This guy is an undiscovered gem in the firmament of Indian authors. I am not kidding. I just finished reading The Foreigner written by him, loaned by a friend who got it on the footpaths in a second hand form. But the novel is amazing in its readability, simplicity and power. I feel sorry that I never even knew this guy existed. Something wrong somewhere with our system of distribution, promotion, retailing and so on.
Anyway, the story is about a Kenyan-Indian student in the U.S., who falls in love with an American girl, but is too caught up in his detachment syndrome to take the relationship into the marriage orbit. The girl, tired of trying to convince him, goes into another relationship on the rebound. It is a tragedy of sorts, but compelling in its storytelling power.
Kudos to the author. A new star is (re) born, at least for me.
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3 comments:
In a somewhat similar vein is a relatively recent American movie called 'The Visitor'. Worth a bucket too IMHO.
I first read Foreigner about 13 yrs ago during my early days in US and I can't even count the number of times I've read it since then (along with Strange Case of Billy Biswas) with the most recent reading this evening.
As someone who spent more than a decade in US and went thru a scarily similar life as compared to Sindi, the book is very close to my heart and I think Arun Joshi is probably the most under-rated authors to come out of India.
There is hardly anything available on his life and I wish I had a chance to meet him had he not died at a young age of 54.
Thank you, Gautam, for the comment. I agree with you about Arun Joshi. I can fully understand your feelings if you went through experiences like he has described.
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