Ravan & Eddie
In your face, India! – A well needed mirror shown to society
by Kiran Nagarkar
For a long time after I was amazed with
the excruciating detailed commentary on the Indian society and its norms, by Aravind
Adiga in The White Tiger, I had been
looking for a novel with such strong narrative by an author which has shown a
clear mirror to the society of the Indian sub-urban. And with disappointments
from the pen of Chetan Bhagat in Revolution 2020 and Adiga in Last Man in Tower, finally Kiran Nagarkar
emerges out with an absolute brilliant work. Kiran Nagarkar’s words seem to
have flown through the hearts and minds of an average Indian, urban and rural
alike. Sprinkled with countless humourous and sarcastic comments on each and
every aspect of the Indian social and political ecosystems, the novel has
brought out the frustration and complaints that the contemporary youth had with
the condition of India in post-colonial era.
Introduction
Originally conceived as a (rejected)
movie script in 1978, the novel was completed in Marathi by 1979-80. Once it
got the well-deserved attention by the critics, Kiran Nagarkar translated it
himself into English, published by Penguin India in the year 1991. Even though the book is in English, you can feel the
undercurrent of the Marathi language running although it.
Ravan & Eddie tells the story of two
boys, Ravan Pawar the Marathi Hindu and Eddie Coutinho the Goan Catholic. Both
Pawar and Coutinho families live in the chawl number 17 of the group of Central
Works Department (CWD) chawls in Mumbai’s Mazagaon area, and the book describe
their adventures through childhood and teenage years during the era of 1950s
and 60s. The novel begins with an incident that defines the lives of both Ravan
and Eddie. Eddie is still in his mother’s womb and Ravan is just few months
old. Victor Coutinho, Eddie’s father, has a strong sexual attraction towards
the voluptuous Ravan-born-as-Ram-Pawar’s mother Parvatibai, as did every man
who had her in their visual vicinity, but is unable to muster the courage to
profess his ‘love’ for her. The book starts with Victor trying to catch her
eye, but instead lands up catching Ravan, who with excitement, jumps out of his
mother’s grip from the fourth floor balcony in the direction of Victor.
Parvatibai rushes down to get hold of her baby. Victor’s wife, Violet is there
too, shouting at her shameless husband. But to the surprise of everybody in the
chawl, Victor is dead. Ram is the Murderer! During Victor’s funeral, Violet
gave birth to Eddie, who in due time is poised to become the arch-nemesis of
Ram Pawar, aptly renamed by his mother as Ravan to evade any misfortunes after
the close escape from the clutches of death. The
reader then follows both children throughout the novel, following them through
twists and turns of their lives as they get into numerous troubles. The author
makes the reader live their pleasure, their laughs, their pain, horror, guilt,
anxiety and most-importantly their questions about life, society & its
customs.
The language is
vanilla plain and easy to get hold of, combined with a little Marathi here and
a little Hindi there. It’s quite easy to follow the plot, as the narration
switches back and forth between Ravan and Eddie’s lives. Meanwhile, Nagarkar
introduces a horde of interesting characters like Pieta, Violet, Granna,
Parvati, Shobhan, Tara, Lele Guruji, Prakash, Mr. Dixit and Father D'souza. It
is interesting to see that Nagarkar has been quite successful in doing justice
to each and every one of these characters, each with a multitude of layers.
The
world within the chawls
Kiran Nagarkar’s knowledge about the
Bombay chawls and the lives of chawl-dwellers is amazing. As for the plot of
the novel, there is hardly a concrete one which could be considered the
foundation of the novel. However, what lifts the novel is the collection of
several humourous sub-plots, brief stories about Ravan, Eddie and many other
characters in the chawls (and otherwise) conjoined with the bawdy narrative by
Nagarkar. Kiran Nagarkar sees to it that the reader gets a full tour of the
minutest details of the chawl–from the dimensions of the room to the social
topography of the rooms and right down to the make of the flush in the common
toilets. The book provides a very insightful
look at life in the Chawls. Covering a vast scale of subjects, ranging from
out-of-work husbands to the caste system, the water wars to sexual abuse and
many more, Nagarkar's narration of the life and matters of chawls never makes the
reader feel that he is trying too hard to make it believable. The choice of
words, the conversations, the language, the issues among the day-to-day lives…
everything makes perfect sense in his descriptions, everything is believable.
Nagarkar, sometimes, breaks off the chronological narration to provide
insightful and absolutely hilarious comments on many aspects of the social
lives of the people of Bombay chawls. The Meditation on Neighbours
stands out among them with a very accurate elaboration of the differences
between the Catholics and Hindus living on different floors of the chawls. Harangue
on Poverty, A Digression on Afghan Snow, The Great Water Wars,
The History of Romantic Comedies in Hindi Films, and The Shortest
Survey ever of the Portuguese Adventure in the Old World are other such
digressions; each of which is a good piece of writing in its entirety.
Backbone
of the book – Humour
Nagarkar’s writing is bestowed
abundantly with instances of his exemplary sense of humour. Occasionally it is
scornful, but at most times it gives you a hearty laugh. It goes without saying that the book is more than just
funny, with humour strewn throughout the novel with utmost diligence (much like
the way Rushdie did in his Midnight's Children). But Nagarkar’s style of
invoking humour is a little different than most writers. The characters,
especially Ravan and Eddie are not only getting themselves into trouble almost
always, but his commentary on the situations, norms and politics through their
tongues is absolutely hilarious. Children’s justification of their actions and
the way adults interpret them is thoroughly amusing. Even as the children cheat
and tell white lies on the face, Nagarkar somehow retains their innocence. His
narrative makes way for us to not only view the world from the children’s point
of view, but also it makes the adult world (parents, teachers, and religious
authorities) seem utterly out of sync with the reality of life. Reader’s laugh
is accompanied with a stream of thoughts; asking our attention on the issues of
the contemporary world with a freshness & neutrality of a child’s mind.
Several interesting characters appear, play their part, and move out. Nagarkar
uses them aptly. Not just in the matter of characterization, but in terms of
their lengths in the novel. Be it Father D’Souza, Sarang Family, Prakash the
school bully, “aunt” Lalee or Mr. Billimoria, everyone seem to play their part
at the right lengths and leave the reader at a laughing note, before the reader
starts to get bored. One of the most hilarious sections of the book is the part
where Ravan dreams of himself as Lord Krishna and marrying all the nine Sarang
sisters. I literally had to put down the book to stop laughing.
Social
Commentary & Sarcasm
Religious and caste-based divisions are
very much a part of the day-to-day lives of everyone in the chawl. The social
divide among the Hindus and Christians is clearly evident; with Hindus occupy
the bottom four floors of the chawls and Christians residing in the topmost
fifth floor of each chawl, having as little interaction and friendship as
possible, barring a single exception. The religious rebellion is very much
evident in Nagarkar’s words, where he sarcastically comments on Catholicism as
well as Hinduism and their individual idiosyncrasies. The commentary on Sabha
(RSS), confessions in Christian church are some of these hard hitting pieces
which shows us the varied colours of religious diversity in India.
Erotica
& Sexual Imagery
Another important thing that gets a lot
of attention from Nagarkar is the intimate rendering of the sexual lives of the
people of the chawls. He gives a no holds barred description of the women,
especially Parvatibai. Many a times, his words seem to pierce through the
uncovered skins to give not just sensual, rather such detailed erotic
descriptions. Description of Parvatibai’s body, the coital scene between
Shankar Pawar and his ‘sister’ with extreme details, Ravan’s forced blowjob to
Prakash and many such scenes give the clear idea that Nagarkar does not believe
in mincing his words when it comes to sex and erotica. Nagarkar, here, has
touched upon the fact that even though it is considered tabooed in India to
talk openly about sex, it has been one thing overtly abused in the
post-colonial India. He makes it a point to make the reader comfortable with it
and hence ensures that the reader is no longer bounded within the constraints
of the social shackles to ponder upon many such relevant issues addressed
through words and curiousity of a child.
Cinematic Connections
It is not much
difficult to see a strong connection Nagarkar has with the Hindi film industry.
Having written a couple of screenplays and having acted in one of them, he
keeps a close connect with the industry. One direct effect that this association
has is the dramatic scenes throughout the novel. Be it the very start of the
novel, with the death of Victor or be it the end of the novel with a sudden
suicide, Nagarkar has dramatized his scenes to much similarity with the
Bollywood "masala" movies. Another important connection that shapes
the novel is the effect of movies Dil Dekke Dekho and Rock around the
Clock on Ravan and Eddie respectively. While the former made a thief out of
Ravan, the latter made Eddie a liar at the confession booth. It will be seen,
in the sequel of the novel The Extras,
that it is this effect of these movies on them which make them pursue a career
in the film industry as extras. Another important imagery that comes to mind is
the cinematic resemblance of the way Ravan’s condition in the school when his
classmates come to know about his alleged killing of Eddie’s father (and
Mahatma Gandhi). The whole event seems to have been pictured with an intentional
resemblance to the novel (and hence movie) Godfather.
Conclusion
Nagarkar’s style of story-telling is something that interests
the reader to the core. I think it has got something to do with the Indian ink
which makes the authors from the peninsular region of the Indian subcontinent
excellent story writers. His engrossing narrative flair is what keeps the
reader mesmerized despite lacking a great story-line. It’s after 330 pages of
sheer hilarious encounters of Ravan and Eddie that I realized I didn’t want it
to end. A book that I realized I wanted to be much longer in length. Even
though the ending seems a bit abrupt, this seems to be one of the very few
dints in the armour of Nagarkar’s writing. The way this novel has ended reminds
me of Bollywood movies. A suicide and the corpse hanging in the chawl, with
promises of a much bigger, perhaps much more adventurous, sequel of the story
in the form of The Extras which has just released in January this year.
I look forward to reading it along with his other works, Cuckold and Seven
sixes are forty three. Then perhaps I could have a look at his Marathi
plays too, for which he is famous for. And not to forget, the movie on Ravan
and Eddie by Dev Benegal, rumoured to be releasing later this year.
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