The Man Who Would Not See
Page 27
As someone who wrote this novel while being a stay-at-home parent, I have deep gratitude to express towards the many outstanding carers who looked after our daughter during my writing hours: Mandie Pfister over the past five years, and more recently alongside her the amazing teachers at Whare Kea and at Karori Normal School, especially Helena Henley. If I can write with complete concentration and peace of mind, it’s largely because of you all.
Thank you to Tore Hayward for being such a great friend both to me and to my writing; to Chhotidi for answering my medical questions; to Damien Wilkins, Emily Perkins and Kapka Kassabova for the generosity of their responses at an important time; and to Doug and Ann for all the ways, big and small, in which they support my work. And to my early readers — Ma, Baba and Sasha — I have another great debt to acknowledge. Thank you for always allowing me to draw on whatever I need to from our shared life to turn into my fiction. This incredible openness and generosity of spirit are only two of the countless forms that your love takes.
And the final thank you to our Leela, who may bear some slight resemblance to little Mira. It is no exaggeration to say that this book is mostly underpinned by you.
Rajorshi Chakraborti is an Indian-born novelist, essayist and short story writer. He was born in 1977 in Calcutta, and grew up there and in Bombay. He has also lived and studied in Canada, England and Scotland, and now lives with his family in Wellington, New Zealand.
Rajorshi is the author of five novels and a collection of short fiction. Or the Day Seizes You was shortlisted for the Crossword Book Award in 2006, one of the best-known prizes for English-language writing in India. Mumbai Rollercoaster received an honourable mention in the Children’s Writing category of the Crossword Book Awards 2011.
Rajorshi has also published reviews, short stories and essays in several periodicals and anthologies. His story ‘Knock, Knock’ won second prize in the 2011 Sunday Star-Times Short Story Awards. He belongs to the Write Where You Are Trust in Wellington, and is currently part of a team offering creative-writing classes at the men’s and women’s prisons in the region.
For more on Rajorshi’s work, please visit www.rajorshichakraborti.com.
Praise for Rajorshi Chakraborti
‘Chakraborti possesses the gift of good storytelling.’
— The Telegraph, India.
‘Among the most distinctive Indian English novelists of his generation.’ — Time Out, India.
‘Chakraborti [is] an ambitious writer, bravely traversing vast spaces, literal and metaphysical, committed to developing original structures and ideas.’ — Edinburgh Review, UK.
‘Ambitious and challenging metafiction; […] will fascinate readers who enjoy Haruki Murakami.’ — Booklist, USA.
‘The images, descriptions are cinematic. […] The language in Rajorshi’s books glides smoothly, the twists and turns between reality and a fictional dream-like haze. […] Rajorshi talks of exile, of journeys, that everyone is haunted by a past, “losses and scars […], struggling to survive until they can come home”.’ — The Hindu, India.
‘[Chakraborti] revels in the kind of noir-ish realism which works brilliantly for a Murakami or an Auster, while sharing their predilection for the surreal, especially when said surrealism is tucked away into the interstices of his characters’ lives.
‘Since his dazzling debut, Chakraborti has embarked on one of the most interesting career trajectories seen in recent times.’ — The Sunday Guardian, India.
‘Chakraborti ought to be appreciated for his capability of taking the commonplace and creating intriguing and thoughtful stories. The multi-layered tales, mostly of desolation, grief and love are weaved with such uncommon twists and turns that the reader cannot help but sympathise with the “lost men”.’ — Deccan Herald, India.
‘Chakraborti is among the most interesting writers now operating in Indian fiction.’ — Tehelka, India.
PENGUIN
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Penguin is an imprint of the Penguin Random House group of companies, whose addresses can be found at global.penguinrandomhouse.com.
First published by Penguin Random House New Zealand, 2018
Text © Rajorshi Chakraborti, 2018
The moral right of the author has been asserted.
All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
Design by Rachel Clark © Penguin Random House New Zealand
Illustration by starline/pinnacleanimates/Freepik
James Baldwin quote on pages 6 and 208 has been reproduced with the kind permission of the James Baldwin Estate.
Cover image by Alexandra Lande/Shutterstock.com
Fern insert by iStock.com/Ray Hems
Author photograph by Sasha Calhoun
Prepress by Image Centre Group
A catalogue record for this book is available from the National Library of New Zealand.
ISBN: 978-0-14-377179-1
THE BEGINNING
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