November / India Reading: The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy

[Scheherazade]

http://colinresponse.files.wordpress.com/2008/04/roy.jpg

In November, we will be reading The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy.

Please post your comments and questions in this thread.

[Niamh]

Great! I'll pick this up in work during the week!

[Virgil]

Oh it won. I'll have to pick this up.

[Scheherazade]

This is my second attempt at this book. First time I could not pass page 20 but this time I am enjoying it more. Despite the confusing start, things seem to come together (at times too) slowly.

Roy's language is interesting; she writes beautifully but in a way that I would enjoy in short passages but not necessarily in long books. However, some of the expressions she uses are beautiful: "Estha carried [vegetables and shopping] home in the crowded tram. A quiet bubble floating on a sea of noise." Thought this was a beautiful description.

What do you guys think of this passage and gods described?


[Rahel's husband Larry] was exadperated because he didn't know what that meant. He put it somewhere between indifference and despair. He didn't know that in some places, like the country that Rahel came from, various kinds of despair competed for primacy. And that personal despaircould never be desperate enough. That something happened when personal turmoil dropped by at the wayside shrine of the vast, violent, circling, driving, ridiculous, insane, unfeasible, public turmoil of a nation. That Big God howled like a hot wind, and demanded obeisance. Then Small God (cosy and contained, private and limited) came away cauterized, laughing numbly at his own temerity. Inured by the confirmation of his own incensequence, he became resilient and truly indifferent. Nothing mattered much. Nothing much mattered. And the less it mattered, the it mattered. It was never important enough. Because Worse Things had happened. In the country that she came from, poised forever between the terror of war and the horror of peace, Worse Things kept happening.

So Small God laughed a hollow laugh, and skipped away cheerfully. Like a rich boy in shorts. He whistled, kicked stones. The source of his brittle elation was the relative smallness of his misfortune. He climbed into people's eyes and became an exasperating expression.(p.19)

[Niamh]

now that sounds interesting!
I havent picked my copy up yet. We where out of stock in work and i'll be damned if i go buy it somewhere else, esp seeing as i get a 30% in work!!
I also just have to finish the Crystal cave by Mary Stewart first.

[RaatKiRanii]

Scheherazade, I feel the same way about her writing so far. Roy writes beautifully, there are some passages that really snag my attention and which I end up rereading just because they sound and flow so deliciously. However, often I too get the feeling while reading that things come together very slowly. It's like a river that seems so still but you know for a fact it's moving even if you can't really see the movement.

I'm a little close to finishing the first 100 pages, and though this isn't a book I would normally read I have to say it does keep on getting a bit more interesting each time I read it.

There's a part I like:


Once the quietness arrived, it stayed and spread in Estha. It reached out of his head and enfolded him in its swampy arms. It rocked him to the rhythm of an ancient, fetal heartbeat. It sent its stealthy, suckered tentacles inching along the insides of his skill, hovering the knolls and dells of his memory, dislodging old sentences, whisking them off the tip of his tongue. It stripped his thoughts of the words that described them and left them pared and naked. Unspeakable. Numb. And to an observer therefore, perhaps barely there. Slowly, over the years, Estha withdrew from the world. He grew accustomed to the uneasy octopus that lived inside him and squirted its inky tranquilizer on his past. Gradually the reason for his silence was hidden away, entombed somewhere deep in the soothing folds of the fact of it.

- p.17

I liked the way she described the expanding of Estha's silence and how in the process the reason for his silence get buried so that just the silence exists.

[Scheherazade]

Roy is also making a great job of holding back the details till the very last moment and whetting the reader's appetite for more. Whenever I think we are finally going to find out something, Roy redirects the storyline with extraordinary skill and craft.

I am almost half way through the book but the mystery keeps becoming more and more delicious - even though I know that it is a grotesque one.

[bouquin]

Scheherazade, I feel the same way about her writing so far. Roy writes beautifully, there are some passages that really snag my attention and which I end up rereading just because they sound and flow so deliciously. However, often I too get the feeling while reading that things come together very slowly. It's like a river that seems so still but you know for a fact it's moving even if you can't really see the movement.

I'm a little close to finishing the first 100 pages, and though this isn't a book I would normally read I have to say it does keep on getting a bit more interesting each time I read it.

There's a part I like:



- p.17

I liked the way she described the expanding of Estha's silence and how in the process the reason for his silence get buried so that just the silence exists.




One of the reasons why I like this book is because of these nuggets of delicious descriptions and phrasings that Roy has so brilliantly produced.

The imagery of the monsoon rain, the humidity, the growth of molds on the walls, and the decaying house reminds me a lot of The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai.

In your opinion, what is "the god of small things"? What does it signify?

[Virgil]

Oh I just bought the book at lunch time today. I'll try to start it tonight. :D Looks intersting.

[bouquin]

This is my second attempt at this book. First time I could not pass page 20 but this time I am enjoying it more. Despite the confusing start, things seem to come together (at times too) slowly.

Roy's language is interesting; she writes beautifully but in a way that I would enjoy in short passages but not necessarily in long books. However, some of the expressions she uses are beautiful: "Estha carried [vegetables and shopping] home in the crowded tram. A quiet bubble floating on a sea of noise." Thought this was a beautiful description.

What do you guys think of this passage and gods described?

(p.19)



In the country where I come from "Worse Things" also keep happening. While trying to get a notion of what the passage on page 19 meant (which particularly struck me also) I was reminded of this woman I know from back home. She is poor and passive; she has never been able to keep a job. Her daughter supports her financially (if and when the latter has work). Most of this woman's teeth are missing; she can't afford to go to the dentist. But all that seems paltry stuff; she appears to accept her lot. She considers her troubles to be small. Worse things could happen, worse things could attain "primacy" - she could get cancer, her husband (who is also jobless) could die, her daughter could die, the country could fall into anarchy and bankruptcy, etc. Now that would be big. So she might was well accept the small, "contained, and limited" discomfort decreed upon her by the god of small things. Nevertheless, whenever I see her I could not help detecting (beneath her seemingly forebearing compliance) that expression bordering "somewhere between indifference and despair" so aptly described on page 19.

[lugdunum]

Got my copy and will start shortly... looks interesting!

[Virgil]

This is my second attempt at this book. First time I could not pass page 20 but this time I am enjoying it more. Despite the confusing start, things seem to come together (at times too) slowly.

Roy's language is interesting; she writes beautifully but in a way that I would enjoy in short passages but not necessarily in long books. However, some of the expressions she uses are beautiful: "Estha carried [vegetables and shopping] home in the crowded tram. A quiet bubble floating on a sea of noise." Thought this was a beautiful description.

What do you guys think of this passage and gods described?

(p.19)

I started reading last night. I must say it doesn't completely click. I can understand why you gave up once on this. But it does seem intersting. She does write pretty, perhaps a too flowery for my tastes, but that's just me. I've only read the first fifteen pages. When a writer uses elaborate metaphors in every paragraph ("a sea of noise," "It reached out of his head and enfolded him in its swampy arms," "He grew accustomed to the uneasy octopus that lived inside him") they lose their impact and begin to grate. When everything is a metaphor there is a lack of precision. But we shall see. ;)

[Niamh]

Finally got my copy! Will start later in the week.

[RaatKiRanii]

In your opinion, what is "the god of small things"? What does it signify

At this point, I'm not quite sure what "the god of small things" is, but if i had to guess then I'd say that perhaps it is all the small things in life that adds up to the big picture of our life, the major events that shape us as people. So maybe, in the case of Rahel and Estha the god of small things is the what symbolizes all the little things and events that happen before and leading to the dead of their cousin, Sophie Mol.

[Scheherazade]

Virgil> I hear ya re. too flowery writing styles!


I have also been thinking about the small/big gods... In the face of big troubles humanity faces, our own daily troubles and worries about our own existence seem trivial. Rahel and Estha's problems might feel not important enough to bother the big god with so the small god might deal with them? Also somewhat ironic.

Not a fully baked theory yet; something I have been thinking about.

How about the repeated references to different shaped holes in the universe?

[Scheherazade]

Finished!

[Pensive]

Have just completed about fourty pages yet. In the very start, I had little idea about what was going on but slowly it started to make more sense. Have especially enjoyed the characters of Estha and Rahel. As for the 'flowery description' (as Virgil mentions), I quite agree that it is there but am not sure if it's there in an unpleasant way. In fact in some places there are some very interesting comparisons (wish I could remember them exactly though).

As for the title, don't think have any idea about the 'small Gods' part as soon as yet...hope it will make more sense later.

[Bitterfly]

I liked this book too, but found it rather gimmicky. Obviously she put a lot of work into crafting imagery and resonances, as well as symbolism (I think the novel took her two years to write). As a result, she's very "studyable", but "spontaneous genius" is lacking, ha ha! I wonder whether that's why she hasn't written anything else since then... and whether that's not why you found her descriptions too flowery.

She was also influenced quite a lot by Salman Rushdie, and it might be interesting to compare their styles, ideas etc.

[Virgil]

Ok, I’ve finished the first chapter, which is not much, but let me see if I can throw my comments in here. The flow of the narrative seems choppy. The shifts are so frequent that sometimes it seems she doesn’t fully develop one scene before she’s onto another. Characters get introduced before we can even grasp the previous one. This may not be a negative, but it does make for a confused atmosphere. Perhaps that’s what she is after.

As to what Big God and Small God mean, I certainly don’t know yet, but perhaps this passage from the first chapter (page 20 in my edition. Do we all have the same pagination?) will be significant later on.


He [McCaslin, Rahel’s American husband] didn’t know that in some places, like the country Rahel came from, various kinds of despair competed for primacy. And that personal despair could never be desperate enough. That something happened when personal turmoil dropped by at the wayside shrine of the vast, violent, circling, driving, ridiculous, insane, unfeasible, public turmoil of a nation. That Big God howled like a hot wind, and demanded obeisance. The Small God (cozy and contained, private and limited) came away cauterized, laughing numbly at his own territory. Inured by the confirmation of his own inconsequence, he became resilient and truly indifferent. Nothing mattered much….
And it goes on, I won’t copy the entire thing out. But I have no idea what any of that means. I can only hope it becomes clear at some point, or I think the novel fails.

As to the writing, I would have to say it’s mixed. Some beautiful passages and then some I think really bad writing. Here’s some bad writing in y opinion:


She [Baby Kochamma] was frightened the BBC famines and television wars that she encountered while she channel surfed. her old fears of the Revolution and the Marxist-Leninist menace had been rekindled by the new television worries about the growing numbers of desperate and dispossessed people. She viewed ethnic cleansing, famine, and genocide as direct threats to her furniture. (p.28-9)
Huh? Threats to her furniture? Come on. That is trying to be artsy with such a stretch that it’s ridiculous. And here:


Rahel tried to say something. It came out jagged. Like a piece of tin. (p.29)

Hahaha, like a piece of tin? I can understand how words can come out jagged, but like a piece of tin? The comparison is ludicrous.

But there is good writing, even brilliant writing.


Aleyooty Ammachi looked more hesitant. As though she would have liked to turna around but couldn’t. Perhaps it wasn’t easy for her to abandon the river. With her eyes, she looked in the direction that her husband looked. With her heart she looked away. Her heavy, dull gold kunukku earings (tokens of the Little Blessed One’s Goodness) had stretched her earlobes and hung all the way down to her shoulders. Through the holes in her ears you could see the hot river and the dark trees that bent into it. And the fishermen in their boats. And the fish. (p. 30)
A little bit of a stretch with the imagery there, but I can really visualize that. And here’s another:


In a purely practical sense it would probably be correct to say that it all began when Sophie Mol came to Ayemenen. Perhaps it’s true that things can change in a day. That a few dozen hours can affect the outcome of whole lifetimes. And that when they do, those few dozen hours, like the salvaged remains of a burned house—the charred clock, the singed photograph, the scorched furniture—must be resurrected from the ruins and examined. Preserved. Accounted for.

Little events, ordinary things, smashed and reconstituted. Imbued with new meaning. Suddenly they become the bleached bones of a story.

Still, to say that it all began when Sophie Mol came to Ayemenen is only one way of looking at it. (p. 32)
Nice!

[Scheherazade]

And it goes on, I won’t copy the entire thing out. But I have no idea what any of that means.Well, no need because I already have! See post #4. :p

[Virgil]

Well, no need because I already have! See post #4. :p

Oh I missed that. I think you wrote it before I started reading and never went back to that. :)

[Virgil]

You know I'm really getting into this novel. I'm about 40% through. She's done a wonderful job of laying down expectations and shifting through time. That scene in the fourth chapter where that Orange-Lemon Drink man makes Estha do what he does (unmentionable and repulsive) and Roy's contrasting that with the scene from The Sound of Music was brilliant and captivating. She is a really fine narrator. I wish she would curb her similies. I still find them ridiculous at times.

Comrade Pillai uncrossed his arms. His nipples peeped at Rahel over the top of the boundary wall like a sad St Bernard's eyes.
:lol: That is so terrible it is funny. But then you come across wonderful writing as this:

Rahel searched her brother's nakedness for signs of herself. In the shape of his knees. The arch of his instep. The slope of his shoulders. The angle at which the rest of his arm met his elbow. The way his toe-nails tipped upwards at the ends. The sculpted hollows on either side of his taut, beatiful buns. Tight plums. Men's bums never grow up. Like school satchelss, they evoke in an instant memories of childhood. Two vaccination marks on his arm gleamed like coins. Hers were on her thigh.

Girls always have them on their thighs, Ammu used to say.

Rahel watched Estha with the curiosity of a mother watching her wet child. A sister a brother. A woman a man. A twin a twin.

She flew these several kites at once.

He was a stranger met in a chance encounter. He was the one that she had known before Life began. The one who had once led her (swimming) through their lovely mother's c***.

Both things unbearable in their polarity. In their irreconcible far-apartness.

I just love how it builds to those two sentences, actually to the key words: "unbearable," "polarity," "irreconcible," "far-apartness."

One other thing. I am confused wth the historical stuff in the novel, especially the communists. I don't know the history of India and its flirtation with communism, but it seems integral to the work. Are the names Roy mentions(Comrade this and Comrade that) are they real historical figures or fictional? Can someone help me with this? I can't even tell whether Roy is sympathetic or comic or neutral with this.

[symphony]

This is a book i'll save for later. Started it once when i was 15, couldnt continue. Too many personifications and metaphors. I agree her language is pretty, but perhaps a bit too pretty for me to find interesting. So far I havent liked books that drags too much. This dragged and distracted. I'll probably give it a try after 3 years from now.

[Bitterfly]

One other thing. I am confused wth the historical stuff in the novel, especially the communists. I don't know the history of India and its flirtation with communism, but it seems integral to the work. Are the names Roy mentions(Comrade this and Comrade that) are they real historical figures or fictional? Can someone help me with this? I can't even tell whether Roy is sympathetic or comic or neutral with this.

She seems rather critical of it, I think. I don't remember the comrades, so cannot help you out with that question, but there's this site about Indian communism that seems interesting:
http://www.english.emory.edu/Bahri/communism.html

[Niamh]

*sighs* i really am a terrible participant of this read!! I will read it as soon as i've got the Twilight Saga out of my system.....:blush:

[Virgil]

Roy is losing me in the second half of the novel. I won't get into it much now, but I just don't see the relationship between several narraitves. For instance what's Sophie Mol's story have to do with Rahel's and Estha's story? And others too. Perhaps she'll pull it together. But more on this later.

[Taliesin]

Finished!

Wait, was I supposed to announce here too that I had started it?
Well, damn!

[Virgil]

Finished!

Wait, was I supposed to announce here too that I had started it?
Well, damn!

Well, what did you think? You didn't vote.

[bouquin]

Roy is losing me in the second half of the novel. I won't get into it much now, but I just don't see the relationship between several narraitves. For instance what's Sophie Mol's story have to do with Rahel's and Estha's story? And others too. Perhaps she'll pull it together. But more on this later.



What do you think now is Roy's purpose in switching back & forth among different time frames (and thus different narratives and characters)?

[Taliesin]

Easier to write?

[Madhuri]

One other thing. I am confused wth the historical stuff in the novel, especially the communists. I don't know the history of India and its flirtation with communism, but it seems integral to the work. Are the names Roy mentions(Comrade this and Comrade that) are they real historical figures or fictional? Can someone help me with this? I can't even tell whether Roy is sympathetic or comic or neutral with this.

I would have helped you on this, but unfortunately I am not reading this book, and dont know what about communism she is talking. I have this feeling that she is abstract in her writing. I somehow cant make myself want to read this book.

[JBI]

3 more days and I can start reading - I'm swamped at the minute, and can't really do anything but homework and the occasional post here.

[Virgil]

What do you think now is Roy's purpose in switching back & forth among different time frames (and thus different narratives and characters)?

There are generally three reasons why writers do this. One is suspense, and this is from a writer's craft point of view. By holding off information while bring the narrative to beyond the time of climax, creates a certain tension. You grasp fragments of the ramifications of the events without knowing the total picture. Second, and this is from an aesthetic point of view, time itself becomes part of the theme. By the manipulation of time one can understand how the events of the novel are rooted in a time period. The novel is fluctuating back and forth between different moments in history. Three, and this is also aesthetic I guess, it recreates a temporal experience. When we thinnk back on our lives, moments in time merge, overlap, and intersect. Our lives may progress in linear time, but our experience of our lives does not.

I think Roy is considering all three reasons here.

[bouquin]

You know I'm really getting into this novel. I'm about 40% through. She's done a wonderful job of laying down expectations and shifting through time. That scene in the fourth chapter where that Orange-Lemon Drink man makes Estha do what he does (unmentionable and repulsive) and Roy's contrasting that with the scene from The Sound of Music was brilliant and captivating. She is a really fine narrator. I wish she would curb her similies. I still find them ridiculous at times.






I agree that the similies border on the overkill sometimes. But taken as a whole, I still think that Roy did an excellent job. In a way, her lucullan comparisons make me think of India. I have never been there but reading The God of Small Things reinforces my idea that it is a place that's extraordinarily rich in history, culture and local color; teeming with people and noise and temples richly decorated with gods sporting outlandish headdresses and possessing an extravagant number of limbs.

[Gladys]

Past halfway, it's only now that I'm starting to warm to this novel. I would apply Virgil's remarks to the entire first half.


Ok, I’ve finished the first chapter...The flow of the narrative seems choppy. The shifts are so frequent that sometimes it seems she doesn’t fully develop one scene before she’s onto another. Characters get introduced before we can even grasp the previous one. This may not be a negative, but it does make for a confused atmosphere.

For me, Arundhati Roy's heavy imagery has been fading into oblivion for a reader with insufficient context to assimilate. As in 'The Tin Drum', we have these interminable descriptive passages that relate to nothing. Or must one read such books twice?

Notwithstanding, I am now beginning to page back through the book to make sense of it all (Velutha, for instance), as I did three-quarter-way through The Tin Drum. As luck would have it, my library copy must be returned today!

On the positive side, I like Rahel, find Estha fascinating, and wonder about Sophie Mol, Velutha, Indian communism and the ‘Terror’.

[Virgil]

Well, I finished the novel and it was a big disappointment. The first half of this novel was excellent. But soehow it veered off. Did I miss something? The trajectory of the first half of the novel was the relationship of Rahel and Estha, and the schism that was to happen to the twins. This cause of the schism was always held back and allowed the reader to wonder. Ok, but that is a dangerous strategy. If the cause is integrated with the plot, then it will work. But if the cause is added to the plot rather than integrated, then it’s a cheap trick. That’s what I feel has happened.

The cause of the schism turns out to be a taboo relationship between their mother and Velutha, a lighter skinned woman and a dark man of a lower caste. First, how original is that? A plot where white woman (brown in this case) has a relationship with a black man that leads to tragic consequences.. How many times have we seen that? Sure this is set in a specific Indian context of caste, but I’ve seen this plot many times in movies, TV no less. Hey this goes back to Othello.

Second, where was this ever developed in the first half? It was held back as a cheap trick. Which then is the main plot, the psychological development of Rahel and Estha’s being or the elicit relationship between Anmmu and Velutha? And which is the subplot? I can’t tell. When Shakespeare in King Lear has two plots running parallel (Lear’s and Gloucester’s) they intertwine and one is subordinated to the other. In the novel they are almost two separate stories. What does the incident of Estha and the Orange-Lemon drink man have to do with anything? That becomes just sensationalism in respect to the rest of the plot.

Third, the second half of the novel seems like it was largely telling rather than dramatizing. How many times are to have told to us that Velutha was “hounded by history”? This is telling. When the Inspector Mathew taps Ammu’s breasts, Roy writes: “It was a premeditated gesture, calculated to humiliate and terrorize her. An attempt to instill order in a world gone wrong.” “Instill order in a world gone wrong” is again telling the reader what to think. This is I’m afraid ideologically driven. She is telling you how to interpret the events because at the heart of this is a polemic.

Fourth, the style of characterization all of sudden changes in the second half. All of a sudden characters are not three dimensional; they become two dimensional. Police are inhuman brutes, Baby Kochamma is evil and a religious hypocrit, and the communists are corrupt. Check this passage:


Inspector Thomas Mathew was a prudent man. He took one precaution. He sent a jeep to fetch Comrade K.N.M Pillai to the police station. It was crucial for him to know whether the Paravan had any political support or whether he was operating alone. Though he himself was a Congress man, he did not intend to risk any run-ins with the Marxist government. When Comrade Pillai arrived, he was ushered into the seat that Baby Kochamma had only recently vacated. Inspector Thomas Mathew showed him Baby Kochamma’s First Information Report. The two men had a conversation. Brief, cryptic, to the point. As though they had exchanged numbers and not words. No explanations seemed necessary. They were not friends, Comrade Pillai and Inspector Thomas Mathew, and they didn’t trust each other. But they understood each other perfectly. They were both men whom childhood had abandoned without a trace. Men without curiosity. Without doubt. Both in their own way truly, terrifyingly adult. They looked out at the world and never wondered how it worked, because they knew. They worked it. They were mechanics who serviced different parts of the same machine. (p. 248)

Now first I don’t know how anyone can be both prudent and not have curiosity and not know how the world works. Second, they had a conversation that was “cryptic” and “to the point”? Huh? Cryptic and to the point are opposites. And why doesn’t she dramatis this, this being a crux of the plot? She summarizes rather than showing us because she has created cartoon characters and the more she dramatizes cartoons the worse the writing gets. Third, “terrifyingly adult”? Well that’s a rather childish statement on her part. They’re adults and to act otherwise is contrary to their nature. She could have said they lacked understanding or imagination, but to characterize as "terrorfying adults" just reflects a simple notion of humanity. Fourth, this reflects the ideological polemic of the novel, the cartoonish nature of the people she disagrees with (as if they didn’t have complex reasons for their actions) and the running of a “machine”. Isn’t that from a Pink Floyd song? The government is a “machine” that unimaginative adult, people run at the expense of the inspired powerless. How creative. :sick:

Fifth I’m at a loss at how the themes interact. If Roy is criticizing the caste system, why is the central family of the novel Christian? Do we ever understand why Ammu falls in love with Velutha? If this is such a taboo shouldn’t the narrative spend a great deal of time and space showing us why they love each other? Even in Othello, Shakespeare has a large passage of how and why Desdemona falls for Othello. And what does the fact that Rahel and Estha are twins and their psychic connection have to do with climatic events? And what about the added layer of Sophie Mol being an English girl? Now Roy is brining in another historical context (British imperialism of India) when she’s criticizing the caste system. Perhaps someone can explain the relationship between all these themes, but frankly they appear to me as a hodge-podge.

Sixth, wht in heaven’s name does “The God of Small Things” have to do with anything in the novel? What is that all about? Here’s that passage that Scher quoted:


That something happened when personal turmoil dropped by at the wayside shrine of the vast, violent, circling, driving, ridiculous, insane, unfeasible, public turmoil of a nation. That Big God howled like a hot wind, and demanded obeisance. Then Small God (cosy and contained, private and limited) came away cauterized, laughing numbly at his own temerity. Inured by the confirmation of his own inconsequence, he became resilient and truly indifferent. Nothing mattered much. Nothing much mattered. (p. 20)
I have no idea what she’s talking about given the context of the novel. What small things? These are big things that happened. Her high language rings hollow.

Seventh, the ending, after the climax, is cheap and tawdry. We see Ammu listening to a song that just coincidently captures her motivations. It's the Rolling Stones’ song, “Ruby Tuesday.”


The words of the song exploded in her head.
There’s no time to lose
I heard her say
Cash your dreams before
They slip away
Dying all the time
Lose your dreams and you
Will lose your mind.
Ammu drew her knees up and hugged them. She couldn’t believe it. The cheap coincidence of those words. (p. 314)
Yes, it’s very cheap, she said it herself, but even cheaper is the gratuitous sex that ends the novel. The incest between the twins is completely uncalled for, and the description of the sex between Ammu and Velutha borders on pornography. Did she have to be so explicit? No, it was gratuitous, like a movie scene. In fact the whole last chapter of that Ammu and Velutha scene rings like a flashback scene from a movie where there is Celtic music over a misty set of action of events that happened in a innocent pre-climatic time. The whole ending struck me as cheap.

At mid point in this novel I was ready to give this the highest rating. But slowly it got worse and worse and degenerated into a ideological polemic. I’m not from India, so I won’t comment on the ideology, but one can write an essay or if this is truly a problem there should hundreds of true life stories that would carry more impact. But certainly someone who disagrees with her ideology can write something that would rebut her points. For me, ideological polemics don’t make art. There were fine moments of writing in the novel. She does capture the family extremely well and at times she soars to great prose, even poetic prose. But then there are the silly similes too. For all that I wound up with a mid point rating. It’s ok.

[bouquin]

There are generally three reasons why writers do this. One is suspense, and this is from a writer's craft point of view. By holding off information while bring the narrative to beyond the time of climax, creates a certain tension. You grasp fragments of the ramifications of the events without knowing the total picture. Second, and this is from an aesthetic point of view, time itself becomes part of the theme. By the manipulation of time one can understand how the events of the novel are rooted in a time period. The novel is fluctuating back and forth between different moments in history. Three, and this is also aesthetic I guess, it recreates a temporal experience. When we thinnk back on our lives, moments in time merge, overlap, and intersect. Our lives may progress in linear time, but our experience of our lives does not.

I think Roy is considering all three reasons here.



It was the aspect of suspense that especially worked for me. The swinging back & forth of the timetables created a sort of jigsaw puzzle in my mind and I was very eager to read on and watch the separate pieces fall into their rightful places and form a unified picture.

I'm still wondering what Pappachi's moth is symbolic of vis-a-vis Rahel's (and perhaps Estha's also) sentiments and experiences.

[Virgil]

I'm still wondering what Pappachi's moth is symbolic of vis-a-vis Rahel's (and perhaps Estha's also) sentiments and experiences.

There are so many symbols and metaphors that they trip over each other. Moth, God of Small Things, others I can't recall. It feels like Roy's trying so hard to be literary. Too hard. It got annoying after a while.

[Gladys]

Just finished, though unsure how to vote. The symbols and metaphors endlessly trip over each other.


As to what Big God and Small God mean The god of small things relates to conscience and personal responsibility: the inner god of integrity. More literally, Velutha is the god giving 'a catapult, an inflatable goose, a Qantas koala with loosened button eyes': the god of the small children.


The cause of the schism [between Rahel and Estha] turns out to be a taboo relationship between their mother and Velutha Isn't betrayal the cause of the schism? Betrayal of the Paravan, of friendship, of conscience, of one's very humanity, of the god of small things. The maternal betrayal inherent in "That’s what careless words do. They make people love you a little less.”


What does the incident of Estha and the Orange-Lemon drink man have to do with anything? The same betrayal or cowardice is at work here: 'she’d [Ammu] love him less as well'. Sensitive Estha's lack of moral courage begins to silence him forever.


Police are inhuman brutes, Baby Kochamma is evil and a religious hypocrite, and the communists are corrupt. The police and the communists, not unreasonably, believe Velutha (god of small things giving little presents to twins) to be a rogue rapist. Culturally susceptible, they are deceived by the nasty and unambiguously neurotic Baby Kochamma, as are Chacko, Estha and Rachel later.


If Roy is criticizing the caste system, why is the central family of the novel Christian? Do we ever understand why Ammu falls in love with Velutha? If this is such a taboo shouldn’t the narrative spend a great deal of time and space showing us why they love each other? I think the novel is less about politics, the caste system or sex-staved Ammu's love affair than about the instability inherent in all human relationships: ‘they begin to love you less’.


The incest between the twins is completely uncalled for Incest? I, like Baby Kochamma, understand this heroic encounter as a display of illicit empathy in a world frozen by alienation, well illustrated by Catholic Kochamma and her estranged priest, a Hindu convert!


It's the Rolling Stones’ song, “Ruby Tuesday.”... Yes, it’s very cheap, she said it herself, but even cheaper is the gratuitous sex that ends the novel. Even cheaper, crackling through Ammu's tangerine transistor. So is the fool-hardy sex act with the under-age(?) 15-year-old outcast. How likeable is Ammu? How likeable are adults?


But slowly it got worse and worse and degenerated into a ideological polemic. Past halfway, I could finally read thirty pages at a sitting, slowly unscrambling the metaphors, time-lines and plot.


I'm still wondering what Pappachi's moth is symbolic of... The moth represents for Rachal the bitterness of hopes unfulfilled: 'A cold moth lifted a cold leg'. Pappachi's discovery of a new species of moth was dismissed and later credited to others.

[Virgil]

Thanks for all your cmments Gladys. You read this very carefully. :) Let me see if I can respond to one or two.


The god of small things relates to conscience and personal responsibility: the inner god of integrity. More literally, Velutha is the god giving 'a catapult, an inflatable goose, a Qantas koala with loosened button eyes': the god of the small children.

"The god of small things relates to conscience and personal responsibility," well that is interesting. I guess that could be, but what does Velutha "being a god of small children" have to do with that?


Isn't betrayal the cause of the schism? Betrayal of the Paravan, of friendship, of conscience, of one's very humanity, of the god of small things. The maternal betrayal inherent in "That’s what careless words do. They make people love you a little less.”
No I would say the taboo is the heart of the events and the paravan's betrayal a mechanism of the plot.


The same betrayal or cowardice is at work here: 'she’d [Ammu] love him less as well'. Sensitive Estha's lack of moral courage begins to silence him forever.
Oh perhaps it fits thematically in some way, I don't doubt that, but the event is (a) so dramatic that one would certainly think it central to the events and (b) she spends so much narrative time on it that it seems to be the thrust of the novel itself. The shift from the children's story to that of Ammu and Velutha's story is what is disorienting and I think makes the novel flawed.


I think the novel is less about politics, the caste system or sex-staved Ammu's love affair than about the instability inherent in all human relationships: ‘they begin to love you less’.
I'm sorry I just disagree. When I say politics i don't mean political parties per se. I mean she's got a social activist's agenda.


Incest? I, like Baby Kochamma, understand this heroic encounter as a display of illicit empathy in a world frozen by alienation, well illustrated by Catholic Kochamma and her estranged priest, a Hindu convert!
Yes, toward the second to last chapter the brother and sister commit incest. I found that completely gratuitous.

[bouquin]

Second, where was this ever developed in the first half? It was held back as a cheap trick. Which then is the main plot, the psychological development of Rahel and Estha’s being or the elicit relationship between Anmmu and Velutha? And which is the subplot? I can’t tell. When Shakespeare in King Lear has two plots running parallel (Lear’s and Gloucester’s) they intertwine and one is subordinated to the other. In the novel they are almost two separate stories. What does the incident of Estha and the Orange-Lemon drink man have to do with anything? That becomes just sensationalism in respect to the rest of the plot.




The Orange-Lemon Drink Man incident was what triggered Estha's decision to stow away (with Rahel and Sophie) in that little boat. After the molestation Estha became afraid that his mother would be mad at him if she found out. And Ammu herself, at that time when she was locked up in her room, did lash out to her kids, albeit recklessly in a fit of anger and frustration: "If it wasn't for you ... I would have been free! I should have dumped you in an orphanage the day you were born! You are millstones around my neck! ... Why can't you just go away and leave me alone?" (page 253).
Estha had told the Orange-lemon drink man where he lived, thus he was afraid that the latter could come for him any day and do him harm again. So he felt he had to get away. Thanks to what the Orangedrink Lemondrink Man did to Estha, their Home away from Home was already equipped. (page 291).

[Virgil]

The Orange-Lemon Drink Man incident was what triggered Estha's decision to stow away (with Rahel and Sophie) in that little boat. After the molestation Estha became afraid that his mother would be mad at him if she found out. And Ammu herself, at that time when she was locked up in her room, did lash out to her kids, albeit recklessly in a fit of anger and frustration: "If it wasn't for you ... I would have been free! I should have dumped you in an orphanage the day you were born! You are millstones around my neck! ... Why can't you just go away and leave me alone?" (page 253).
Estha had told the Orange-lemon drink man where he lived, thus he was afraid that the latter could come for him any day and do him harm again. So he felt he had to get away. Thanks to what the Orangedrink Lemondrink Man did to Estha, their Home away from Home was already equipped. (page 291).

Yeah, that's pretty tenuous, don't you think? She could have been angry at Estha for any old thing and they would have still run away. But this was a pretty dramatic in your face event that really seems Roy trivializes now in retrospect. In fact one can come to a conclusion the novel is about perverse sexual encoounters, where the Velutha/Ammu relationship can be seen as another perversion. But I don't think that's what Roy is trying to say. And then there is the incest. What is Roy trying to say? You got me.

[Gladys]

After the molestation Estha became afraid that his mother would be mad at him if she found out. And Ammu herself, at that time when she was locked up in her room, did lash out to her kids... Since dreadful and long-standing insecurities abound in mother and son, both seek refugee in the god of small things, Velutha. 'Prepare to prepare to be prepared.' Later, locked in her bedroom, Ammu's god is lost to her, and hope with it. Terrible. She lashes out. Later still, the children witness god's crucifixion and death, and Estha echoes Peter's denial to Inspector Thomas Mathew :


Luke 22:57___And he denied him, saying, Woman, I know him not.


The Inspector asked his question. Estha’s mouth said Yes.
Childhood tiptoed out.
Silence slid in like a bolt.
Someone switched off the light and Velutha disappeared.


I was inclined to agree, Virgil, with many of your criticisms but, writing for this thread, I am warming to the novel.


"The god of small things relates to conscience and personal responsibility," well that is interesting. I guess that could be, but what does Velutha "being a god of small children" have to do with that?


Mark 10:14___But when Jesus saw it, he was much displeased, and said unto them, Suffer the little children to come unto me, and forbid them not: for of such is the kingdom of God.


The shift from the children's story to that of Ammu and Velutha's story is what is disorienting and I think makes the novel flawed. The children's story is in many ways a loss of innocence and a fall from grace but above all, a denial of their god. Ammu is passionate for the same god. Both mother and children aspire to what is pure and good. But life disappoints: perhaps the major theme of the novel.


As Estha stirred the thick jam he thought Two Thoughts, and the Two Thoughts he thought were these: (a)Anything can happen to Anyone. and (b)It’s best to be prepared.


Yes, toward the second to last chapter the brother and sister commit incest. I found this scene very moving. Can you show that the 'incest' is more than a metaphor for two souls communicating (one silently) in contravention of a taboo, which relates to the unspeakable (the sacred) rather than the untouchable?

[Virgil]

Since dreadful and long-standing insecurities abound in mother and son, both seek refugee in the god of small things, Velutha. 'Prepare to prepare to be prepared.' Later, locked in her bedroom, Ammu's god is lost to her, and hope with it. Terrible. She lashes out. Later still, the children witness god's crucifixion and death, and Estha echoes Peter's denial to Inspector Thomas Mathew :


Luke 22:57___And he denied him, saying, Woman, I know him not.

I did see the Christian parallels, though I must say you really saw more. But, let me ask, do you think Roy is being ironic (meaning cynical) with the Christian allusions or is there a spiritual side to this novel? Frankly I think she was being cynical.




The Inspector asked his question. Estha’s mouth said Yes.
Childhood tiptoed out.
Silence slid in like a bolt.
Someone switched off the light and Velutha disappeared.
That was very good writing. There are solid passages in the novel.


I was inclined to agree, Virgil, with many of your criticisms but, writing for this thread, I am warming to the novel.
I'm suspecting that you're Roy in incognito. :p :lol:



Mark 10:14___But when Jesus saw it, he was much displeased, and said unto them, Suffer the little children to come unto me, and forbid them not: for of such is the kingdom of God.

The children's story is in many ways a loss of innocence and a fall from grace but above all, a denial of their god. Ammu is passionate for the same god. Both mother and children aspire to what is pure and good. But life disappoints: perhaps the major theme of the novel.
Yes, I do think there is a solid novel in this material. I just can't help but feel the structure is all screwed up and that Roy. I frankly think it's a mess as one tries to piece together cohenerent themes. They seem to trip over each other like her metaphors. Plus I can't help but be irritated by her activist agenda. She dislikes the caste system, and while it's not for me to have an opinion on it, she can at least make the opposing view less than human. Those that disagree with her are cartoonish characters. They have no depth. As if thousands of years of history is black and white moral/immoral.


Can you show that the 'incest' is more than a metaphor for two souls communicating (one silently) in contravention of a taboo, which relates to the unspeakable (the sacred) rather than the untouchable?
I'm not sure I understand what you're asking. I took the incest as a by product of their mother's failed taboo relationship. Here's the little passage that describes it:


Only that once again they broke the Love Laws. They lay down who should be loved. And how. And how much.
This suggests a social defiance, not a sacred/spiritual experience. They are replicating their mother's central core of experiencing taboo. Almost as if there is a psychic connection with their mother, though perhaps I'm stretching a bit with that last thought. It's almost as if the disappointment and saddness that has run through their lives for the 23 years after the climatic event can only be relieved with this act. Frankly that's gratuitous to me. Come on, lots of events shape children, but to think they will have incest because of it, well that's just melodramatic.

[Gladys]

do you think Roy is being ironic (meaning cynical) with the Christian allusions or is there a spiritual side to this novel? I don't know: 'Anything can happen to Anyone'.

Her spokesman for the caste system, Vellya Paapen, is particularly unpalatable. Victimising people by social group or cultural heritage seems to parallel slavery in the West.


I'm not sure I understand what you're asking. I took the incest as a by product of their mother's failed taboo relationship. Here's the little passage that describes it:


Only that once again they broke the Love Laws. They lay down who should be loved. And how. And how much.

I confess my last two posts on incest have been cryptic; Roy's imagery is so extreme. No incest occurs between the twins (and even if it does, the incest is sacred like Ammu's affair)

Incest is metaphor for two damaged souls communicating, Estha silently and Rachel, alone in a bedroom: deep heartfelt solidarity between two innocents who have lost their way in a hostile world. Such honest communication between of souls is cultural heresy, almost a cultural 'incest', according to the likes of Baby Kochamma; their solidarity as much a taboo as inter-caste sexual relations.

The union of the beneficent god, Velutha, with the children and their mother breaks both taboos: the implicit and the (sexually) explicit. The gracious god has spiritual intercourse with the twins and their mother, and sexual intercourse with Ammu. God with man; untouchable with touchable.


Genesis 1:31___And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good.

It’s so very sad:


Only that once again they broke the Love Laws. They lay down who should be loved. And how. And how much.

Tears to my eyes.


This suggests a social defiance, not a sacred/spiritual experience. They are replicating their mother's central core of experiencing taboo. Your remarks, in bold, hit the nail on the head. The 'sacred/spiritual experience' shared by the twins amounts to social defiance and a sharing in their mother's experience of taboo.

[Virgil]

I don't know: 'Anything can happen to Anyone'.

Her spokesman for the caste system, Vellya Paapen, is particularly unpalatable. Victimising people by social group or cultural heritage seems to parallel slavery in the West.

Sure. But the two dimensionality of the characters who disagree makes this polemic not art.


I confess my last two posts on incest have been cryptic; Roy's imagery is so extreme. No incest occurs between the twins (and even if it does, the incest is sacred like Ammu's affair)
Oh you're saying it didn't occur and it was a metaphor? I don't see how that is possible.


Incest is metaphor for two damaged souls communicating, Estha silently and Rachel, alone in a bedroom: deep heartfelt solidarity between two innocents who have lost their way in a hostile world. Such honest communication between of souls is cultural heresy, almost a cultural 'incest', according to the likes of Baby Kochamma; a solidarity as a much taboo as inter-caste sexual relations.
Wow, you're going to have to explain that. Certainly it's cultural heresy. That's what taboo is. I don't understand how or what they are communicating. Here's the passage that leads up to it:


There is very little that anyone could say to clarify what happened next. Nothing that (in Mammachi's book) would separate Sex from Love. Or Needs from Feelings.

Except perhaps that no Watcher watched through Rahel's eyes. No one stared out the window at the sea. Or a boat in the river. Or a passerby in the mist in a hat.

Except perhaps that it was a little cold. A little wet. But very quiet. The Air.

But waht was there to say?

Only that there were tears. Only that Quietness and Emptyness fitted together like stacked spoons. Only that there was a snuffling in the hollows at the base of a lovely throat. Only that a hard honey-colored shoulder had a semi-circle of teethmarks on it. Only that they held each other close, long after it was over. Only that what they shared that night was not hapiness, but hideous grief.

Only that once again they broke the Love Laws. They lay down who should be loved. And how. And how much.
I guess they are communicating grief. But really did Roy need to do that?


The union of the beneficent god, Velutha, with the children and their mother breaks both taboos: the implicit and the (sexually) explicit. The gracious god has spiritual intercourse with the twins and their mother, and sexual intercourse with Ammu. God with man; untouchable with touchable.
That is an interesting thought. Perhaps. I don't see any sexual context of Velutha with the twins, but perhaps I missed it. But frankly this just adds more confusion to the themes that Roy is dramatizing. Like the metaphors, it all seems to trip over themselves. But let me say, I am not from Indian culture and I am not particularly school on it. It may be going over my head.



Genesis 1:31___And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good.
I don't see the connection that quote has here. I'm confused with that reference.


Your remarks, in bold, hit the nail on the head. The 'sacred/spiritual experience' shared by the twins amounts to social defiance and a sharing in their mother's experience of taboo.
I still fail to see the twin's incest or even their psychological development as a sacred/spiritual experience. It strikes me it's all within a social context, the here and now. If anything, the caste system (though I really know little of Hinduism so take this with a grain of salt) is rooted within the sacred/spiritual. The story is a breaking down of the spiritual/sacred, not just a breaking down but a stamping out.

[bouquin]

This suggests a social defiance, not a sacred/spiritual experience. They are replicating their mother's central core of experiencing taboo. Almost as if there is a psychic connection with their mother, though perhaps I'm stretching a bit with that last thought. It's almost as if the disappointment and saddness that has run through their lives for the 23 years after the climatic event can only be relieved with this act. Frankly that's gratuitous to me. Come on, lots of events shape children, but to think they will have incest because of it, well that's just melodramatic.



I admit that when I got to the part of the incest my first reaction was, was this really necessary to the story? I'm still of the opinion that the incident was rather needless... but on the other hand, Ammu and her clan are rather a curious lot and they have been through some harrowing experiences... so who knows where the consequences would lead them? Anyway, the family is on the road to perdition, it seems obvious to me, so perhaps the incest thing was a kind of final nail to seal the coffin, so to speak. Because I don't see it at all as redemptive.

I considered the Ammu-Velutha taboo relationship audacious and even heroic... sacred, in a sense. There was beauty in it. To put it in the same basket as the act committed by Rahel & Estha was to demean it, I think. I was quite disappointed with that.

[Virgil]

I considered the Ammu-Velutha taboo relationship audacious and even heroic... sacred, in a sense. There was beauty in it. To put it in the same basket as the act committed by Rahel & Estha was to demean it, I think. I was quite disappointed with that.

Yes I agree, and I would say it was heroic. But don't you find it odd that its hardly developed,let alone suggested, until the second half of the novel. I just find this novel incorrectly plotted. Theorectically Roy should have interweaved the Ammu/Velutha relationship with the Rahel/Estha psychological development. Why did she hold back the Ammu/Velutha relationship as a mystery? Here's my guess: The taboo relationship between a whitish, high society girl with a lower class dark man has been done to death and Roy was striving for some form of originality. Where she couldn't be original in story line, she tried to be original in plot. But plot is a dangerous thing to be original in. Plots have to have an internal logic, much like a sentence. If you veer off the path of known plot then it better make complete sense. I don't think Roy's structure and even some major details (like a Christian family at the heart of a story about the caste system or the whole Orange-Lemon Drink man incident, and I still have no idea what communism has to do with any thing in the novel) confuse her themes. Despite some lovely passages, some fine characterizations, some wonderfully detailed narrative, the novel feels flawed. Roy tried to be overly literary when she just needed to tell the story.

One other thing. I'm not against social themes being put into novels, but they have to capture the complexity of the situation. It can't be those who agree with me are the good guys and those who are agianst me are the bad guys. That kind of equation is in every day politics. A novel, if it's a work of art, must capture a moment, a full experience, the totality of life, even if one has a decided position. Roy's treatment of anyone that disagrees with her ideas was two dimensional. That's why I feel this novel degenerated from art into polemic.

[Gladys]

Days after reading, my enthusiasm for ‘The God of small things’ is soaring. The after-taste beats the drinking.

All are fickle and survive in a universe of spasmodic betrayal and intolerance, where people ‘begin to love you less’. Characters aren’t simply two dimensional, good or evil, Virgil, except possibly the boy-god Velutha. As a divine creator, it is true of Velutha that 'god saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good'. He, like Jesus, was a carpenter - a maker 'of small things' - and a scapegoat who suffered, died and was buried…his footprints swept away.


Isaiah 53:3___He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him.

Religious and political ideologies – Catholic, Hindu or Communist – are ‘big things’ that fall victim to human nature and prove barren. Similarly, cultural practices, caste systems, moral standards, legal codes and Love Laws degrade rather than uplift and are flawed ‘for practical purposes, in a hopelessly practical world’. Even sons of the deities, Karna and Bhima, savage their relatives. I’m reminded of John Lennon’s ‘I just believe in me, Yoko and me, and that's reality’.

Authenticity ‘in small things’ is a consistent theme, extending to incest between Estha and Rahal or the Paravan paedophilia of Ammu – taboos broken by those with no legal standing, no ‘Locusts Stand-I'. If incest is not redemptive, Bouquin, at least flakes of kindness communicate between damaged souls stranded in silence and 'hideous grief': two, lonely fugitives from ‘the Heart of Darkness’ and its ‘Love Laws’. Are others more virtuous? Who?

Like it or not, a pathetic reality abides in the bitterness of Pappachi (John Ipe), an imperial entomologist robbed of a moth; the detachment of blind Mammachi; the meagre harvest of two sad paedophiles, the Orangedrink Lemondrink Man and Kari Saipu; the elicit consummation of the long-divorced Ammu; the unrealised hopes of Sophie Mol; the pathetic aspirations of Vellya Paapen, the drunk untouchable; the schadenfreude of the chronically disappointed Baby Kochamma; the shallow expediencies of Comrade Pillai and Inspector Thomas Mathew; the blinkered, mob violence of six Touchable Policemen; the betrayed beneficence of fifteen-year-old Velutha; the latter-day violence of the peacemaker Chacko, a Rhodes Scholar with Marxist ideals; the slapping, slapping Margaret Kochamma; and a silent, incestuous and hideous Holy Communion between the sensitive Estha (now re-Returned) and Rahal partaking of the sacrificed Paravan, Paschal lamb.


Mathew 7:1___Judge not, that ye be not judged.

Life rarely measures up. Taboos abound and many (characters and readers alike) stand ready to cast the first stone at glimmers of beauty, at shards of translucent, muted jade. Sensitive Estha, singing guilelessly during ‘The Sound of Music’, comes to see this too clearly and seeks shelter in silence: 'Prepare to prepare to be prepared'. Arundhati Roy never explicitly passes judgment on any character, preferring instead to say, “It wasn’t entirely their fault”.

That ‘Anything can happen to Anyone’ is also reflected in the seemingly haphazard structure and imagery of the novel. Even the words and sentences of Arundhati Roy sometimes solidify only in retrospect, just as repercussions for living are appreciated only in hindsight. We survive on hope.

‘Tomorrow’…at best.

[Virgil]

Wonderful defense of the novel Gladys. This does make sense and does amplify my respect for the novel.


Authenticity ‘in small things’ is a consistent theme, extending to incest between Estha and Rahal or the Paravan paedophilia of Ammu – taboos broken by those with no legal standing, no ‘Locusts Stand-I'. If incest is not redemptive, Bouquin, at least flakes of kindness communicate between damaged souls stranded in silence and 'hideous grief': two, lonely fugitives from ‘the Heart of Darkness’ and its ‘Love Laws’. Are others more virtuous? Who?

I do think novel is flawed structurally. And I do disagree with this:

Arundhati Roy never explicitly passes judgment on any character, preferring instead to say, “It wasn’t entirely their fault”.
Perhaps she doesn't personally pass judgement on any character, but her dramatization/characterization does. There is no question in my mind about that. Perhaps she intended not to pass judgement, but then her skill as a writer was lacking there. The two dinesionality of most of the other characters, the characterization of Baby Kachamma and Maamachi (I forget the actual names now) and the inspector and the communist. Their dramatization is clearly intended for one not to see their side.

[Pensive]

Completed if finally.

There have been so many comments since I last posted. Good to see that the book has initiated some discussion, just had to skim through most of the posts though. But I guess I will have to read them when I have more time.

As for my impression of the novel after having completed it, I find it a bit disappointing. Not as good as I expected it to be. There are loop-holes in the story as Virgil mentioned, how Ammu fell in love with Velutha, and the significance of that Lemonade Man. I especially disliked the sex scene between Velutha and Ammu in the end, and I agree with what Virgil said about it. Quite pornographic.

The coincidental way the song was being played at that time was also a bit cheap. It reminded me of the HP series fanfiction I used to read online.

Also I noticed later that there were some expressions used more than once and which when read for once though were interesting but on repetition they lost their charm. For instance something like this 'it was as wrinkled as a dhobi's finger when it was out of water' (am afraid have forgotten the exact phrase).

Most importantly, what's the connection of the title with the whole plot? I have still not been able to understand that. Sometimes, it seems that the author is referring to Velutha as The God of Small Things, but in what context I am unable to figure out...

But despite of all this and the fact that the way the events shifted through time annoyed me, I basically enjoyed it (perhaps not as much as I had expected to, but still pretty much) because of the level of curiosity that sprung inside me while reading it.

[NEEMAN]

I read this about a month ago for college. I won't go into any in depth analysis, as it's late and I have an exam tomorrow (TGoST will probably be on it), but my thoughts are pretty much as follows: amazing writing at times; the first few pages are some of the most visual and evocative I have ever read. The second half of the novel doesn't match the high standard of the first, and as a result, though not bad taken by itself, it makes the novel feel inconsistent.

I also felt the climax of the novel (pardon the pun) was a little abrupt. Of course, this may have been intentional, but for me, it wasn't very satisfying.

Still, a book you should read, if only to appreciate just how luscious Roy's writing is in places.

[Gladys]

Perhaps she doesn't personally pass judgement on any character, but her dramatization/characterization does. There is no question in my mind about that. You make a telling observation that makes one think.

With the probable exception of divine Velutha, Arundhati Roy passes judgement of all her characters. Yet she reserves the mildest judgment for the less than likeable Ammu, a fornicating paedophile, and her incestuous twins, Estha and Rahal, who once denied their dying god, Velutha. How harshly does she judge the sister-bashing Chacho and the Estha-slapping Margaret Kochamma? For other respectable and law-abiding citizens she offers little positive. Surely this paradox is a deliberate irony: who exactly are God’s elect?

Romans 3:23___For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God [Velutha].


The two dimensionality of most of the other characters, the characterization of Baby Kochamma and Mammachi...and the inspector and the communist. Their dramatization is clearly intended for one not to see their side. If two dimensional, why do I sympathise with them all? I may not like them but can understand much of their motivation and their prejudice:


The aging Baby Kochamma, pathetically obsessive and impulsive from childhood, still a baby, is unlucky in love and 'frightened by the BBC famines and television wars that she encountered while she channel surfed'.

Mammachi is beaten frequently by Pappachi 'with a brass flower vase'', the snapped bow of her gleaming violin thrown in the river. 'Her brass-vase scars.'

Inspector Thomas Mathew had believed Velutha was a rapist. Comrade Pillai's wife, Kalyani, had died of ovarian cancer. 'He walked through the world like a chameleon. Never revealing himself, never appearing not to. Emerging through chaos unscathed.' 'It was he who had introduced the twins to kathakali at the temple.' The narrator says of the inspector and the communist, 'They looked out at the world and never wondered how it worked, because they knew. They worked it. They were mechanics who serviced different parts of the same machine.'

Luke 18:26___And they that heard it said, Who then can be saved?

[Virgil]

You make a telling observation that makes one think.

With the probable exception of divine Velutha, Arundhati Roy passes judgement of all her characters.
I see. But don't you feel that Velutha isn't even developed? I know nothing about him, or at least anything memorable.


Yet she reserves the mildest judgment for the less than likeable Ammu, a fornicating paedophile, and her incestuous twins, Estha and Rahal, who once denied their dying god, Velutha. How harshly does she judge the sister-bashing Chacho and the Estha-slapping Margaret Kochamma? For other respectable and law-abiding citizens she offers little positive. Surely this paradox is a deliberate irony: who exactly are God’s elect?
ou're quite persuasive. :lol: Good points.


Romans 3:23___For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God [Velutha].
Perhaps I should have been more persistent in looking for Christian alusions. As you point out this is a very Christian novel.


If two dimensional, why do I sympathise with them all? I may not like them but can understand much of their motivation and their prejudice:


The aging Baby Kochamma, pathetically obsessive and impulsive from childhood, still a baby, is unlucky in love and 'frightened by the BBC famines and television wars that she encountered while she channel surfed'.

Mammachi is beaten frequently by Pappachi 'with a brass flower vase'', the snapped bow of her gleaming violin thrown in the river. 'Her brass-vase scars.'

Inspector Thomas Mathew had believed Velutha was a rapist. Comrade Pillai's wife, Kalyani, had died of ovarian cancer. 'He walked through the world like a chameleon. Never revealing himself, never appearing not to. Emerging through chaos unscathed.' 'It was he who had introduced the twins to kathakali at the temple.' The narrator says of the inspector and the communist, 'They looked out at the world and never wondered how it worked, because they knew. They worked it. They were mechanics who serviced different parts of the same machine.'

Luke 18:26___And they that heard it said, Who then can be saved?
For some reason I could not engage with the characters in the second half of the novel. Once I felt that the focus of the story had shifted from the development of the twins to the tragic love affair, I kind of felt cheated. But I will say this is a better novel than I initially voted based on your comments Gladys. It does seem to hold together intellectually. If there were a middle catagory between average and a good book I would have chosen it. :) Actually it is a good book, just not a perfect one.

[Gladys]

But don't you feel that Velutha isn't even developed? How does anyone develop a God? Regarding Velutha, Virgil, we do know that:


1 John 4:16___God is love.



For some reason I could not engage with the characters in the second half of the novel. So many have said this, but for me it was the opposite. I almost gave up a third way in. But I'm a slow reader.

[JBI]

What's the verdict on this, worth reading over the December book you think?

[NEEMAN]

It's definitely worth reading; the style is pretty unique. You probably won't like some aspects of it (I've yet to meet someone IRL who thought the book was a 95%er), but she can really write. I have a feeling this is a book that will age very well- I would't be surprised to see it getting name checked for a long time to come.


That said, I haven't read The Map of Love, so really I'm just blathering on without being of any help whatsoever. END COMMUNICATION