RK Narayan

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RK Narayan

• Sameer Jha
• BAJC First Year B
• 100701055

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A Few Words

• It is very difficult for me to be somebodys fan.
  I dont like a lot of things, and even if I do, I
  often find a reason for its inferiority. And,
  thus lose a significant amount of respect for the
  creator.
• However, there are a handful of people, whom I
  think can do no wrong. RK Narayan is one of them.

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• In May, last year, I picked up one of his novels
  (The Bachelor Of Arts) by getting attracted to
  its name. Reason being, that I too had enrolled
  for the BA course a few months back. (Which, I
  ultimately had to drop because of attendance
  shortage.)Reading it, immediately gave me a
  feeling that this is how books should be written.
  A big reason for that would be, that the
  character of Chandran is very similar to my own.
  And much to my delight, most Narayan novels are
  written from a similar viewpoint, that of a upper
  middle class Brahmin with artistic bents.

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Early Life

• Since this is a history project and not a
  literary one, it is more important to talk about
  his life than his work. (Though, the two are
  related.) R. K. Narayan was born in Madras (now
  known as Chennai), Madras Presidency, British
  India. His father was a school headmaster, and
  Narayan did some of his studies at his father's
  school. As his father's job required frequent
  moves, Narayan spent part of his childhood under
  the care of his maternal grandmother, Parvati.
  During this time his best friends and playmates
  were a peacock and a mischievous monkey.If you
  want a better account, please refer to the first
  chapter of his autobiography My Days. That
  said, his first book, Swami and Friends, is a
  better recommendation if you want to ignore the
  facts and straightaway know what kind of a child
  he was.

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Reading

• No writer of modern times can be explained,
  without first understanding what his influences
  were. As a kid, Narayan was lucky to have a
  father who was a school headmaster. This gave him
  access to the library at any time. He read a lot
  of books by various authors like Dickens,
  Shakespeare, Hardy, Wodehouse, Conan Doyle, and
  many others. He also followed Magazines, and the
  literary world of England held his fascination.
  After Scott I picked up a whole row of
  Dickens and  loved his London and the queer
  personalities therin. Rider Haggard, Marie
  Corelli, Moliere and Pope and Marlowe, Tolstoi,
  Thomas Hardy an indiscriminate jumble I read
  everything with the utmost enjoyment.

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Writing Struggle

• Even though Narayan is a well respected writer
  now, his early years were not that easy. In his
  autobiography, he mentions how he wrote several
  stories revolving around matrimony, for his
  uncles friend who was starting a magazine on it.
  Later, the editor said, that he would publish the
  stories one by one, over a period of time, and
  the payment too was delayed. Or not made at all.
  I am not sure. The whole concept of him
  becoming a writer, was in itself a very
  uncomfortable pill to swallow for his family.
•  Unwisdom! Unwisdom! one gentleman cried.
  You could write as a hobby, how can you make a
  living as a writer? The notion is very
  unpractical.

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• He mentioned in his memoir, I had got used to
  getting back my manuscript with unfailing
  regularity once every six weeks- two weeks onward
  journey, two weeks on the editors table, and two
  weeks homeward journey with a rejection slip
  pinned to it All in all it provided me with six
  weeks of hope.
• The response to Swami and friends was
  mixed even amongst his family. While one person
  said it was brilliant and a masterpiece, his
  uncle criticised the very first sentence.
• He held one to the light and read out, "
  'It was Monday morning.' Oh, oh, Monday! Why not
  Tuesday or Friday?"

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Success At Last!

• His novel did ultimately get published, and in
  quite a dramatic fashion. After being rejected
  by half-a-dozen publishers in England, he asked
  his friend Purna, to weigh it with a stone and
  drop it into the Thames river. Better sense
  prevailed, and Purna sent the novel to Graham
  Greene. He said that the book was one in ten
  thousand and found a publisher for Swami and
  Friends. The novel despite being well received
  did not do well as far as sales are concerned.
  The publisher, Hamish Hamilton, refused to
  publish his second novel, The Bachelor Of Arts,
  and again Graham Greene intervened and found him
  a publisher.

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• Years later, when RK Narayan met Hamish Hamilton
  at a party (who other than Graham Greenes),
  Hamilton said, Remember I was your first
  publisher, and I will always be proud of the
  fact.

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Narayans Fiction.

• Only the story matters, that is all. If readers
  read more significance into my stories than was
  meant originally, then thats the readers
  understanding of things. But if a story is in
  tune completely with the truth of life, truth as
  I perceive it, then it will be automatically
  significant."
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• R.K. Narayan has written around 15 novels,
  mostly revolving around the fictional town of
  Malgudi. Most revolve with a middle class Brahmin
  as the protagonist.
• About the origin of Malgudi and his first
  novel, he says
• Malgudi with it little railway station swam
  into me all ready-made, with a character called
  Swaminathan running down the platform peering
  into the faces of passengers and grimacing at a
  bearded face.

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• "I must be absolutely certain about the
  psychology of the character I am writing about,
  and I must be equally sure of the background. I
  know the Tamil and Kannada speaking people most.
  I know their background. I know how their minds
  work and almost as if it is happening to me, I
  know exactly what will happen to them in certain
  circumstances. And I know how they will react."

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• As for his short stories, one can make out from
  the introduction of his anthology Malgudi Days,
  that he enjoys writing them more. As they offer
  the writer and the reader more variety in less
  time.
• Several of his short stories and his novels,
  Swami and Friends, and The Vendor Of Sweets has
  been converted into a novel.

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Other Works Of RK Narayan

• Besides his fictional work he has written, the
  two great Indian epics- Ramayana and Mahabharata,
  a healthy amount of essays, an autobiography, a
  travelogue, and also a Guide Book of Karnataka,
  which he republished as The Emerald Route under
  his own publication.
• It may sound hyperbolic, but I am prepared
  to state that almost every individual among the
  five hundred millions living in India is aware of
  the story of the Ramayana in some measure or the
  other. Everyone of whatever age, outlook,
  education, or station in life knows the essential
  part of the epic.
• As a fiction writer, I have enjoyed reading
  Kamban, felt the stimulation of his poetry and
  the felicity of his language, admired the
  profundity of his thought, outlook,
  characterization, and sense of drama.

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• Besides this, he even started a journal called
  Indian Thought, which he later discontinued.
• The Publication (also Indian Thought)
  still exists and is managed by Narayans
  granddaughter. It publishes only Narayans books
  and prices them in the range of Rs. 100.
• He wrote a travelogue, on his journey to
  USA, called The Dateless Diary. It has many
  humorous incidents, including one where Narayan
  was asked whether he liked to have his coffee,
  black or white. Narayan, confused, said that
  hed like to have it brown the way it was made
  back home.

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Awards

• Awards
• His first major award was in 1958,
  the Sahitya Akademi Award forThe Guide. 
• In 1964, he received the Padma
  Bhushan during the Republic Day honours. 
• In 1980, he was awarded the AC Benson
  Medal by the (British) Royal Society of
  Literature, of which he was an honorary member.
•  In 1982 he was elected an honorary member
  of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. He
  was nominated for the Nobel Prize in
  Literature multiple times, but never won the
  honour.
• Recognition also came in the form
  of honorary doctorates by the University of
  Leeds (1967), the University of Mysore (1976) and
  Delhi University (1973).
• Towards the end of his career, Narayan was
  nominated to the upper house of the Indian
  Parliament for a six-year term starting in 1989,
  for his contributions to Indian literature.
•   A year before his death, in 2000, he was
  awarded India's second-highest civilian honour,
  the Padma VIbhushan.

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Death

• Rasipuram Krishnaswamy Narayanswamy Iyer,
  died on May 13th, 2001. Leaving behind a rich
  series of books, which clichéd as it sounds,
  still makes him and his imagination alive.