Perumal Murugan who, in 2015, declared himself “dead” in a Facebook post, in an act of “literary suicide”, following the right-wing attack on his novel Maadhorubagan (One Part Woman), is back in news. He has become the first Tamil author whose novel Pyre (originally titled Pookuzhi) has been longlisted for this year’s International Booker Prize.
Translated into English by Anirudhhan Vasudevan, it is the tragic story of a newlywed inter-caste couple, Saroja and Kumaresan, who, unaware of the extent of the consequences of their marriage, decide to move to the latter’s village. Though it is clear, right from the beginning, that this union is headed towards a dark turn, Perumal’s thrilling style of writing keeps the reader hooked till the
end. The solid and pithy narrative is vociferous and moving.
Both keep the details of their marriage a secret initially, but being his parent’s only son, Kumaresan is confident that at least his mother would eventually accept his decision. But, to his disappointment, his
family and the entire village turn against them, with not just humiliating Saroja every step of the
way, but practically chasing them away for lying in the first place.
Interestingly, Murugan does not go into the details of the couple’s caste––whether Kumaresan is from a higher caste than Saroja’s is unclear. All the author reveals is that her father and brother work in the leather industry, and his community does not allow intermingling with people of other castes. It is likely that the decision was to avoid a protracted controversy, something which mired One Part Woman.
The depiction of the complexity of the relationship between Saroja and Kumaresan’s mother, Marayi, is also where the book shines. The author paints a vivid and relatable portrait of the two women who come from distinct experiences. Yet, they are similar in their desires, frustrations and fears, and most of all, their longing for Kumaresan. While Marayi believes her son has been “bewitched” by his wife, for Saroja, he is her oasis in the desert of a village that refuses to accept her as their own.
A typical component of Murugan’s novels—Poonachi, A Lonely Harvest, Trial by Silence––is their agrestic setting, inspired by a life he is familiar with. Another aspect is the weaving in of local traditional and religious rituals. In Pyre, the author has retained the rustic rural milieu, but it is more contemporary thematically, particularly in the social issue of caste-discrimination it tackles. His words pierce the heart and the reader awaits the culmination with bated breath. The ending is, in fact, quite Murugan-esque in the way that it has the possibility of multiple endings.
Murugan is known for his brevity. He is not the kind of writer that draws a sentence for half a page, clausing it with philosophical digressions. His prose is far from prolix. Instead, his writing is subtle and sublime, a quality Vasudevan seamlessly takes to while translating. He, however, admits that the more succinct-than-usual prose of Pyre makes it a “challenging” book to translate, although for a reader, who doesn’t have the original to compare with, will find the writing fluid and supple.
Pyre’s nomination for the Booker Prize is another prestigious moment for Indian literature, after Geetanjali Shree’s Tomb of Sand bagged the award last year. Its win, of course, depends on multiple factors, but one thing is certain that the world is recognising the brilliance of the country’s regional literature, of which Murugan is one of the finest ambassadors.