- Hardcover: 256 pages
- Publisher: WW Norton (Feb 1 2001)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0393050424
- ISBN-13: 978-0393050424
- Product Dimensions: 24.4 x 16.4 x 2.8 cm
- Shipping Weight: 658 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (80 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #1,695,187 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Details |
Product Description
From Amazon
The title of Manil Suri's first novel gets right to the point. His protagonist, having purchased the right to sleep on the ground-floor landing of a Bombay apartment house, slips slowly from a coma into death. As this aging alcoholic takes leave of the earth, his neighbors surround him, arguing over who gave Vishnu a few dried chapatis, who called the doctor for him, and who will pay for the ambulance to cart him away. Meanwhile, the hero of The Death of Vishnu is lost in memories. Drifting through increasingly vivid scenes from his past, he recalls his relatively rare snatches of love and joy--and especially his romance with Padmini, a self-involved prostitute. On one particular day, it seems, he stole one of his employer's cars and drove his love interest to the honeymoon town of Lonavala, where he showered her with gifts and finally lifted her veil to kiss her like a bride:
Then the absurdity of the situation strikes him. The preposterousness of his images, the foolishness of his feelings, the comicality of chasing currents that skim across Padmini's face. He thinks how absurd this whole trip has been, how absurd is the presence of the two of them in Lonavala, how absurd is the scenery itself that stretches before them. He thinks of poor, ridiculous Mr. Jalal, waiting back in Bombay for his Fiat, and of how Padmini will react when he asks her to buy them petrol so they can get back.Vishnu also recalls his secret passion for Kavita Asrani, the beautiful teenage daughter of one of the families for whom he works. Given the protagonist's focus on his hapless love life, the scope of Suri's dazzling debut may appear narrow. However, the apartment house upon whose floor Vishnu spends his final hours functions as a microcosm of Indian society. It helps to know even a smattering about Hindu mythology or India's religious conflicts. But even if you don't, there is plenty to relish in The Death of Vishnu, with its comical, richly drawn characters, loving attention to the details of everyday life, and provocative exploration of destiny and free will. --Regina Marler
From Publishers Weekly
Visualizing a village, a hotel or an apartment building as a microcosm of society is not a new concept to writers, but few have invested their fiction with such luminous language, insight into character and grasp of cultural construct as Suri does in his debut. The inhabitants of a small apartment building in Bombay are motivated by concerns ranging from social status to spiritual transcendence while their alcoholic houseboy, Vishnu, lies dying on the staircase landing. During a span of 24 hours, Vishnu's body becomes the fulcrum for a series of crises, some tragic, some farcical, that reflect both the folly and nobility of human conduct. To the perpetually quarreling first-floor tenants, Mrs. Pathak and Mrs. Asrani, Vishnu is a recipient of grudging charity and casual calumny; each justifies her refusal to pay for his hospitalization. Though locked in perpetual bickering, the women are united in their prejudice against their upstairs neighbors, the Jahals, who are Muslims. While Mr. Jahal seeks to test his intellectual agnosticism by seeking spiritual enlightenment, his son, Samil, and the Asranis' spoiled, willful daughter, Kavita, prepare to defy their families by running away together. On the third floor, reclusive widower Vinod Taneja still mourns his young wife, Sheetal; their story of tentative love blossoming into deep devotion and truncated by early death is an exquisite cameo of a marital relationship. Interspersed are Vishnu's lyrically rendered thoughts as his soul leaves his body and begins a slow ascent of the apartment stairs, rising through the stages of existence as he relives memories of his gentle mother and his passion for the prostitute Padmina. Suril has a discerning eye for human foibles, an empathetic knowledge of domestic interaction and an instinctive understanding of the caste-nuanced traditions of Indian society. The excesses of life in that countryDthe oppressive heat, the mixture of superstitions and religious fanaticism, the social crueltyDpermeate the atmospheric narrative. By turns charming and funny, searing and poignant, dramatic and farcical, this fluid novel is an irresistible blend of realism, mysticism and religious metaphor, a parable of the universal conditions of human life. Agent, Nicole Aragi. (Jan.)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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First Sentence
NOT WANTING TO arouse Vishnu in case he hadn't died yet, Mrs. Asrani tiptoed down to the third step above the landing on which he lived, teakettle in hand. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt
NOT WANTING TO arouse Vishnu in case he hadn't died yet, Mrs. Asrani tiptoed down to the third step above the landing on which he lived, teakettle in hand. Read the first page
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Most helpful customer reviews
1.0 out of 5 stars
Dwindling patience,
By Zsuzsa Schuster (NY United States) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Death Of Vishnu: A Novel (Paperback)
Normally I am a patient person who can sit through even the most daunting of books, but not this one. The book began quite well and seemed to be turning into quite the spiritual experience (in reference to Vishnu's "flashbacks"). Somewhere along the way the self absorbed inhumane characters began testing my patience at every turn. My anxiety increased until I decided that if I tried to read the whole book I may start believing that hitting myself over the head with it may be less frustrating than "watching" these people bicker over the mundane details of their hopelessly dead end lives instead of recognizing the true spirituality in life and death, as Vishnu is finally doing (in his death, which I guess is supposed to be the author's attempt at irony????). One the whole I would not recommend this book, save for the first half. (FYI I did read the whole thing just so I could write this and my worst fears became reality, it didnt get any better)
5.0 out of 5 stars
Fabulous,
By San (San Jose, CA USA) - See all my reviews
This review is from: The Death Of Vishnu: A Novel (Paperback)
The Death of Vishnu has become one of my absolute favorite novels. Although some reviews have called its characters a representative microcosm of India, I believe the message is much simpler and much broader than that. This is a book about human nature, in all its ugliness and glory. The characters are superbly well drawn--sometimes they come across as despicable, other times sympathetic, but they are always heartbreakingly real. Watch how all thier seemingly altruistic acts have selfish human motives behind them and you will recognize yourself. One of the nicest things about this book is the odd little quirks that Manil Suri gives his characters. Mr. Jalal (my favorite) trying to burn himself with pink candles in order to achieve spiritual enlightment, Mrs. Pathak serving kraft cheese as a foreign delicacy, Kavita's obsession with Hindi films, Sheetal's dying wish to make it into the Guiness Book of World Records...and of course Vishnu, who starts to wonder if he might be god. It's a rich tapestry, and so very different from anything I've ever read before...Despite the aimless nature of the plot, the novel still built up a great deal of suspense at the end, and unlike most supposedly "suspenseful" stories I honestly had no idea how everything was going to turn out. And when I finally finished it I was left with a greater understanding of how human beings can be so horrible in so many little ways. I believe this is a book everyone would benefit from reading, not just people specifically interested in India or Indian fiction. However, it should be noted that there is a great deal of Hindu mythology in this book. Being Indian myself I was familiar with most of it, but other readers might want to get a little background information beforehand.
5.0 out of 5 stars
A superb social novel by a gifted, ambitious writer,
By OmnivorousReader (Chelsea, MI United States) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Death Of Vishnu A Novel (Hardcover)
First off, let me confess that I was predisposed to like this book. I've been enjoying the latter-day Golden Age of South Asian literature for some time now, and I picked up Mr. Suri's novel with the expectation that it would be filled with colorful characters, comical arguments, and telling details of domestic life, all conveyed in exuberant prose. Such elements are de rigeur in post-Rushdie Indian fiction, and if those are what you're after, The Death of Vishnu does not disappoint.Indeed, after the first few chapters, I had settled in for what I fully expected to be a somewhat predictable read about a battle of wits between two middle-aged couples over what to do with the dying Vishnu, interspersed with scenes from the dying man's life. But then the book took some unexpected and delightful turns and became much better in the process. New characters were introduced who complicated all the various relationships and greatly expanded the social reach of the novel; Vishnu's spirit separated from his body and started to climb the stairs; a few of the characters' fascination and identification with film stars became increasingly pronounced; things started to get, shall we say, a little trippy. (Believe me, I'm not giving away anything here.) Toward the end, as the book becomes by turns suspenseful, mythic and surreal, I could not stop turning the pages. As I write this, it's been a couple of weeks since I finished the book, and I still find myself flashing on particular scenes, as if I'd seen them happening before my eyes. (Try to go to sleep after reading the description of the man dangling by his fingertips off the edge of a balcony--go ahead, try!) Unlike most first novelists, Suri does not even attempt to resolve all of the plot issues by the end of the novel--indeed, he leaves one woman's story in particular agonizingly unsettled--but nevertheless the book left me with a remarkable sense of completeness. That is the mark of a truly gifted writer, which Manil Suri surely is, and I look forward to his second novel with bated breath.
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