A good novel is one that stays with you long after you’ve turned the last page, its characters walking around in your head repeating snatches of dialogue and disappearing into dark doorways only to return a moment later to do it all over again. Stories that are populated with more characters than we might run into on a crowded train journey can be confusing, making you flip back and forth to fix in your mind their names and relationships and places in a typically complex narrative.
Ocean Rimmed World by R N Joe D’Cruz (translated from the Tamil Aazhi Soozh Ulagu by G Geetha) is both these things. It is, as Shiv Vishwanathan notes in his context-setting foreword, “an epic act of storytelling”, a narrative thread—no, cord—spanning more than half a century, and delving deep into the life of the fishing village of Aamanthurai in Thoothukudi district.
The Parathavars—or Paravars—of coastal Tamil Nadu are a community of seafarers and pearl fishermen known for their expertise in building kattamarans and weaving strong cotton nets that trap fish without wounding them. The village of Aamanthurai is part of this sea-face, located somewhere between Rameswaram and Thoothukudi, an area often affected by cyclones.
The story opens on a monsoon evening when three fishermen from the village—Gothra Pillai, Soosaiyar, and the young Siluvai—are caught by a huge tidal wave and cast out into deep waters, hanging on to their lives on a log, all that is left of their once-sturdy kattamaran. Their struggle on the sea is chronicled intermittently in spells through the book, with the main narrative progressing on a sweeping arc over half a century, from 1930 to 1985.
In places, the book reads almost like an anthropological work, with its “thick descriptions” of the net weaving and boat making, the intricate ways in which the Catholic Church is tied into the fabric of the village, and the dynamics of family and community relationships. There is treachery and infidelity, grand tragedy and petty quarrels, and all the emotive ingredients needed to move a plot along.
The story itself, however, is as simple as it is grand. The sea is a constant, living presence; it takes life, but it also sustains it. In the 50 years we accompany the Aamanthurai folk through their ups and downs, watch them inside their kitchens and on their thinnais, their lives unfold against the backdrop of the larger national and regional movements of the times.
News of Gandhi’s ‘salt satyagraha’ resonates keenly in the village, as salt is a big part of this coastal economy. In the 1950s, the youth of the village are fired up by the Dravidian movement. And in 1964, they are touched by the devastation of the cyclone that swept away an entire village—Dhanushkoti—and a trainload of passengers travelling from Chennai to Colombo by the once-famous Indo-Ceylon rail link.
We meet, among others in a large cast; Thomanthirai, the master boat builder; Kagu Samiyar, the beloved parish priest of Anthonyar Koil, or the Church of St Anthony of Padua; Gabriel, the lapsed seminarian; Eskalyn, his brave and steadfast—but much wronged —wife; Mary and Thokalatha, whose large-heartedness provides refuge to those orphaned by the sea; and Oomaiyan, the refugee who loses his tongue in the first wave of anti-Tamil violence in Sri Lanka.
We learn about the everyday heroism of the fisherfolk who brave the unpredictable and treacherous sea, and the stoicism of their women, about a way of life that continues to be invisible to those who live in different realms.
The translation is particularly loving; it retains the colour of the local Tamil dialect that allows us to hear, smell, and taste the sense of Aamanthurai. As the translator herself notes, “The fishermen’s speech—pungent and piquant as the roasted karuvadu they so love to eat—was a difficult act to follow in English.” But while something may be lost in translation, much is always gained.
Ocean Rimmed World is not an easy book to read. It demands commitment, and close attention as the details can sometimes keep you from grasping the flow of events. But in the end, it is worth it. Much like the conch which whispers its memory of the sea when you hold it close to the ear, the people of Aamanthurai stay with you, their stories lapping at the edges of your consciousness… long after you’ve turned the last page.