Vikram Chandra's Love and Longing in Bombay makes me ask that question. He is one of the newer additions to a roster of astonishing talent in Indian writing which appears from all parts of the globe: the USA, Canada, England and India, especially India. If this is a case of creativity finding expression because the wherewithal of publishing has been taken care of, what does it mean? That writers languished, that full many a flower was born and blushed unseen in the desert air? In which case, shouldn't we sing a lament to what might have been?
I'd rather sing a hossanah to people like Chandra. Love and Longing in Bombay is a collection of first-rate stories with vivid characters and a style that conjures up with swift economy the pain of love and longing. I'm not sure about the Bombay bit though. There are five stories, each different from the other, but linked by their theme of bittersweet love and the sutradhar-like figure who narrates them (and tells the final one about himself). This is a story of social climbing, of new money versus old, and features two Bombay institutions prominently: the club and the 'top work' bai, who goes from house to house and provides a vital link in unravelling the relationship between two warring families.
I have been a member of a prominent Bombay club for years and I know how difficult it is to get into any of them nowadays.
But, it isn't impossible, if you have the right credentials and the money, which is why the episode of 'blackballing' in Shakti is farfetched, as is the parallel club set up by the rejected Bijalanis. It's called the Banghai Club and is run by a Mr Fong (shades of the Piano Bar Club started by Nelson Wang in real-life Bombay at the China Garden restaurant where membership was by invitation?). But, despite much hype, no one pulled strings to get an invitation. That's since everyone who mattered was already a member of one of the old established clubs, and any new club was regarded as an upstart.
That isn't the reason why Shakti doesn't fit in. After all, events are only a device, and a good story-writer is permitted a little exaggeration. The real reason is that the story—despite being fast-paced and compelling—is brittle and its events too neatly contrived. Moreover, there is no love and longing in it.
From the others, I wouldn't choose one as a favourite if you asked me. Each is different: Dharma is about the ghost of a child; Kama is about a cop investigating a murder; Artha is about cracking the mystery of a computer virus; only Shanti is directly about love, but human desire and want appear in all and leave behind an aching melancholy in the reader. Here's a passage from Kama: "In the kitchen he had to wash the pot, and then the tea cups as the water burbled.
Then he stood ready with the sugar, alert and concentrated, and the smell of the heating milk and the leaves, and the wisps of steam, sent him reeling into the first morning of their marriage, the first time they had woken together, the profound heat of her skin against him, and her confession that she did not know how to make tea. I told you I can't cook, she giggled into his neck. But tea, Sartaj said, pretending to be angry, but after that he had always made tea in the morning. Now the heat from the stove spread across his knuckles, and he remembered the newspaper splayed across the table between them, and buttery kisses, and he felt his heart wrench, kick to the side like a living thing hurt, and he fell to his knees on the dirty floor, held his head between his hands, and wept. His sobs squeezed out against all the force of his arms, and the wooden doors in the cupboard under the washbasin rattled faintly as he bent and curled against them.
"He felt Megha's hands on his shoulders, and her breath on his forehead as she whispered, 'Sartaj, Sartaj', and he turned away from her, from his own embarrassment, but his strength was gone, and she pulled his head back, into the solid curve of her shoulder. He shook again and she held him tight, hard, and he felt with piercing awareness the pain of her forearm against the back of his neck. He was gone, then, vanished into the familiar fragrance of her perfume, unknown for so long, with its flowers and underlying tinge of salt." And a passage from Shanti: "What about her, Shiv? Frankie said, 'Did you find out anything about her? The husband?' Shiv thought, his head titled back to the grey glory of the clouds. 'I don't think so,' he said.
'You didn't ask?'
'No'.
'Don't you want to know, Shiv?' Shiv shrugged. He knew he was smiling awkwardly. 'I know it's strange,' he said. 'And I suppose I do want to know. And I suppose I'll find out. But right now, today, I just like her name.
' 'Shanti?'
'Yes'.
Frankie put his hands in his pockets, hunched his shoulders, and laughed. 'Some people fall in love with dark eyes. Others with pale hands glimpsed besides the Shalimar. Why not a name then?'" In many ways, Love and Longing in Bombay is more a novel than a collection of stories. As you can see, I liked it immensely and can't recommend it too strongly. And I can't wait for Chandra's next book.
