Sunday, March 18, 2001		Article

IT began with a news agency report about an Indian professor of mathematics at the University of Maryland being offered a five-million-dollar advance for his debut novel. Then came the amendment that, no, in fact the U.S. rights went for a lesser figure — $ 350,000.

Thereafter, the hype picked up with a stream of gushy teasers in the international press and on the Net. The venerable Time magazine declared The Death of Vishnu to be "one of the most eagerly awaited books" of the new millennium.

Yet, when Manil Suri visited Bombay recently to release his novel, the reception was muted. Except for two book-reading sessions, one at the American Centre and the other at a bookstore, the city could not care much for the man who grew up in rundown building at Kemps’ Corner.

The novel too is set there. "Vishnu was a real person," the author insists. "He lived on our building landing and lay around chewing paan. He ran errands for my mother and greeted me with a salaam baba. In 1994, he fell sick, and although there was some talk about getting an ambulance, he just died."

In the novel, as Vishnu lies comatose below the staircase other characters stir to life. There is a Mrs Asrani who derives karmic fulfilment from giving Vishnu his morning tea. The bodily stink from the landing also draws Mrs Pathak who does her bit by nourishing Vishnu with leftovers.

As confusion prevails, Vishnu’s life whirs by on a private screen. It is a gentle awakening. Writes Suri: "The light shines through the landing window. It plays on Vishnu’s face. It passes through his closed eyelids and whispers to him in red. The red is everywhere, blanketing the ground, colouring the breeze."

If at first it is the red of Holi, evoking painful memories of a violent father, soon it transforms into the red of his old lover’s room. But throughout this flood of memories, he hears echoes of his mother’s words: "You are Vishnu, keeper of the universe, keeper of the sun..."

Therein lies a clue to the spirit of the novel. Vishnu emerges as the keeper of the building, extracting kindness from petty lives and playing catalyst in spiritual awakenings. So even as he visits his past in that kaleidoscopic red, stories are coaxed out of the flats above.

Clearly, these too have been drawn from Suri’s first-hand experience: "When my parents arrived in Bombay soon after Partition (in 1947), they moved into a single room of a large flat. There were constant skirmishes over the common kitchen and bathroom. My childhood was a fight for space."

Suri’s father was an assistant to music directors Laxmikant-Pyarelal and Madan Mohan. His mother was briefly secretary to Indira Gandhi and then a teacher at Clare Road Convent Manil, himself, went to Campion School, Jaihind College and the Institute of Science.

"In those days, everyone did medicine and engineering," recalls the 41-year-old author. "So I vaguely considered research. In my class at the Institute of Science, seven out of 12 students were trying to go abroad. I did too. And I landed in the United States, at Carnegie Mellon."

The next stop was at the University of Maryland, where he teaches "everything from calculus up". Whenever he found time, he wrote letters to his mother and on an eventful week, at least four bulging envelopes too the journey from Maryland to Bombay.

"My mother saved all 2,500 letters, counted every word, compiled statistics and approached the Guinness Book" says Suri, who has woven a similar anecdote in the novel. "When they turned her down, she approached the Limca Book of Records. And there we are — Most Letters from Son to Mother!"

In 1992, he started writing a novel with the death of Vishnu planned as the ending. But the beginning "took off in its own direction" and the characters turned increasing bizarre and complex. He abandoned the project, wondering if he should just concentrate on mathematics.

But Vishnu was saved from a second demise by a string of coincidences — a writing workshop, a fresh burst of confidence and the Pathaks and Asranis started talking again. He sent the final draft to his agent in January 2000 and left for Bombay on a holiday, not expecting things to move in months.

"Three days later, my agent-e-mailed me," he exclaims. "A number of publishers were interested and an auction had been planned. My parents and I would sit by the phone and wait for the entertainment to start. Finally I accepted a $350,000 advance from W.W.Norton."

The rest is history.

(Maharaja Features)