The Mystery Of Malgudi Man

Priyanka Rout

The Mystery Of Malgudi Man

The town of Malgudi has always fascinated us. While some say that it resembles a village in Agumbe, the writer claims that Malgudi is “imaginary and cannot be found on any map.” Let’s reveal the mystery by visiting The Malgudi Days where we might spot Swami and ask him our doubts.

The Timeless Treasure Troves of Narayan; Image Source: Literary Theory and Criticism

Narayan wrote his first novel titled Swami and his Friends. Though this did not earn much appreciation from his family and book publishers, he went on to create a special world from this book, which is popularly known as Malgudi- a town full of happiness and memories of his childhood. This town has got quite popular among the literary circles. Often deemed as a fictional urban town in Southern India, some say that it is indeed a real place, while some others say that it is a beautiful fragment of RK’s world.

In one of his interviews, Swami had said that he saw a railway station and suddenly the name Malgudi popped into his mind. Not only this, but he made sure to make the place all the more realistic by giving it a slight touch of history. He has said that Lord Rama passed through this town in the epic Ramayana and Buddha too visited this town in his travels.

It was Saturday- the day when I can finally meet them. Born and brought up in an orphanage, I always found myself alone. I didn’t have my parents whom I could call Maa and Baba. I didn’t have a home where I could have a family waiting for me to come back from school. It was always lonely. But I had lots of friends in my orphanage with whom I celebrated my birthday, shared my experiences and stuff. As I grew up, Sister Avery made sure to provide me with everything that I needed. Soon, I got a scholarship from Harvard University and flew to foreign lands for getting my degree.

But I always felt that emptiness ringing in my heart, even when I had so many people around me who loved me unconditionally. I missed my country, I missed my orphanage, I missed my friends and Sister Avery. As soon as I returned to India, an amazing job offer was waiting for me. Deciding to take up the job, I shifted to Mumbai. I loved the work environment, the people, and the work culture. Soon, they transferred me to Delhi where I grew up. The orphanage where I spent my childhood was just a few kilometres from my house. I decided to visit it every Saturday.

The car finally came to halt. Today, I had got some gifts for the children since it’s my first visit. Stepping out of my car, I could see the same old theleywala uncle who sold bhutta and buddhi ke baal. Some children were running in front of the orphanage gate which was now rusted and made a rattling sound with the blowing wind. As usual, the security wale bhaiya was taking his usual afternoon nap. A soft smile spread across my face. Nothing has really in these years- the same old building with paint coming off in peels, the same old lawn whose grasses were never trimmed, and the same old dog who kept on barking incessantly on seeing anyone who passed in front of the gate.

Asking the driver to bring all the gifts, I slowly made my way towards my home. As I went near it, I could see Sister Avery knitting a sweater with her old wrinkled eyes trying to focus on inserting the needle in the small holes. As I entered the gate, she suddenly got up from her seat with a huge smile plastered on her face. I ran to her and she embraced me in a tight hug.

After some time, we finally settled in the dining hall with kids surrounding us from everywhere, eagerly waiting for their gifts. As I was giving the gifts, I saw a girl sitting on the stairs, staring into oblivion. After having our dinner, when everyone finally went back to sleep, I saw that girl still sitting outside. I went near her with a book titled Malgudi Days by R. K. Narayan in my hands.

Giving it to her, I received a cute smile in return. “Who is R. K. Narayan, Naina Di?”, she asked with curiosity lacing her voice. Getting excited about hearing this question, I cleared my throat and got ready to narrate the life story of my favourite author, Rasipuram Krishnaswami Iyer Narayanaswami aka R. K. Narayan.

This town changed his entire life as he progressed towards a path where all his books received undivided attention, not only by the publishers but his faithful readers.

“Di, did he not marry anyone?”, asked a small voice. Coming out of my la-la land, I gave a huge smile and replied, “Of course, dear. He did marry his lady love, Rajam who was just 15 years at the time of marriage. Once he went to his sister’s house for spending his vacation and saw Rajam. Entranced by her lovely character, he immediately fell in love with her and asked her hand for marriage from her father. It was after his marriage that all his novels were finally getting published. They lived a happy life for quite some time, but fate had to turn against him. Rajam died of typhoid in 1939, and her death pushed Narayan into a state of extreme sadness and depression. Though he did come out of it and continued his life, he couldn’t marry anyone else. That void stuck of Rajam with his last breath.”

Tears trickled from my eyes as I finished narrating the story of R. K. Narayan. “When I was of your age, I too wanted to become a successful woman who would excel in studies and get a good job. When I had nobody beside me, R. K. Narayan’s books gave me the love and support that I had always wanted. Today, I am giving you this book. Read it whenever you’re sad and feel lonely.”, I said with a sad expression on my face.

Hugging me tightly with her tiny arms wrapped around my frame, she held me tightly until the sun started showing its beautiful rays. We went back inside and before returning, I promised her to visit every Saturday along with Narayan’s books. I could see myself in her, and she could relate to my childhood.

R. K. Narayan's childhood was always extraordinary. With his out of ordinary family members, his life never took a boring turn. That day too was as usual busy for the Narayan family. Mr. Narayan was shouting for his children to get ready for school. With eight children, it was difficult to manage the household. But Mr. Narayan being a strict school headmaster of his very own school, discipline was never a problem. All the children completed most of their school years from their father’s school. Due to his job, Mr. Narayan had to bear the brunt of frequent transfers and unstable life. Not wanting Rasipuram to face trouble due to frequent shifting, he sent him to his maternal grandmother, Parvati.

Narayan’s stay at his grandmother’s influenced his life quite deeply. Staying in a village, amidst the serene environment, his time passed with his playmates which consisted of a peacock and a notorious monkey. Parvati gave him the nickname Kunjappa, a name that stuck to him like his second skin in the family circles. Parvati was closer to him as compared to his parents. Together, the grandmother-grandson duo would go on learning lessons from random subjects like arithmetic, mythology, classical Indian music, and Sanskrit. Focusing on local languages, his mother tongue, and Sanskrit, Iyer’s spoken English was always frowned upon. Though his entire clan spoke in English, the grammatical mistakes that Narayan made while speaking was disappointing for the entire family.

Growing up, Kunjappa always had this innate desire to learn, and his learning mostly included thick books and marvellous collections from the bookshelves of Dickens, Wodehouse, Arthur Conan Doyle, and Thomas Hardy. Often Thomas and Narayan are compared because of the provincial writing style that they adopted in most of their novels where they used elements that allowed people to relate with things that they saw in their everyday lives.

After a few years, Narayan moved with his parents to Mysore where he completed his college education. The heavily stacked libraries and his father’s interest in books ultimately pushes him into the world of books where he read endlessly for days together, and often forgot to complete his homework. As a result, Krishna failed to pass the university entrance and spent his entire year reading and writing. Later on, he did join the college for completing his Bachelor’s, but it took him four years to obtain his degree. One of his friends convinced him that pursuing his Master’s would ruin all his interest in literature. After endless discussions, he finally thought of becoming a school teacher, but this did not last for long as he left the school when the headmaster appointed him as a physical training master.

Quitting his job, Swami took to writing his profession. Staying at home and writing books to earn his living was quite out of the way for any normal person during those days, but he did not back out from the challenge that life served him. Initially, he did not earn much, but his below mediocre living style did not give him much trouble.