Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard | Kiran Desai

Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard | Kiran Desai | Happiness Comes in Doing Your Own Thing

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Hullabaloo in the ...

	Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard Kiran Desai Anchor, 1999 - 224 pages average customer review:based on 48 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Sampath Chawla was born in a time of drought that ended with a vengeance the night of his birth. All signs being auspicious, the villagers triumphantly assured Sampath's proud parents that their son was destined for greatness.

Twenty years of failure later, that unfortunately does not appear to be the case. A sullen government worker, Sampath is inspired only when in search of a quiet place to take his nap. "But the world is round," his grandmother says. "Wait and see! Even if it appears he is going downhill, he will come up the other side. Yes, on top of the world. He is just taking a longer route." No one believes her until, one day, Sampath climbs into a guava tree and becomes unintentionally famous as a holy man, setting off a series of events that spin increasingly out of control. A delightfully sweet comic novel that ends in a raucous bang, Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard is as surprising and entertaining as it is beautifully wrought.

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A delightful novel

This is the story of Sampath "Good Fortune" Chawla, an idle young man who spends many hours dreaming in the tea stalls and singing to himself in public gardens of Shahkot. At the post office he spends time reading the mail instead of working and soon loses his job. Then he decides to take permanent residence in the fork of a guava tree in a marvellous orchard upon a hillside and become a hermit. Unfortunately his family quickly realise that Sampath could make their fortune and so a stream of worshipers start visiting Sampath's tree, asking for blessing while his parents, in a nearby tea stall, sell flower garlands, fruit, incense and souvenirs.
In a witty and sharp prose Ms Desai mocks pious devotion, official incompetence, domestic tiffs, young love, marriage customs, sacred monkeys and the novel is a delightfully funny satire of the customs of India.

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Happiness Comes in Doing Your Own Thing

Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard is the old sixties message of "do your own thing" brought to bear in rural India. That nation is still bound by caste and class consciousness that places strong limits on what each person may and may not do. Naturally, the truly talented may transcend those limits, but what about the rest of us?

To explore that point, Kiran Desai provides us with the least likely hero you've ever met, Sampath Chawla, who combines the simpleness of Don Quixote with the desire for ease of Tom Sawyer. He and a number of the other characters are especially interesting for being originally drawn, rather than representing traditional archetypes. In doing this, Ms. Desai is helped by her references to the lack of mental balance in Sampath's mother and her children.

Some may incorrectly describe this as a humor book, but rather it's a biting satire of the nuttiness of the way things usually work. For example, in a job we are supposed to please the boss and rely on the boss's good will to provide for us. But if pleasing the boss means that we make ourselves miserable, what use is this? As another example, spew out a nonsensical aphorism and most people will find a connection to their own life . . . even if none is intended. We defer to those who seem to have superior power or knowledge . . . even when it's only a reputation for such rather than the reality.

Ms. Desai's point is that the good life is the rational life of meaningful self-interest, unrestrained by tradition, convention, and habit. She makes the exposition of that point more fun than any other writer I can remember.

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Deep Irony with a Splash of Humor

This is a novel I've had around for several years. I'm sorry I waited so long to read it.

This delightful novel tantalizes the senses, including taste and smell. To me, the Indian setting is exotic - although in one of the Political Correctness classes I had to take it was pointed out that considering other cultures exotic is a form of racism.

But hey, we don't have monkeys running wild in SoCal. And the orchards around here that still remain are for oranges, not guavas.

This is a Fools' Journey novel. The more I reflect on reading it, the deeper connections and folds and ironies I find. Perhaps I'm reading some into the story ... but that's OK.

I'd say more, but that would lead to a lot of spoilers.

I haven't had such a delightful time reading for many years (Probably not since I read Bless Me, Ultima, which is an entirely different sort of book.)

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