A Passage Through India

Spuyten Duyvil, 1998-12-01. Paperback. Very Good. Spuyten Duyvil [Published date: 1998]. Soft cover, 182 pp. Stated First Edition. In very good condition. Glossy black and white pictorial paper covers have light bumping to edges and corners of covers and light overall scuffing Binding tight. Light age spotting to edges of text block. Otherwise pages are clean and unmarked. NOT Ex-library. NO remainder marks. [From Foreword] Soon after I arrived in India, Mr. Mankekar, the man whose house I lived in, teased me with a cautionary observation: ââ¬ÅIf a writer visits India for two or three weeks, he writes a book. If he spends a few months here, he writes an article. If he lives in India for a year, he writes nothing.ââ¬Â I lived in India for a year and, though my narrative may appear to ignore Mr. Mankekar s words, I think Iââ¬â¢ve abided by the spirit of his sensible warning. India is overwhelming. Foreigners often feel a strong, sometimes panicky impulse to impose reassuring order on this disorderly place; they seem compelled to ââ¬Åunderstandââ¬Â India, to spout explanations, solemn generalizations, and specious insights. Yet the longer one remains, the more one sees of India, the more arbitrary and meaningless interpreting India becomes. One of the prevailing issues in E.M. Forsterââ¬â¢s A Passage To India is the very matter Mr. Mankekar put before me: the urgent effort outsiders make to get a grip on thingsââ¬â a venture that can be comic, sad, disturbing, and finally, quite futile. In a sense, I wrote ââ¬ÅA Passage Through Indiaââ¬Â as an antidote to this impulse to comprehend the incomprehensible. If there is one lasting impression I hold of India, itââ¬â¢s how often I was swept up in situations I never anticipated. India surprised and baffled me; it delighted me; it wore on my nervesââ¬âat times, it broke my heart. Again and again, it jarred loose rich, unexpected feelings.The way people addressed elemental needs and eventsââ¬âeating, sleeping, play, labor, prayer, commerce, deathââ¬â often seemed wondrously new, inexplicable, worthy of the deepest respect. As a teacher, Iââ¬â¢d been brought to India to speak to people, but I learned the importance of silence, of observing and listening. And I learned to value the unknown. From all this there emerged a sharpened awareness of the absurd yet paradoxically valuable project of travel: our stubborn wish to make sense of our fleeting passage through life.