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kamila79 's review for:
A Fine Balance
by Rohinton Mistry
Rohinton Mistry’s “A Fine Balance” may well be the best Indian novel I have ever read, and I’ve read quite a few. Magnificence of his writing made reading this over 600-pages-long book a breeze, even though the reality described is terribly bleak.
The story is set in the 1970s India, in an unnamed village as well as city (we can guess though that it is Bombay). We follow four main characters. Dina, in her mid-40s, is renting a room to a college student Maneck, the son of her school friend. She became a widow early and doesn’t want her brother’s charity, preferring to earn her income herself. She hires two tailors, Ishvar and his young nephew Omprakash, to sew clothes which she gets commissioned for. Dina and Maneck belong to the Parsi community, whereas two tailors are Dalits, escaping the occupation that their caste prescribes. The reader learns about the past of each character, as well as many minor figures in the novel, and discovers what life under Indira Gandhi’s regime was like. I couldn’t avoid comparisons with Tolstoy when it comes to the broad, kaleidoscopic scope of the story, character development and the level of attention to detail. All absolutely masterful.
Many times while reading I reminisced about my own travels to India and everything I saw and lived through in that country. For me reading Mistry was a deeply personal experience and made me ponder on the notion of fate vs. accident, determinism and free will. Everyone who knows a little about India is aware of how the system of oppression works there when combined with the caste system, political corruption and greed. Mistry illustrates it on numerous examples excellently. In spite of how much tragedies afflicting the characters need to be understood to be accepted, this is a novel to be felt. Its power is immense. Upon reading the last sentence and closing the book I felt a profound sense of loss and despair, and I cried - it may sound pathetically, my apologies - over the condition of humanity. A little empathy goes a long way and yet I feel that for some extending it to others is a luxury they seem to be unable to afford.
The story is set in the 1970s India, in an unnamed village as well as city (we can guess though that it is Bombay). We follow four main characters. Dina, in her mid-40s, is renting a room to a college student Maneck, the son of her school friend. She became a widow early and doesn’t want her brother’s charity, preferring to earn her income herself. She hires two tailors, Ishvar and his young nephew Omprakash, to sew clothes which she gets commissioned for. Dina and Maneck belong to the Parsi community, whereas two tailors are Dalits, escaping the occupation that their caste prescribes. The reader learns about the past of each character, as well as many minor figures in the novel, and discovers what life under Indira Gandhi’s regime was like. I couldn’t avoid comparisons with Tolstoy when it comes to the broad, kaleidoscopic scope of the story, character development and the level of attention to detail. All absolutely masterful.
Many times while reading I reminisced about my own travels to India and everything I saw and lived through in that country. For me reading Mistry was a deeply personal experience and made me ponder on the notion of fate vs. accident, determinism and free will. Everyone who knows a little about India is aware of how the system of oppression works there when combined with the caste system, political corruption and greed. Mistry illustrates it on numerous examples excellently. In spite of how much tragedies afflicting the characters need to be understood to be accepted, this is a novel to be felt. Its power is immense. Upon reading the last sentence and closing the book I felt a profound sense of loss and despair, and I cried - it may sound pathetically, my apologies - over the condition of humanity. A little empathy goes a long way and yet I feel that for some extending it to others is a luxury they seem to be unable to afford.