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V S Naipaul's A Bend in the River

I first read about A Bend in the River from an interview of the former American President Obama. In that interview he talks about all the books he has read during his term as President and the ones he would recommend. He spoke of this as an important book . Also, the author VS Naipaul, a Nobel Laureate, has the reputation of being "the greatest living writer"(paraphrased from NYTimes). The other occasion that I had heard about this author was when his comments about female writers being inferior to male writers made front page news in The Hindu. His comments were made with pointed reference to Jane Austen, of whom I am a huge fan. Nevertheless I wanted to see for myself what the greatest living author wrote like. 

The short version of my verdict on  Bend in the River is : it is quite brilliant. There is no long winded prose, no descriptions of the sights and scenes that make you want to stop reading to take a yawn break. The narrative is so simple and neat that it convinces you that this story really is the diary of a man who is living through the things he is writing about. 

The only things I know about Africa are what I have heard from the South African comedian Trevor Noah and Hollywood movies like Blood Diamond and Captain Phillips. Trevor Noah makes lighthearted jokes about  most African stereotypes and the two movies give a very dark picture of the lives of some Africans. The story of V.S.Naipal's book though, is somewhere in between .It takes place in the year 1977-1978. It feels very real in the dullness of the initial life of the story's main character Salim in his new town. The other characters in the town are very intriguing. Most of them are immigrants and have found a way to lead a life in that town at the bend in the river. And each thinks they can't do much better than their chosen way. 

The book takes us through the author's version of the post-colonial transformation of this town in Africa and it took me a while to realize that this town has been left unnamed in the entire book. It is vaguely described as being near the west coast. An uprising occurs and someone referred to only as the 'Big Man' comes to power. 

The Big Man's dictatorial rule brings about a period of cautious hope to the town. An inordinate amount of  effort is being made to infuse modernity into  a town that was largely "just bush" and its main purpose is to be on par with Europe. But everything stagnates again and the story starts to sound like Salim's mid life crisis. He is vexed with the  lackluster life out here in this remote town. Towards the end, the narrative takes on the nature of a thrilling war story, and we are left with an ending that is in a way both  inconclusive and final.

There is a strange part in the story where Salim does some brash things that don't make any sense at all. He physically hits a woman that he is having an affair with, and the woman finds the need to check with him if HE is O.K. That was inconsistent with everything we had read so far about the two people. I am not sure what the purpose of putting this distortion was. Perhaps it was to show the world and its people for exactly how they really are? I also hear that there are some real life references for the author in relation to that particular incident.

Either-way, leaving aside that weird scene of domestic violence, what V.S. Naipaul has captured in the novel is what it feels like to have no place to call home. Almost every character in this story is alike in that way. When things go downhill in the town, none of them has a better place to dream of escaping to. Each one has a reason they cannot go back to where they had come from. And for most, the reason is because that place is not likely to be much better than how it is here. Uniformly they all struggle to make something out of their lives here, fight to stay relevant and to survive the turbulence hoping it  would pass. Some of them have had just about enough and want to run away but they can't afford it.

I am not sure if this book gives a taste of Africa as it really was back then, but by itself the story felt quite real.


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