Brilliance of a recently disabled author, shattered yet unbroken

How innocent we must seem when we don’t know our fate,” says Hanif Kureishi in ‘Shattered’. It is one of the truest lines I have read in a long time. A man is at his partner’s house in Italy, running his life as per plan. His day is laid out in front of him till his blood pressure drops, his head hits the table and later, he wakes up almost completely paralysed. How does one deal with such a scenario? Especially a writer like Kureishi, whose works have come to be foundational to South Asian diasporic writing. The stillness he experiences is palpable and resembles a Greek tragedy.

But ‘Shattered’ does not carry the sombre, foreboding tone of a Greek tragedy; rather, the pages are buzzing with the busyness of London or with intimate observations of the people who seem to be flitting in and out of his life with rapidity. As with thoughts during long hours of contemplation, Kureishi’s reflections make frequent incursions into his life before and after the incident and draw parallels without being maudlin or seeking sympathy. He lets the readers in, seats them beside him and his scribe of the day, be it his partner Isabella or his sons. Childhood, adolescence, drugs, pornography and sexual explorations are narrated with a matter of factness that delights. Tips on how to be a good writer, what constitutes a good beginning and similar pathways intersperse the narrative that focuses a good deal on shit and piss as well.

It is rather interesting that Kureishi details the processes of cleaning, preparing, probing the anus, undergoing an enema, attaching a catheter — the processes of voiding — with due diligence. He also refers to Kafka’s ‘Metamorphosis’, where the protagonist Gregor Samsa turns into a giant insect. The grotesque, ungainly image this reference provokes speaks volumes. The author speaks of the long, painful hours of physiotherapy, the various contraptions he is strapped to, the accidents he has along the way, in the process, revealing a vulnerability that one stops to regard. This, when juxtaposed alongside his memories of going to bars, meeting writers — all of which is filled with the heady scent of life — you end up thinking about the fragility of life.

Kureishi’s cast of characters is limited: the people he meets during his treatment, the medical personnel, immediate family, but he worlds his narrative beautifully, mixing in the pop culture that his generation had experienced first-hand and the little tics of personalities that make some people very distinct. The novelist in Kureishi is never far off as he weaves memory, desire, longing and sexuality into intricate intersections and even creates a cliffhanger around a young woman named Iris.

‘Shattered’ gives the impression of a psychedelic trip that a recently disabled man takes, dictating his life and times to his family and watching them as they write down his most intimate thoughts and pains. But peel back the layers and you see the pulsating angst: “When I saw a man waving to his own wife, I couldn’t believe that he didn’t see what a profoundly complicated act this was. I envy anyone who can use their own hands.” Much later, he mentions that no one used to touch him before the accident, or well, except his partner. “Now I am turned, rolled, prodded and poked constantly, and when I say constantly, I mean constantly — every day and every night.” He shows us the gradually crumbling walls of relationships, no matter how intimate or bound by blood, the way life acquires a completely different point of view.

‘Shattered’ is a compelling read. It is a brilliant memoir of a man who is fighting to keep his head above water and make a bid for the shoreline. He has readjusted the angles from which he views life and has become more sensitive to his surroundings and to how the disabled are disadvantaged while living in the world of the able-bodied. The book is remarkable and nuanced in its treatment of disabilities and the inherent blindness that an ableist society suffers from.

This book should be seen as a turning point in Kureishi’s literary career. He promises a fresh start, a resoluteness is apparent in his words.

Among all the profound, irreverent, sacred, profane lines in the book, this line stood out for me: “Not that I led an interesting life before my accident, it’s just that I was free.”