Author VJ James.
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In his 1981 Booker Prize-winning novel Midnight’s Children, Salman Rushdie’s protagonist and narrator Saleem Sinai reflects: “I am the sum total of everything that went before me, of all I have been seen done, of everything done-to-me. I am everyone everything whose being-in-the-world affected was affected by mine. I am anything that happens after I’ve gone which would not have happened if I had not come. Nor am I particularly exceptional in this matter; each ‘I’, every one of the now-six-hundred-million-plus of us, contains a similar multitude. I repeat for the last time: to understand me, you’ll have to swallow a world.”
The fire bird
What Sinai notes of his life holds true for the principal character Kunjootty of VJ James’ debut novel Purappadinte Pustakam (DC Books), too. The book, which is much more than Kunjootty’s coming-of-age, was adjudged the winner among 161 entries in a novel-writing competition DC Books organised in 1999 to commemorate its silver jubilee. James was working at the Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre when he began writing this book. It took him more than a decade to finish writing it. For the first time, it has been translated from Malayalam to English, by Ministhy S, an IAS officer working in the Uttar Pradesh cadre.
The Book of Exodus begins with an arresting Prologue. Like all classics, it begins much before the beginning. Kunjootty’s Valiyammachi, grandmother, is telling her grandchild the story of a fire bird who decided to descend to Earth from “the land of clouds”. Perhaps it’s their nighttime ritual. What consequences this storytelling exercise is going to have anyway? But nothing is as straightforward as it seems in this intricately crafted world of Potta Thuruthu (the Isle of Reeds).
While Valiyammachi may have to put Kunjootty to sleep by manufacturing such stories, on a young mind select stories leave an impression, for all stories’ roots are deeply psychological. As Valiyammachi gets immersed in telling how horrifically the fire bird gets slaughtered by vultures, she is transported to her past, thinking of an exile – of being uprooted, a time that, for her, marked the beginning of several exoduses to come. And this story’s aftereffects happen to govern the life of people in this rural landscape in the backwaters of Kochi. The tale of the fire bird will repeat itself, and a young Kunjootty, who had trouble reconciling with the fact that how someone with the freedom to float in the sky be tempted by terrestrial life, would start questioning everything as he comes of age. Eventually, he will learn that there are only questions, no definitive answers; that every emptiness is completeness.
The Prologue is followed by 43 well-crafted chapters, beginning with Ghastly Nightmares. Readers find Kunjootty in a hospital bed. It’s 21 years after the day his grandmother told him the story of the fire bird. It was a Friday. The day he gets admitted to the hospital coincides with the day his girlfriend Susanna disappears – a Friday again. These are the minute details that one has to catch to make sense of the pulsating nature of The Book of Exodus, for it is full of not only biblical undertones and mythological lores but is also suffused with scientific temperament and philosophical currents.
In the hospital, while the police are harassing and enquiring Isaac, Kunjootty’s friend, about Susanna, Eli and Zavarias, Kunjootty’s mother and father respectively, can’t seem to comprehend what their child has gotten himself into. The demand for an origin story here seems natural. However, James steers the story adroitly, untangles it bit by bit, and gives it a complexity that’s rarely seen in storytelling these days. This gift of complicating the narrative is neatly and meticulously preserved in Ministhy S’s masterful translation.
The story of the cosmos
What seemingly appears to be Kunjootty’s story – a whodunnit, a whydunit – soon transforms itself to be the story of the cosmos itself. Hundreds of micro-stories of people real and imagined, of sea creatures and terrestrial beings are enveloped in this single tale, demanding the absolute attention of readers.
While what’s transpiring dispirits Eli, Zavarias seems to have been immunised by everything owning to his gender. He begins to work as usual, where he is ably supported by Koppan – son of Chonachu, who used to work at Zavarias’ father’s land and helped Zavarias and his mother safely leave their homeland when the latter’s husband was killed. The intergenerationality of the scheme of things mustn’t be ignored. It’s much more than the passing of the means of livelihood to the next generation, it signals the mutual claim of what’s stored in their collective fate. Each one’s doings will impact the other just like everything else informed Sinai’s world in Midnight’s Children.
The story is then populated by strange characters. There are three nomads named Velandi, Muniandi, and Murukandi whose “curiosities” influence others’ futures. Anyway, the “residents of Potta Thuruthu had great anxieties about the future”. Like an adage, when the seeker is ready, the seer appears. What unpacks later is something that only a seasoned storyteller could’ve pulled off, making The Book of Exodus an enviable debut. The way James places characters strategically while narrating this story is again commendable. For example, Chathutty, whom Koppan seems to have rescued from his dark past, but eventually it appears that the impersonator’s presence rather influenced Koppan’s life. While readers await to see Kunjootty’s life stabilise, their expectations are thwarted by the introduction of yet another intriguing lost character (Chathutty).
Even after being discharged from the hospital, Kunjootty seems to be living in a state of delirium. He finds himself going to the lighthouse at Vypin Island, thinking of the time he spent with Susanna. There, one day, he finds a mute girl “swimming like a sea creature in the raging sea” to earn a living. The way she’s treated by people whom she seems to be entertaining speaks volumes about how one is othered, marginalised. Kunjootty’s sympathy – or empathy – can’t alter her fate. But he doesn’t realise this. Soon, Kunjootty finds himself in trouble but gets rescued miraculously. He credits his grandmother, his “guardian angel” for it. Can this happen? Do the dead have the capacity and hold over the lives of other mortal beings? For the time being, find comfort in the opening sentence of the 2024 Giller-prize-winning novel Held by Anne Michaels: “We know life is finite. Why should we believe death lasts forever?”
James’s novel is full of notorious propositions as it introduces one after the other unbelievably relatable characters. Be it Govindan Kutty Asan (Ezhuthassan), who transforms himself into Hanuman, living in oblivion, or be it Unnicheera, Koppan’s wife, who didn’t happen to receive her share of satisfaction out of the marital bond and begins to satiate her desire. Or Chirutha’s oldest uncle, Cheethan, who undergoes a “metamorphosis to become Queen Kunti” from the Mahabharata in a marital ceremony. James writes, “One soul was dancing between two incarnations at that moment. The Kunti from the past life stared covetously at the plate of Poli offerings through the eyes of Cheethan, the present avatar.”
There’s an elegance to this transformation – this transness. The androgyny at display here celebrates the ways of those who live under little or no influence of the corruptness of the modern world. They transcend a peculiar border of morality that seems to govern the lives of people from a rural land. Beyond this point, there’s little hope in the eyes of the majority for such idiosyncratic beings. Coming from a small village – where while one would be chided for being “effeminate”, at the same a man wearing a sari in devotion to Krishna would be worshipped – I was able to appreciate the naturalness of the appearance of the wildest cast of characters in this novel.
James pays great attention to the younger characters – Nandini and Anita – too. Their peculiar questions inform readers about the curiosities of a young mind. For example, Nandini asks Kunjootty if the nameless river shall die in its old age. Then, leveraging Murali and others, James platforms a critique of caste.
At one point, James writes: “Nature had, long ago, completed all the stories. As the pages flipped, each person experienced it as his or her own life.” Kunjootty in this novel seems to be going through such an experience, which is why he attempts to document everything strange happening around him in his blue notebook, which he titles The Book of Exodus.
It’s a mystery for readers to unpack whether he’ll be able to complete it. Will Susanna be found? Or whether Ezhuthassan be understood as someone suffering from a mental illness or will he be treated like the Monkey God? Will Koppan be able to continue his lineage? What would become of the “toddy tapper” whom Unnicheera seems to be mesmerised with? Chathutty, where will he disappear? And snakes, what about them … and, and, the fire bird … and on and on. There’ll be enough to keep everyone engaged in this novel which delves into the meaning and meaninglessness of everyday living with an intensity that can rarely be captured. The Book of Exodus, thus, is a uniquely local narrative that will find universal appeal and acclaim. Besides James, one is thankful to Ministhy S for enriching the lives of Anglophone readers with this exquisite translation.
The Book of Exodus, VJ James, translated from the Malayalam by Ministhy S, Penguin India.
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