– “The Guide” won the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1961
SURESH RAMPHUL
In “The Guide” (Indian Edition published in 1958 by Indian Thought Publication, Mysore), Railway Raju, a tourist guide, lives opposite the Malgudi station. He takes a couple around. Marco, the husband, is overly keen on studying caves. Rosie, his wife, is often alone. Raju immediately finds her “a divine creature” (p 64). She does have “a figure” (p 65), in his judgment. On discovering that she is a good dancer, he flatters her for her talent and eventually seduces her. She becomes “the only reality in my life and consciousness” (p 118). He keeps by her side “like a parasite” (p 118). He promises to launch her as a professional dancer. Marco disapproves and leaves the place without her.
Pretences
Raju and Rosie pretend they are a married couple. He changes her name to Nalini and becomes her impresario. He dresses soberly, wears rimless glasses to appear important. He picks up a few terms about classical dancing from her and uses them to captivate his listeners. He likes to pass himself off as knowledgeable. He pretends to be interested in classical dancing but he is just an ignoramus. He likes impressing people.
Nalini’s recitals are successful. They now live lavishly. Raju displays arrogant traits while Rosie remains simple throughout. He is offhand with musicians seeking a chance to accompany Nalini. He snubs those who want an interview with him. He haughtily asks visitors to leave their address with the clerk, and treats visitors with “the scantiest attention” (p 185). He “swelled with pride” (p 184) to know that Nalini is indebted to him. He admires adulation and cannot help showing off. Possessive, jealous, superior and money-minded, he forges her signature on a legal document and is imprisoned for two years.
Platitudes
After his release, he is sitting cross-legged on a granite slab resembling a throne, beside an ancient shrine near a river – an ideal place where he will not be recognised. His posture and the location subconsciously strike Velan, a villager. He gazes at Raju “reverentially” (p 5). Raju wants to tell him he is just an ordinary person but somehow it pleases him to feel special. Velan tells him he has a problem. Raju says everybody has a problem. Velan is immediately “overwhelmed by the weightiness of this statement” (p 15). The villager is easily misled into taking mere platitudes for profound thoughts. If you care to see the layer under the humour, you may find that R.K.Narayan is in fact making an interesting and significant point about the power of words over the mind of the common man.
Velan complains that he has given every possible comfort to his sister… Raju puts in a guess: but she is ungrateful. Velan is wonderstruck: this man is no ordinary man! He wonders how this man can read his mind. Velan later comes back with his sister. Raju utters logical things to solve her problem: to arrive at a proper understanding, time is needed. In Velan’s mind, Raju represents a master. It is delightful to see how the author brings out the villager’s simple-mindedness. Politicians around the world often use platitudes or hollow ideas either to impress us or to make us believe that they are brilliant.
Raju enjoys the situation he is in. He is shown respect and importance, so he decides he must play the role Velan expects of him. He will thus go on dropping gems of thoughts from his lips. He pretends to be what he is not. He is no counsellor yet he offers guidance tips on routine matters.
The public
He had never expected to obtain so much attention. One day he hides behind the hibiscus bush to avoid people. Not finding him in his usual place, the public concludes that he has renounced the world and gone somewhere to meditate. In their eyes, he is already a yogi. R.K.Narayan demonstrates how naïve some people can be in jumping to conclusions and believing that their conclusions are the only truth. Later, Raju gives a boy something to eat. He returns to the village to announce that “the saint is back to his post” (p 44). Villagers rush to the temple in mass. Raju becomes a saint through distortion of a fact. Velan thinks Raju’s “discourses” make him a wise man; people, like sheep, murmur approval without raising a brow. Raju is unhappy “for one mistaken for a saint” (p 51) and considers the people as “fools” (p 51).
He grows a beard and now has long hair. His motive is to enhance his spiritual status. He knows what he is doing. Indeed, his audience increases. Soon, his influence is unlimited. He incidentally tells Velan’s brother that unless fighting between two factions in the village stops, he will not eat. The semi-moron reports it as there is no rain, therefore Raju won’t eat and it will be all right. The people believe in what they are told. They do not take the trouble to verify with Raju. Raju will be fasting to bring rain! They lose no time in hailing Raju as “our Saviour” (p 104).
He is believed to be fasting but Raju secretly helps himself to some food he had kept away (p 235). He rinses his mouth in order not to let people discover his ruse. They say fasting will bring rain to the drought-stricken village but Raju himself “felt sick of the whole thing” (p 235). Fasting is deemed a penance by the people but for Raju it is a trial in reality. He is viewed as a holy man, yet Raju admits to himself: I’m not the man to save you (p 235). Desperate, he recounts his life story to Velan, hoping people will stop putting misplaced faith in him, but Velan’s belief in his powers strengthens. You see, blind faith is not so easy to conquer.
Raju is sitting near the river bank trying hard to think about where to go and what to do but people around him are convinced that he is lost in spiritual musings and are afraid to disturb him. They believe Raju is devoting himself heart and soul to save the village but Raju himself is irritated at the thought. In the game he has been playing, he has become a saint, a yogi, a master, a great soul. On the last day of the fasting, Raju stands as usual in his basin of water and prays. “I can feel rain coming,” he announces. Is Raju a saint or is it a mere coincidence? Has he reached salvation and self-abnegation or is Nature merely doing its job in case rain is coming? The ending is open to interpretations.