Customer Reviews

India - A Wounded Civilization

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(9)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

Nobody writes like V.S. Naipaul. Nobody. His visual descriptions of ordinary people always hit the nail on the head. His central theme is the vibrant, pulsating, intellectual Hindu civilization has been dominated for too long--first, and longest, by the Muslim invaders and second, most recently, by the English. After the initial burst of optimism following independance, India has faced one obstacle after another, turning inward, revealing a 'wounded civilization,' a stilted culture who doesn't know herself anymore or what made her great. I'm not sure if I'm smart enough to comment on this theme . . . it is sort of an impressionistic history that cannot be divined by ordinary historical models. Using his own methods of analysis, V.S. Naipaul may not be an ideal person to do this analysis because like Ghandi and Nehru he studied(and, in his case, was born)outside India. This theme of exile and what is learned is brought back again and again. Naipaul writes with vigor. His words are a joy to read and ponder over. In some ways this is his most personal book.

Perhaps it was the setting, for I read this book in its entirety on an overnight flight to Delhi where I was about to immerse myself in northern India for about a month. But it's a fantastic book that seemed to me throughout my journeys to be as relevant today as it was when it was published in 1976. There's no way to really explain India to someone from the west who's not been there, but V.S. Naipaul's writings are a glimpse into the hope and hopelessness that is India.

This is not academic work that tries to cover an issue from some kind of systematic methodology that is currently in fashion. Instead, it is an extremely dense essay by an original novelist on what makes India what it is: chaotic, without a sense of historical continuity - his contrast with the European narrative that moves from the Middle Ages through the Renaissance/Reformation and Enlightenment to the industrial democracies is absolutely fascinating and yet deliciously succinct - and struggling to forge a modern identity in the post-colonial independence. What the reader gets is an interpretation, the details of which (s)he must fill in or debate oneself. Naipaul even does brilliant literary criticism of contemporary Indian novels in this book to shed light on his ideas, which as anecdotal and quirky as they are are always interesting. Disagree we might, but he stimulates even in error. Even after almost 30 years from its original publication, this essay is worth the read, if only to explore the reasoning behind rejecting it (I couldn't totally).

Warmly recommended.

Most Indians don't seem to like Mr.Naipaul from what I hear about his very acrimonious literary workshops and press conferences in India. He has a reputation preceding him as 'not a very nice man' but a great writer. I had all this in mind when I opened to read this book(such a sharp title).

The book is written by some one who is intellectually a westerner(written from an unabashedly western stand point),and wants to understand and digest the Indian social & cultural scene to satisfy his probing mind. Naipaul does not accept convenient lies and soft answers in this quest.

The result is a remarkable book about India and about the attitudes and expectations of average Indians(one generation away from the closed social life of an extended family, caste, religion, region).Naipaul dissects the Indian psyche and pinpoints the muddy thinking and mythologising that is widely prevalent in the intellectual life of India. This book could be seen as a critique of the blindness of Indians to the 'real' world, who prefer to live and judge themselves and others through the myopic glass of perceived high culture of 'centuries of rich civilization'. Unlike any previous rendition of India, Naipaul has a familiar access to people and places and the perspective of an outside observer that is closed to Indians. He straddles this unique viewpoint successfully, making this a very revealing book on India. This book is never dry or trite but has a rich humanity to it, a cast of real people seen through the curious and sympathetic eye of Naipaul.

The book, to an Indian expat like me, was riveting.This book would have been an uncomfortable read for me in India. I would have failed to see the western ideals that Naipaul is grounded on and would have criticized him for trying to pull down an intellectual edifice under which I grew up and shared with everyone around me(with nothing else to take its place).

The book is one of the better studies on India and gives you a flavor of the Indian mind.
And what's more, it is a short book.

I picked up this book after reading Naipaul's AMONG THE BELIEVERS, which I thought to be an interesting view of the Muslim world, so often shrouded by polemic and ideology in this day and age. I am married to an Indian woman and have travelled in India, so I did not approach this book as a complete outsider.

First, one must acknowledge that Naipaul is an erudite individual who is able to craft a well-thought and well-phrased sentence, no doubt.

However, this book failed for me on several levels. It really provides more of a view of Naipaul's blighted view of India than India itself. I was reminded of reading Mailer's ARMIES OF THE NIGHT-- could he just scrap his all-encompassing generalizations and tell the story?

All-encompassing generalizations are especially distasteful when made by an outsider. Naipaul is undoubtedly an outsider in India, as he is only Indian by ethnicity and was born and raised in Trinidad. If this work had been written by an outsider of a different ethnicity, say a white man, I'm sure its scathing stereotypes would earn more abbhorence than approbation.

Just to recap some of these stereotypes: Indians are a backwards-looking people incapable of individuality and objectivity in the Western sense, as attested by an Indian psychoanalyst in the book. This is due largely to their overly strong bonds of religion and family. Naipaul blames Gandhi himself, the liberator of India, for this purported backwards religiosity.

Such gross overgeneralizations are a dangerous game. Indeed, they could apply just as easily to any other time and place-- say the Republican party and Christian conservatives of the U.S. itself-- were the biases of the author to so dictate. The biases are born of the author, not the nation. While I am not religious myself, Naipaul's wholesale dismissal of Hinduism and dharma reveal an author looking through a glass, darkly, rather than attempting to appreciate his subject on its on merits, on its own terms.

I can't really recommend this book. It actually made me doubt the objectivity and insight of AMONG THE BELIEVERS, since Naipaul's scathing dismissal of Islam and Hinduism seemed similarly all-encompassing. I really don't recommend it for people who don't know about or haven't been to India. If you want to know about India, go yourself.

its sheer cause it cuts, but what this guy has said is
true.
Dont buy this book if you are looking a fluffy travelouge
Naipaul's best gift is presenting complex human emotions
in a simple fashion. I like his non fiction better, but
thats because the matter he covers in his interviews.
Check out his 2 books on traveling through islamic countries also. They dont pertain to india but the psyche of a lot of characters is the same.
A lot of his writing has to do with his age. He is 70+ and
non-white. His generation had high hopes for the 'civilizations'
recovering from colonial-imperial-racial oppressions and joining
to create a global civilization. But the road has not been easy.
"Are the former colonies better off now ?" This is the question
that he is allways asking. I am in my 20's and naipauls literature helped me see the world in an honest non-delusional way. I recommend this to younger readers because when people
his generations are gone and the cultures will eventualy change,his work will serve as an educational link to learn the emotions at work in day to day working of those individuals.

This book remains probably the best external perspective on India.

India is in constant trauma-of one kind or the other. This trauma does not give Indians any time to pause and look at themselves objectively. Therefore, the task falls on some one like Naipaul.

Naipaul claims he does not belong to Indis but his ancestors do. However, he becomes insider- journeying through India. The sensitivity he shows, praise he showers on what he believes is good (for example Kannada book "Samskara") and then stinging criticism...no one is spared.... Mahatma Gandhi, R K Narayan, Vinoba Bhave,Shiv Sena. In the end he 'belongs', he is never a Sahib,never condescending.

Wonderful and humbling experience.......

Sir Vidyadhar is perhaps one of the most brilliant writers of English, as to prose style and thoughtful, philosophical content. However, when it comes to writing about his ancestral land, India, his arrogance is only exceeded by his ignorance. He speaks no Indian language, does not understand the culture and thinks of himself as a Brown saheeb (British gentleman). He could probably demolish me and my criticisms in a minute of aptly termed Oxford phrases, but would that be worth it, for selling himself as a brilliant toady. I feel safe writing this as I doubt he will get to read it and if he does, he will be too arrogant to care and ditto for his devotees. I have to admit I am one of them. Peace, love and light from a man in his seventies, older than Sir V.

India: A Wounded Civilization is my first book by V.S. Naipaul. While Naipaul's skills as a writer are extremely impressive, it is hard to believe that someone can define all the ills of a country as vast and complicated as India based on observations from two or three trips. It is true that Naipaul is of Indian ancestry, but his ancestors had left India over a hundred years ago, a time long enough, by his own admission, to wash him clean of most Indian religious attitudes.

The main target of Naipaul's diatribe in this book are the Hindus in India who, as per him, have suffered irreparable damage to intellectual capacity and have lost the ability to regenerate because of a thousand years of invasions and conquests. It is a Hindu's blind faith in `karma' and his inclination to retreat into his own isolated, private sanctuary which enables him to accept and also, occasionally, glorify the poverty and distress around him, and in his own life. By Naipaul's logic, Muslims - who constitute fourteen percent of India's population and do not suffer from the afflictions of Hinduism - should be much better off. The reality is that the plight of Muslims in India is similar to that of the Hindus, if not worse.

Naipaul does, however, raise a number of pertinent and valid points which Indians would do well to heed to. The inability of many Indians, especially in smaller places, to let go of the desire to go back to some glorious past makes them skeptical of the advancements in modern technology and its benefits. The inept and corrupt politicians do not help the matter by promoting and exploiting such sentiments. The fact that time and money was spent on a study to improve the performance of bullock carts (which, as per Naipaul, can be as expensive as second hand cars in England) by ten percent is both sad and comical. The strong feelings of caste and certain dehumanizing practices have also hampered the growth of rural India.

Reading this book one gets the impression that Naipaul's castigation of the miseries of India is not done with the glee or snobbery of an outsider looking in, but rather with the anger and agony of someone who is clearly disturbed by what he has seen. This book was written in 1976. In the last thirty years India has made rapid strides forward. If Naipaul were to write a book on India today, it would be interesting to see if his views are any different.

Naipauls premise here is shattering. Using the considerable literary talents at his disposal, he unravels a sordid picture of a nation historically and ideologically preprogrammed to run aground at every level.Unfortunately the evidence with which he carefully chooses to back up his grand denouement, is decidedly shoddy. Granted this is not a scholarly work, but the staggering conclusions that he draws from his pot pourri of annecdotal and other seemingly(not uninteresting) arbitrary sources beg at the very least some objectivity. Using cases in point as disparate as Gandhi's memoirs, the works of R.K. Narayan and a Sudhir Kakkars dubious interpretation of the indian psyche - he preselects his mottoes and offers ready explanations. In the chaotic orchestration that ensues, Mr. Naipaul succeeds only in muddying the waters. One can sense Naipauls involvement here - he really does care. At best he affords us tantalizing questions; at worst he ends up looking like a pompous, opinionated colonial posterboy. Highly recommended.