Narayan does gloss over the details of their personal lives just as he avoids giving descriptions of Malgudi. It is amazing to see that their stories are every bit as fantastic as those of the Princes and Princesses that we are used to hearing.īut R.K. The tenderness with which Narayan brings out their human side, neatly wrapped in his beautifully constructed world for them, is what makes these stories so much more than just tales about people. But that alone is not all that they are, they are more than just thieves and beggars and misers and urchins they are human beings. There are misers and thieves and there are beggars and urchins. The people in Malgudi are in fact quite miserable. He accepts them as a part of life and treats them with no special concern or emphasis. He has simply adopted a more humane approach towards these things. Narayan has conveniently kept these harsh realities out of his stories. He doesn't talk too much about suffering in his stories. We might even be inclined to say that nothing really bad happens in Malgudi. It is charming to think of an idyllic Malgudi, where people lead simple lives away from the scourge of true misery. Something that everybody from a school going kid to a wise old man will connect with.Īt first I used to think that it is the rustic charm of Malgudi.
Narayan understood a deeply human attribute and used it to tie all of his stories with a common thread. I've read 'Swami and friends' and 'Malgudi Days' in parts, never having finished either and though I read them at different times in life: as a kid, as a teenager and as a college graduate, I found that there was always something in these stories that one connected with, without actually knowing what it was.
However, one thing that stayed with me was his remark that Narayan is 'easy to read but hard to understand'. Narayan's style and makes many interesting observations. Overall, our group would give the book three stars out of five because of the interesting plot line and an uneventful conclusion.Īt the beginning of the penguin classic version of 'The Guide', Michael Gorra has written a fine introduction to it wherein he makes arguments for and against R.K. We believe that the ending could have been better if the villagers believed Raju when he told Velan he was not actually was saint, and Raju was exposed to the world.
This is why we believe that the ending of the book was not fitting to the thrill of the rest of the book and Raju’s life. There is never a dull moment throughout the novel. Narayan tells the reader about the most exciting and influential moments that contribute to Raju’s interesting life as Railway Raju, to tour guide, to wife-stealer, to convict and finally to saint. Although this got confusing at times, our group appreciated the struggle because it was fun and it was beneficial to our comprehension. By telling the story of Raju’s life through flashbacks, the reader is able to better understand the current narration with small memories that highlight the important elements that Narayan wants the reader to understand. Although the majority of our group did not have a lot of background information about Indian culture, such as Bharatantyam dance or the morals of Hinduism, Narayan provided sufficient knowledge for the group to understand. Narayan’s The Guide was a novel of excitement, scandal and culture.