BOOK REVIEW: The Guide – RK Narayan

I wasn’t sure what to expect from RK Narayan’s The Guide. I’ve read & enjoyed RK Narayan‘s other works. The author was a vital presence in my educated South India childhood of the 1980s. Ranging from the TV popularised Swami and Friends to the more literary ones like The Painter of Signs, his distinct brand of subtle intellect has been familiar. I don’t recall many other writers in English who captured the identity of the vast middle class of India quite as well. All the others I read spoke from the hallowed ranks of British-adjacent angrez sahebs.

RK Narayan’s work also normalised South India’s culture for me, growing up in a ‘But where are you actually from?’ environment in Bombay. Yet or possibly because of The Guide‘s Bollywood film association, I worried that this RK Narayan story might not be like the others. And it wasn’t.

The Guide by R.K. Narayan
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

For one, The Guide‘s narrative structure meanders through time, occasions & people. Unlike other RK Narayan books which stand solidly in simplicity – of description & structure, this one takes pleasure in playing with deliberate obfuscation. I’m inclined to think that this was a deliberate choice. The first four chapters are spent just creating the character of the protagonist, Raju via sundry incidents across his life, with no chronological order.

So the book sets the tone of being the ruminations, the very personal journey of one man. Memory would meander, reflect, edit & double on itself so the whole book creates the air of being the personal ruminations of Raju. The last chronological event to be described in the book is one of prolonged meditation so these may be the thoughts running through Raju’s head as he ponders how he came to find himself in his current situation & what this means.

I was alternately intrigued, charmed by, sorry for, disgusted, disapproving of and finally empathetic to Raju’s character. What masterful writing, to be able to take the reader on such a diverse journey through a few pages! True, Raju’s life story seems dramatic when seen from a distance, chronicling his rise from a rural youngster to his many adventures as a shopkeeper, tour guide, marriage breaker, celebrity manager, jailbird and godman. Seen from this distance as if on a glamorous big screen, you could think of Raju as an opportunist, exploitative money-chaser.

But while reading, there is a sense that Raju does not actually care for money or really, much else. He’s apathetic, a curious condition for someone who isn’t high up on privilege. His background is modest, if not completely impoverished. His family is never at starvation point though it seems like the people around them might be. But he’s low enough on the social system to have no actual aspirations to ascent because that’s just not a realistic dream. Many of the things that happen, seem to be fortunate happenstance & the story is really in the ways he responds and his reflections on why he chooses the way he does.

Raju is almost illiterate, having faded out of the rudimentary rural school system early. He also lacks any notable references or role models around him & has no real company of others his age. Perhaps it’s not surprising that his mind is the only hungry thing about him.

The story sets this up neatly by having him pore over every piece of print that comes his way, in his quest for wrapping paper, to his keen interest in shop customers who speak of things other than the weather, politics & local disputes. We see his mind grow as it learns to use these for small personal conveniences & comfort, by convincing the people around him to let him push his mental boundaries with new experiences & also by making use of the newer clientele for resources & his way forward.

It is almost as if his mind has opened up for the first time and his morality has not yet had time to catch up. In parallel, his meeting with Rosie mirrors this dichotomy as he experiences very adolescent pangs of desire, attachment, jealousy & more and is bewildered by them. But he never seems to dwell on it too long, other than to run that quick mind off on another tangent & keep racing (mentally). Raju has the wonderful (and sometimes terrible) ability to rationalise everything that happens to him and to other people with very little damage to his psyche.

At the same time, it’s not that he doesn’t evolve. There is something touching about his rumination about his time spent with Rosie, alternately glorifying his own egoistic machinations as well as philosophically accepting that these have been selfish acts. He debates with himself but without rancour or desperation. The same happens and with far less struggle in the culminating event.

In a discussion about this book, one person suggested that the ending was punishment, a vindictive sort of just dessert. Another brought up the thought that it was redemption. The ending has been left satisfyingly ambiguous. And I say that the way I imagine Raju would think of it.

*The story is most famously known by the movie but check out the audiobook of The Guide by RK Narayan in Hindi on Audible.