English, August
One of my favorite books is to be published in the U.S. eighteen years after it first came out in India. This book, Upamanyu Chatterjee’s English, August, is being brought out by NYRB in April.
“I’ve a feeling, August, you’re going to get hazaar fucked in Madna.” “‘Amazing mix, the English we speak. Hazaar fucked. Urdu and American,’ Agastya laughed, ‘a thousand fucked, really fucked. I’m sure nowhere else could languages be mixed and spoken with such ease.’” You read these lines on the very first page of the new novel by a twenty-six-year-old writer–and if you too were in your twenties, and had misspent many years in Delhi, and, like the protagonist, had had sex more often with yourself than with others, this language found you suddenly willing to conduct lightning.
When I heard that this delightful novel is going to come out in America I went back to those acerbic parts where Chatterjee mocked assumptions that any foreign visitor might have about small-town India. Remember the moment when a British visitor expresses surprise that there is a video parlor, possibly showing blue films, in a remote Indian town? This is what Agastya said to his guest: “‘About sixty-five per cent of the population of the block of Jompanna–a block is roughly one-sixth or one-seventh of a district–is illiterate. But one doesn’t need to be brainy or literate to watch a blue film on video. Your real surprise is just the…’ he looked for the word, ‘juxtaposition, isn’t it?’ and then he was galled by Avery’s solemnity (and so began, in Madan’s phrase, to ‘finger’ him), ‘but that’s because India is a land of sublime and fascinating contradictions, where the Himalayas of the soul arise out of dung, and dance hand in hand with the phallus of Shiv.’”
I hope the book garners good reviews here but I also know that Chatterjee probably doesn’t care. A part of the reason English, August is just so good is because its author hasn’t tried to cultivate an audience that doesn’t recognize his world immediately. That explains the book’s wonderful comedy and irreverence–its ability to mock itself and the world of its readers. Nevertheless, I hope they give Chatterjee a Pulitzer. No, wait! They are really provincial in places like New York. Even more so than Hollywood. You have to be an American, silly, to get this award! Even though it is true that much of America has been outsourced to places closer to Madna.
Thanks for this post! I read English, August as an undergraduate in an engineering school in Allahabad and agree when you say the world he wrote about was “immediately recognizable.” And here is an interview in The Hindu that might interest you - Upamanyu Chatterjee on his latest book - Weight Loss. http://www.hindu.com/mag/2006/02/19/stories/2006021900050200.htm
Aswin.
Comment by aswin — February 19, 2006 @ 3:04 am
Really good book. Did you ever watch the film “English, August”? It has Rahul Bose in it. Never found a copy.
Comment by Vikash Singh — February 19, 2006 @ 3:35 am
So I just stopped by during a break from my nightly procrastination and saw this post and became insanely happy. My dad handed me his copy of English, August a few years ago in an effort to explain what might have become of him had he listened to his father and sat for the IAS exam after college. Quite possibly one of the funniest books I have ever read. I’ve always wished I could take a class where English, August was being taught, but in many respects I don’t know how successful it would be given the fact that, as you say, Chatterjee “hasn’t tried to cultivate an audience that doesn’t recognize his world immediately.” The story is so sublimely absurd at times that I think would confuse the hell out of people who have no context (or logical entry-point) into this world. I was about to ask if you’d seen the film version but the above commentor beat me to it. I haven’t seen it, and to tell the truth, I have no idea how anyone could take that book and somehow make it visually compelling. I’m sitting here now envisioning long interminable scenes in Agastya’s living quarters while he smokes pot and contemplates his existance. There’s so much hilarious inner monologue in the book that I think would be lost (or ineffective) on film. (But then, I haven’t seen it, so maybe I’m wrong…)
Comment by reeya — February 19, 2006 @ 6:01 am
The film is interesting, has its moments. The frog in the bathroom is funny. It isn’t anything like the book, though. The book lets each reader think of a different degree of heat in the Madna summer, etc. The film, gives you one constant.
Book’s superb. And the bit about Agastya telling his uncle Pultu Kaku, ‘Doesn’t anyone understand the absence of ambition, or the simplicity of it?’. All wonderful. What a book!
Comment by fingers — February 19, 2006 @ 3:23 pm
Thanks for this. I am glad for August’s American debut. BTW, the blog is shaping up well.
Comment by Zafar Anjum — February 20, 2006 @ 2:51 am
It’s always nice to find something to read online about ‘English, August’. I read the book about 2.5 years back n loved it instantly. Yet to watch the movie…hoping to find a copy somewhere!
Comment by Anupam — June 26, 2009 @ 3:54 am