U.R. Anantha Murthy (1932–2014)

A very difficult book for me. Not because of the writing, which is mostly clear and unambiguous, but because of the treatment. On the surface, it’s the journey (both literal and figurative) of an acharya (a Brahmin scholar/teacher) in a small village where an apostate Brahmin dies. The title is a Sanskrit word with multiple meanings and nuances; indeed, the epigraph is a transcription from an old dictionary defining the word that means everything from “rite of passage” to “moment of recognition”…and much more. Should the dead man be buried and accorded all the rights (and rites) of a Brahmin, notwithstanding his clear rejection of all that being a Brahmin entailed? The issue deeply divides the other Brahmins in the village but it demands an answer as the dead body lies unburied and begins to rot.
As the acharya whom the village turns to wrestles with the “correct” answer according to the religious and philosophical texts, more and more people are falling sick and dying: a plague has struck the area. On one hand, the issue is clear: do we, as a community, elevate form (rite and ritual) over substance (humanity)? On the other, our protagonist has his own personal issues. How good must one be? While the larger issues are clear, the story is so deeply embedded in expositions of classic texts (like the Veda) and Vedanta philosophy are to be very hard to follow at some points. It is, by all accounts, a world classic; the notes were generally helpful although I found it very difficult to follow some parts as Anantha Murthy has a weakness for introducing (and then dropping) obscure and arcane (to me, anyway) fine points of Brahmin obligations.… (lisätietoja)

The blurb tells me that Samskara, a Rite for a Dead Man is a classic of modern Indian literature but I bought it when the author U.R. Ananthamurthy (1932-2014) was a finalist for the 2013 Man Booker International Prize. In this edition the novella is only 118 pages long, but it offers plenty to think about and I’m not surprised that it enjoyed critical acclaim as well as popularity when it was first published in India in 1965.
The Translator’s Note tells us that Samskara is a religious novella about a decaying Brahmin colony in a Karnataka village, an allegory rich in realistic detail. That doesn’t sound immediately appealing, but the story absorbed me almost immediately. A dilemma arises when a man has died and the Brahmin religious rites must be performed – but he has no son and none of the Brahmins want to sully themselves by doing it for him because he was a bad man who had flaunted his sinfulness for a long time. And while the community deliberates over this, it is forbidden for any of the adults to eat, and what’s worse, the body is putrefying and making the whole village smell.
Naranappa’s sins are drinking alcohol, taking an ‘unclean’ woman as his lover, and breaking numerous taboos such as throwing a sacred stone into the temple pool. There’s no doubt that he’s been provocative, and he’s been a very bad influence on the next generation too. However, Naranappa remains a Brahmin despite all this because unless he is excommunicated he remains a Brahmin all his life – and Praneshacharya, (the spiritual leader of the community) never took that step because Naranappa had threatened to convert to Islam if he did. Under the new secular laws of the Congress, Naranappa cannot be evicted from his house, so the presence of a Muslim among them would mean that they would all have to leave their nice houses and comfortable way of life in order to stay ‘pure’.
When I discussed this conundrum with The Spouse who is a student of philosophy, he thought that the solution was simple. The risks to public health outweigh religious scruples: cremate the body and be done with it. (And that, in fact is eventually what happens, though the Brahmins don’t know it and go on agonising about it.) But it’s not as simple as that for people of faith. The problem for them, at heart, is the Brahmin fear of ‘polluting’ themselves because that would interfere with whatever karma they’ve accumulated towards their next reincarnation. (Karma is the universal causal law by which good or bad actions determine the future modes of an individual’s existence). Praneshacharya has spent his whole life in self-sacrifice in preparation for his next rebirth, and failing to live in accordance with his dharma puts that at risk. (Dharma means law, duty, code of conduct, righteousness, and rules.) (To put it crudely, he could plummet from being a highly respected sanyasi to being reborn as an Untouchable, or worse, some kind of despised insect…)
However, Samskara is not a simple religious parable. Praneshacharya is not the noble holy man that he seems to be.

To read the rest of my review please visit https://anzlitlovers.com/2018/04/19/samskara-a-rite-for-a-dead-man-by-u-r-ananth...… (lisätietoja)