“Oh very much so. You know that Christ had a big nose?”
Not that Christ was particularly celebrated for his virility. Still, Ananda found this an arresting piece of information. He hadn’t known that there were actual likenesses available — which could have attested to the feature. The Roman Catholic portrait at the reception of the Indian YMCA displayed the generic Christ, the timorous, blonde-haired, blue-eyed face upturned to the heavens, a lost middle-class student searching for guidance in an inhospitable world.
“If you think Christ looked the way they show him in films,” said his uncle, gazing straight at Ananda, as if he’d caught him out indulging in exactly such an irresponsible misconception, “you’d be wrong. Christ wasn’t European: he was from the Middle East. It is said that he had a large prominent nose. The way you see him today is Western propaganda.”
He leaned back on the sofa, unarguable, his nose radiating a new power, looking like he was in no hurry to leave. The next moment he got up.
“Small job,” he clarified.
He shuffled off to the neighbouring bathroom.
A thunderclap. The Patels. Or was it Mandy? Back earlier than expected. Ananda steeled himself. Another bang — below him. Mandy. You had to feel for her, actually. Solitary homecomings. From Paul Hogan draining a can of lager in the outbacks — such were the images (caricatures of epic voyages) that flashed before you as the day drew to a close — Ananda looked behind him at Warren Street, the pale torches of the sodium vapour lamps that would keep him company through the troubled sleep to come.
Tandoor Mahaclass="underline" bright and desolate. A lone jacketless man before it. Was it Mr. Alam?
His uncle returned to him with the fretful air of one who’d not only been pissing but deeply pondering.
“When Annada Shankar Ray came to Europe in 1931,” he said, “he predicted a time would come when everybody will be famous. Well-known people will rise as thick and fast as bubbles in the air.”
Ananda wondered whether this might be some kind of comment — a parting shot before his uncle made his way back — on the futility of Ananda’s unspoken but undeniable ambition. That Ananda, through no real fault of his own, had simply been born too late, when becoming a successful poet didn’t actually mean that much: not because success was less desirable now, but because everyone had a right to it today. This might explain the disbelieving feeling he had when he watched This Is Your Life or Cilla Black or Stars in Their Eyes.
“Shudrer yuga,” said his uncle, as if pronouncing a verdict, tucking in his shirt very slowly. “The final epoch, according to Vivekananda. The age of the shudra.”
Terrible word: doomed menial, untouchable. Fixed in servitude for eternity. Brahman, Kshatriya, Vaishya, Shudra. The lowest of the low. His uncle had assumed each of these incarnations in the course of a single life: philosopher, warrior, merchant, beggar. Surely it wasn’t the actual shudra he was speaking of? For was the shudra anywhere near finding dignity and freedom? It seemed not. Then in what way the age of the shudra? Unless it was some allegory he meant…Of course—then it made sense, as an insane cosmogony. The caste system could serve as a metaphor for the epochs succeeding each other since the dawn of time. Ananda was momentarily happy to go along with the scheme. The first age, of Brahman, was (decided Ananda proudly) India’s — the Brahman not being the pusillanimous priest with the sacred thread, but the spiritual man, who could have any provenance whatsoever, emerge from any caste: the sage and renunciate. The second age, of the Kshatriya, the warriors and aristocrats, was Rome’s. The king and the notion of Empire was then supreme. It was the aristocrat who fostered and nurtured value and beauty and the arts. When the aristocracy went to seed the third age came into being, of the Vaishya — the merchant. You had to grant that epoch to the English: the ascendancy and rule of the shopkeeper, the burgher, who might possess an Empire but whose outlook was essentially humdrum, middle-level, and suburban. (Amazing how the allegory fell into place.) Finally, the last age: the shudra’s — in which the man on the street was illusorily empowered. (For power invariably deceives those it passes on to.) It was a toss-up whether — if you subscribed to the metaphor — the epoch belonged to Russia or America. It would seem America. For this would be the epoch nominally of the common man, but really of capitalism and popular culture. Everyone would be famous. And after this final phase (Ananda hoped it would take another century to truly arrive) — what?
“Pupu.”
Ananda looked up.
“It’s after eleven…I’d better head off before the tube closes.”
Yet another outing! Could he be sprightly, setting out now for Belsize Park? At least it was warm. Better than those chill nights on which he’d dutifully make his way homeward from his nephew. Ananda nodded, briefly and fiercely hating the peace and quiet that came at the end of everything. Mandy was very still, as if she were in hiding. Yet be grateful for the peace before the Patels are back again — and for this indecisive lull before his uncle declaims on a detail he’d forgotten about in his rush to depart. He was loitering: clearly not about to say goodbye just yet. Never say, “I’m leaving.” Always, “I’ll be seeing you.” “ ‘Jachhi’ bolte nei, Pupu, but ‘aschhi.’ ”
“So — do I see you on Monday then?” enquired Ananda of the hovering figure.
Acknowledgements
I’m fortunate to have the belief and support of a group of great readers who also happen to be my agent and publishers: Peter Straus, Chiki Sarkar, Rosalind Porter, Sonny Mehta, Diana Miller.
My mother continues, as ever, to inspire me: this book is for her too.
Rinka embraced the idea when I put it to her: I procrastinated, and she brought me round.
Lastly, there’s Radha, to whom I am grateful for — among other things — thinking I am funny.
A NOTE ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Amit Chaudhuri is the author of several award-winning novels and is an internationally acclaimed musician and essayist. Freedom Song: Three Novels received the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Fiction. His many international honors include the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize; most recently, he became the first recipient of the Infosys Prize for Humanities — Literary Studies. He is a contributor to the London Review of Books, Granta and The Times Literary Supplement. He is currently professor of contemporary literature at the University of East Anglia and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.
An A.A. Knopf Reading Group Guide Odysseus Abroad by Amit Chaudhuri
The questions, discussion topics, and reading list that follow are intended to enhance your reading group’s discussion of Odysseus Abroad, Amit Chaudhuri’s captivating and elegantly crafted novel about two Indian men living in London — a daydreaming college student and his eccentric bachelor uncle — and how they cope with feelings of isolation and alienation in their daily life.
Discussion Questions