan consulted with a noted tiger expert K.

Ullas Karanth on the writing of this novel. The tiger recounts his story of

capture by an owner, and his eventual escape. He lived freely in the wild

jungles of India in his youth. He mates and has a litter with a tigress, and

raises a litter until one days he finds that hunters have captured and killed

his entire family. He exacts revenge by attacking and eating the cattle and

livestock of nearby village, but is captured by poachers. He is sent to a

zoo in Malgudi, where a harsh animal trainer known only as the captain

starves him and forces him to do tricks in the circus. He lives in captivity

successfully for some time, but eventually his wild instincts overcome

him and he mauls and kills the Captain. After an extended rampage

through town, he is recaptured, but this time voluntarily by a monk and

renouncing with whom he passes the rest of his life on the hills.

The Talkative Man (1986) is a novel first published in 1986 by

Heinemann. Like his earlier novels, it is also set in the fictional town of


115

Malgudi. It falls short of Narayan’s standards but provides the same level

of enjoyment one experiences with his other writings. Talkative Man is

the story of the mysterious activities of Dr. Rann. He claims that he has

come to Malgudi to research a project for the United Nations. It is not a

talky book indeed, Narayan adds a postscript apologizing for its brevity,

but there is nothing to apologise for. The story is not slight but

economically told, each sentence serves to advance the narrative. As

important as the story is Narayan’s masterly way with character and

atmosphere. The book, like many of its predecessors, is rich in garrulous

lecturers, insincere politicians, pretentious scholars, gossipy neighobors

and the like. “Charming and vivid touches abound, I think

particularly of the Malgudi stationmaster’s solicitous treatment of

Rann’s wife whom he allows to live in his waiting room for weeks at a

time, of the portraits “of film stars and one or two gods also in

Girija’s bedroom, of the riot that ensues when Rann tells a meeting

of Malgudi’s Lotus Club about the Cannibal Plant, of the gossip

disseminated by TM’s friends, who know the precise hour and

minute of every stage of Rann’s liaisons with Girija, and of Girija’s

grandfather, an old librarian who keeps the crossword page of the

newspaper in a drawer behind in counter and enjoins the reading-

room habités, Copy it down, don’t mark on the paper.”23

23 Sanyal S.C. Indianness in Major Indo English Novels (Prakash Book Depot Bareilly


116

In The World of Nagaraj, the novelist shows how an ineffectual

man lives with his ineffectuality. Only those who have never begun a

project and dropped it, or thought the truth but failed to speak it, or

acquiesced in a decision which went against their wishes in order to avoid

embarrassment, can have no sympathy with Nagraj. Nagaraj's world is

quiet and comfortable. Living in his family's spacious house with only his

wife, Sita, and his widowed mother for company, he fills his day with

writing letters, drinking coffee, doing some leisurely book-keeping for his

friend Coomar's Boeing Sari Company, and sitting on his verandah

watching the world and planning the book he intends to write about the

life of the great sage Narada.

However, everything is disturbed when Tim, the son of his

ambitious land-owning brother Gopu, decides to leave home and comes

to live with Nagaraj. Forced to take responsibility for the boy, puzzled by

his secret late-night activities and by the strong smell of spirits which

lingers behind him, Nagaraj finds his days suddenly filled with

unwelcome complication and turbulence, which threaten to, forever, alter

the contented tranquillity of his world.

The Grandmother’s Tale written in 1992, is the last novel of R.K.

Narayan. In this short length novel which is considered a novella. This

1984), p.225.


117

novel exhibits his style to the core, which is simple and vivid at the same

time. It brings joys to the readers who relates it ot the anecdotes. It is a

personal story of Narayan’s great grandmother,who travelled far and wide

in searcn of her husband.

Prof. Srinivas Iyengar rightly advocates the theory that : “Malgudi

is the real 'hero' in his novels and the many short stories of R.K.

Narayan, and that underneath the seeming change and the human

drama there is something the 'soul' of the place? That defies, or

embraces, all changes and is triumphantly and unalterably itself. All

things pass and change, men and women try to live, and even as they

are living they are called upon to die; names change, fashions

changes, but the old landmarks the Sarayu, the Hills, the jungles, the

grove remain. The one remains, the many change and pass.”24.

Narayan's fictional characters have their moorings in Malgudi. The

town of Malgudi is traditional once visited by lord Rama, Laxmana, Sita,

Hanuman, and Goddess Parvati- the mythical gods and goddesses. These

Malgudians invite parallels with Chaucer’s Canterbury characters,

Shakespeare’s fools and Hardy's rustics. Narayan's rustics and fools are

controlled and governed by a value system that is enshrined in their

culture, tradition religion and philosophy, though their understanding of

24 Iyenger K. R. S. Indian Writing in English (Sterling Publishers & Limited, 1983), p.142


118

these systems varies from person to person that accrues a high degree of

complexity to these characters.

All the human follies and idiosyncrasies are the visible

manifestation of life, however absurd or cold might appear. Natraj with

his original Heidelberg work, Vasu with pythons and carcasses, Mali with

his story producing machine, Jagan with his philosophies with many

other strange creatures crowd the stage of Malagudi. In Narayan's world,

women stand for traditional value and are the very personifications of the

home and the hearth. They also represent the real and the unchanging and

often proved to be the source of strength because of their strong

conviction and unswerving moral values.

Doyle in his book remarks, .........''the life of Malgudi never

ruffled by politics proceeds exactly the same way as it has been done

for centuries, and the juxta- position of the age old convention and

the visible encroachment on the traditional values'' and the lifestyle

by civilization, the different human situations depicted in these novels

border on pathos. But the old value,''25........eventually reign supreme;

the modern only touches the fringes of society, never really penetrating to

the core. After the storm is over characters return to, what Chandran calls

25 Darshana R, The Magic Idyll of Antiquated India in R.K. Narayan Fiction, (International

Journal of Education and Information Studies, 2011),Vol 1, pp. 15-18


119

in the Bachelor of Arts, “a life freed from distracting illusions and

hysterics”.26

Much the same can be said about ‘Krishna: The English Teacher’.

Though he is more mature than Chandran, The Bachelor of Arts, and thus

able to expose Brown's absurd criticism of Indian spelling habits as a

proof of British arrogance, he too is never made to reflect on the role and

function of the British educational system in India. When he leaves his

job in order to settle down to teaching his pupils in a way which would

serve their needs as Indians, he approaches his predicament from a

merely cultural point of view excluding any consideration as to the

historical necessity of view decision.

The relationship between the husband and wife is carried through

Narayan's world of values in his novel the English Teacher. This novel

explains about a simple, Stylish ordinary living man Krishna who lives

with small dreams and limited expectation. It says how much he loves his

family and care. This story revolves around a very soft spoken, kind

hearted and sensitive lead character, typical orthodox village lady, one

eccentric character in atypical village environment. The lead character

narrates his story (Krishnan) about his different phases of life. All the

characters are very natural and can believe them. We have used this word

26 Narayan R K. , The Bachelor of Arts, (Mysore: Indian Thought Publication 2010), p96


120

believe because this story is all about belief and faith. As contrasted with

the Dark Room. Where the relationship between Krishna and susila in

The English Teacher achieves the point of sublimity. Proper

understanding of each- other self-respect for each-other, and the frank

communication between them are the marked features of the relationship

between them are the marked features of the relationship between krishna

and Susila in The English Teacher.

In English Teacher R.K. Narayan has beautifully projected the role

of love and death as inevitable agents in the formation of a successful

husband-wife relationship. In the relationship between Krishna and

Susila, love and romance are successfully resolved and future of the

relationship depends upon fate and chance. The sublimity of the

relationship between Krishna and Susila lies in Krishna's acceptance of

Susila's death in a natural manner. Krishna accepts the reality of human

existence in the form of death. Narayan's portrayal of Krishna-Susila

relationship is different and fascinating. They make themselves a specific

couple because there is no question of individuality, pride and ego in their

relationship. The courage of their relationship lies in their sublime nature

which inspires them to face one of the bitterest realities of human

existence. It is because of mutual devotion and proper understanding for


121

each-other that the relationship between Krishna and Susila that their

relationship attains the height of sublimity.

R.K. Narayan has displayed the significance of husband-wife

relationship by observing the daily affairs of both the husband and the

wife. Unlike Ramani, Krishna is a devoted husband. In this novel, we find

that owing to his true love of his wife, even death is not able to separate

Krishna from his wife Susila from the bond of love. Though they are

separated in the physical sense of terms, they are spiritually united. After

a brief separation Krishna has entered into direct communion with the

spirit of his wife and this rejuvenates him and he reconciles with life

again. The husband-wife relationship presented in The English Teacher

clearly explains that the separation and loneliness are the two natural

agents of human relationship. Every human being has to fight against

them The presentation of relationship between Krishna and Susila are the

basis of the novelist's philosophic understanding of life as well as death.

Thus the novelist highlights the nature and strength of true love that is

spiritual love which is everlasting.

The Dark Room’s Savitri appears to show the Indian womenhood

reflected through the idealized roles of wife and mother in this male

dominated society. She waits for her husband till midnight by sitting at

the door without eating anything, even after bearing all the insults. She is


122

also unable to forget her children even when she is away from her

husband’s house. Savitri returns back home for the sake of her children

and to prevent the house from falling to pieces. Through the character of

Savitri the novelist has universalized the Indian philosophy of acceptance.

It emphasizes the theme: the return of the native.

Narayan's novel waiting for the Mahatma implicit & hunt for

hidden meaning, social implication, commitments and concerns of the

nation's ethos. Waiting for the Mahatma emerges from the surviving

Gandhism and post- independence optimism of the early-to-mid 1950

while The Painter of Sign emerges from the ideological disenchantment

and inflexibility of Indira Gandhi's emergency in the mid 1970. The

novels thus represent the tension between the differently articulated and

focussed nationalism and feminism of the two decades. They also reflect

Narayan's own abiding sympathies for middle class, Hindu upper caste,

andocentric and conservative- They end up rehearsing the dominant

gender narrative of the Indian nation, particularly as it devolves upon the

bodies and the voices of the two leading female characters, Bharti in-

waiting for Mahatma. However, by reading against the grain to give voice

to the silenced female narratives in Waiting for the Mahatma, one can

quote from Gayatri Spivak' analysis of Narayan's the Guide: “Put into

the filed of vision the fault lines in the self-representation of the


123

nation, precisely in the terms of the women as object seen. By

probing the submerged interiority of his women character,

Narayan's andocentric cultural etho-nationalism and thereby

underscore the fissures in the hegemonic nationalist text of modern

India.”27 V.S. Naipaul contends that Narayan's novels are less purely

social comedies than religious books at time religious fables and intensely

Hindu.

Narayan's India, though ostensibly the contemporary one, comes

across as Bharatvarsha, which is both ancient and modern at the same

time. It is constantly growing and developing, but basically it has not

changed much since epic times. R.K. Narayan's comic vision illuminates

numerous weighty themes-the place of woman in a traditional society, the

moral limitations of a materialistic way of life and the consequences of

flouting accepted codes. His fiction also incorporates in pshychological

and ethical implication of some Hindu concepts as ascetic purification,

Yoga, renunciation, non-attachment Maya and the cyclic progressions of

life and death. Most importantly Narayan projects the great Indian theort

of Karma and he minutely represents various paths of achieving Moksha

27 Darshana R, The Magic Idyll of Antiquated India in R.K. Narayan Fiction, (International

Journal of Education and Information Studies, 2011), Vol 1, pp. 15-18


124

or self-realization in his novels. His fiction combines different facets of

life and experience.

K.R.S Iyenger writes ''Narayan's is the art of resolved and

conscientious exploration....he would, if he could, explore the inner

countries of the mind, heart and soul, catch the uniqueness in the

ordinary, the tragic in the prosaic.''28

Narayan believes in all rituals, ethos and abstract philosophies. No.

wonder his fiction reflects his inherent knowledge of Indian philosophy

classical, literature, religion and ethics, Except for the use of English

language, his novels are indo-centric as opposed to Eurocentric that

imbibes the quintessence of Indian philosophy. R.M. Verma also points

out that the author's common place creations seek a righteous path in the

travails of their existence which is pinpointed in the totality of Indian

living- an amalgam of past and present, tradition and modernity. V.S.

Naipaul also holds the similar view and remarks- “Narayan's novels are

less purely social comedies I had once taken them to be than religious

books, at time religious fables, and intensively Hindu.”29

28 Amar N.P., Critical Response to R.K. Narayan, (Sarup and Sons, New Delhi, 2009), p.2. 29 Pier P. P., A Companion to Indian Fiction in English, (Atlantic Publishers and

Distributers, New Delhi, 2004), p.6.


125

Being an unassuming and unpretentious artist, Narayan does not

unnecessarily burden his readers with pedantic discourses on abstract

philosophy or metaphysics. Novel for Narayan is not a means of social or

political propaganda, nor does he treat it as a vehicle for filtering in

philosophy into the text like Raja Rao. His fictional works are simplistic

but realistic projection of life. Almost all Narayan's principle characters

experience loneliness and alienation is fruitful. The long weary nights

which Swami spends in the forest enables him to appreciate and

understand the love and affection of his parents. In the same way, Marco

and Rosie in The Guide and Krishna and Susila in The English Teacher

suffer from separation and loneliness which teach them to face the bitter

truths of life, Raju, the guide denounces the material life and turns

spiritual and introspective during his lonely hours in the jail Raja, the

tiger too turns out a sanyasi as he is tamed and separated from his wild

manners of living and thinking. Thus, Narayan has projected the theme of

separation in his novels in order to incorporate the philosophic vision of

India. This vision has been preached by most of the Indian scriptures

through the theory of self-realization.

R.K. Narayan's characters with a fore-grounding in the cultural life

of their society have deeply absorbed and assumed philosophical ways of

life. Although they cherish the ancient values and retain the traditional


126

ways of life, yet they do not hesitate in bringing about a change, adopting

and adapting to the modern ways of life. Narayan deals with Indian

Philosophy, but he does not preach in an aphoristic way. The dull, dry

and serious material of Indian thought is made comprehensive and

contemporary. In his novels Mr. Sampath. The Man Eater Malgudi and

The World of Naragraj the philosophy of the protagonists and other

characters is largely derived from the vedas, the upanishads, the epics and

the Bhagvad Gita. This philosophy is a part of their cultural heritage and

ancestry which varies according to the familiar or social conditions of

these characters.

Narayan is not only the most popular and prolific novelist but a

short story writer too. He approaches to the Indian scene with no serious

angle of study. Unlike Anand and Raja Rao,he is neither a commited

writer nor a spiritualist. Like other major short story writers, Narayan also

comes under the influence of our ancient classic lore as well as Western

masters. He shows a strong affinity to typically Indian tradition of story

telling.In his own words, “After all, for any short story writer (Indian)

the prototype still inevitably remains to be our own epics and the

mythological stories.”30

30 Narayan R. K., View of an Indian Novelist, (Indian and Foreign Review, Vol. No.15,

May15, 1920)


127

Thematically speaking, R .K. Narayan’s novels may be termed

mythical comedies or modern fables, because they reflect quite

authentically the absurdities and incongruities of modern Indian society

in a fictional form, which is truly ironic in nature. And comedy, as we

know, from its inception has been used as an art form to reveal to the

masses the evils inherent in their society. Even those who have no first-

hand experience of India will feel that what they experience in reading

these books is a taste of the real place.

Narayan is, in fact, exploring as well as exposing human

weaknesses, follies and foibles in both man and beast. At the lowest level

of physical existence Raju and Raja share the Tamasik Gunas when the

pursuit of Karma and Artha is their topmost priority in life. Narayan is a

person who maintains privacy. He rarely comments in print on his writing

or intentions and issues He deals with in his novels. He is a successful

artist of language. He presents realistic details of day-to-day life with an

air of authenticity, a realistic setting and a concrete texture consisting of

minute details of the situation.

Narayan as a writer of social novels has a light approach to life and

he stirs no deep human emotions. In every one of Narayan’s novels, the

usual order of life, i.e. the normally is disturbed by the arrival of an

outsider into the sheltered world of Malgudi or by some plight or


128

uprooting, but in the end there is always a return, a renewal and a

restorations of normally. The normal order is disturbed only temporarily

and by the end we see the usual order established once again and life

going on as usual for all practical purpose. Narayan perceives an

elaborate system of cheats and balances.

Thus, his theme can be easily studied through a analytical study of

his novels. Narayan may be considered as a novelist of the middle class.

His novels present members of the Indian middle class engaged in a

struggle to extricate themselves from the automatism of the past.

***

Documents

Chapter – III: A Thematic Study of R.K. Narayan's Novelsshodhganga.inflibnet.ac.in/bitstream/10603/111118/4/chapter 3.pdfAfter short, uninspiring stint as a teacher, an editorial