Will
you consider The English Teacher as an autobiographical novel?
Narayan,
in his auto biographical account, “My Days” describes “The English Teacher” as
autobiographical in content, very little part of it being fiction saying that
“the dedication of the book to the
memory of my wife should to some extent give the reader
a clue that the book may
not be all fiction”
To
an avid or critical reader the novel in question appears to be a kind of sequel
to „The Bachelor of Arts‟. The protagonist of which was Chandran, a young
bachelor of romantic disposition….but this novel, „The English Teacher‟ takes
different direction in its second half; Narayan starts narrating his own sad
story after the death of his beloved wife Rajam, impersonating himself Krishnan
and tries to establish contact with his departed wife; thus the second part of
the novel to the end of it describes Narayan‟s own spiritual experience of
holding communion with the spirit of his departed wife.
The
six year-gap in Narayan‟s career as a novelist can reasonably be attributed to
Rajam's death which devastatingly shattered the very core of his being, both as
a man and as a writer. Time hurts and time heals;
Such
a long time it had taken for Narayan to come to terms with that shattering
traumatic experience which found profound expression in the most
autobiographical novel „The English Teacher‟. The depth of his grief and sorrow
is nakedly and profoundly and movingly reflected in the concluding part of the
first section, through describing Krishna's response to Susila's death. Narayan
wanted to see the novel as an attempt to attain a philosophical understanding (My
Days 135)To a casual reader „The English Teacher‟ might appear to be a sequel
to „The Bachelor of Arts‟.................................................................................
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