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Coolie (Penguin Twentieth-Century Classics)

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Aparajito is sequel to Pather Panchali. You have to read Aparijito if you liked Pather Panchali. Satyajit Ray's film Apartijito and Apur Sansar look like patchy collages compared to the treatment of characters in the novels.

Aparajito starts with Apu's adult struggles in city life. You would expect the character to somehow come over the unending series of tragedy that he goes through, but Bibhutibhushan takes his time, like a life really running its urban grind. I kept peeking through latter pages to see if Apu was ever going to have that happy turn of events that novels are supposed to have. But what you get is not a tale but Apu's own experience of slow discovery of beauty in life. There is no story. There is only a character that refuses to give in, that lives "lives" of drudgery, passion, freedom with the adamant spirit of a crusader. Nothing earth-shattering except the will to believe that life is and will be what he wants to see it as, not what the city has defined for others.

Gopa Majumdar's choice of words is decidedly British, and therefore, at some points, knots the easy flow of the passages. Nevertheless, the beauty of the original seems to come through the translation because the strength of the book is not in the language used but in the detailed exploration of its charming charcater, Apu.

As the title of the book implies, the book is truly about an unvanquished soul. Inspite of all the adversities he has had to face, Apu's soul is not defeated. I wouldn't want to spoil your enjoyment by waxing eloquent over it, Read it, you are going to be moved beyond words.