2 days ago
- Entertainment
- New Indian Express
Hegemony by the water's edge
The prose is decidedly unsentimental. Yet, typical of this writer, lyrical; the reader absorbs the family saga silently, moved beyond words. The dammed-up sentiment breaks through once in a while, in the telling of the life and times of Ammu, the strong woman who holds home and family together. She plays the market in Hong Kong, and after the same markets crash, picks herself and the pieces up and moves on. Ammu, who becomes somewhat inured to managing everything by herself, grows a stoic exterior, learns to cope when her journalist husband has them moving cities, (Hong Kong, NYC, Bombay, Bangalore) countries and jobs, when he goes to jail (thus acquiring in the words of the narrator notoriety, fame and unemployability, all at once), and when he eventually retreats into silence. She knows what it takes time for the other members of her family to realise: that when an Elsewherean fetches up in a new place, there's no sense of belonging or welcome.
George is looked at through a lens devoid of sentiment, described as a man with a grand idea of himself. The legendary journalist, known to readers across India and Southeast Asia for decades now, is a keen observer of people, places and practices. He is prone to quoting from the Hindu scriptures (he has an interesting take on travel in the Ramay ana), and at one point, his brother-in-law wonders if George is also a communist…which would make him a Hindu Christian Communist! George turns that old saying 'water finds its level' on its head; his take is, 'a river cannot rise above its source.'
The story Jeet Thayil tells is an engaging one, despite the laconic tone of its telling. The Hong Kong chapter, where George sets up Asiaweek, is interesting; the Vietnam one, where the author goes tracking some personal history, is even more interesting. The Germany account, wherein the author tells Germans about their own George Grosz and Otto Dix, and eventually gets a black eye, is rather esoteric, while the China chapter, where the author gets a lesson on slavery Indian style, is both frank and funny. In Paris, the author searches for and finds Baudelaire's tomb as a sort of tribute to his uncle, who was obsessed with the poet. In Bangalore, we hear the gardener Govindappa's story of his travels during the pandemic. And in the end, everything loops back to the Muvattupuzha River, the river of three rivers.
