Hanif Kureishi's 'The Buddha of Suburbia' -My Book Review

I just finished reading 'The Buddha of Suburbia' by Hanif Kureishi. This book won him the Whitbread Book Award, now known as the Costa Book Awards, after Costa Coffee, a subsidiary of Whitbread took over the sponsorship in 2005. Though I avoid reading fiction (Gabriel Garcia Marquez and Dan Brown are my only weaknesses), this book was an exception I relished, and if rumours are to be believed, 'The Buddha....' is in fact a semi-autobiographical account, one that made Hanif's father so angry that he didn't speak to him for a year.

Whatever the truth, the book is superb in its characterisation and narration, in its callous attitude towards relationships (at the same time being critical about them), in its strange orientations of characters and above all in its accurate description of the 'English' life of Indians who neither fit in entirely nor move out of London- just stick out like odd branches from suburban ghettos.

And it is in one of the suburbs of South London where the story begins with Karim as the protagonist who speaks out at length about his family and the several eccentricities he sees around him. Written in a first person narrative, the book is an interesting read right from the first paragraph where Karim seems confused with his dual identity of an Indian and an Englishman, though he somehow settles for the latter. Hanif does a brilliant job of describing in particular Karim's father (which apparently is his own father, if the book really is semi-autobiographical), an Indian trying hard to hold his ground in the suburbs of London, not quite successful at anything (he hates his job), who suddenly becomes the Buddha of Suburbia, when he starts delivering lectures to people from suburbs on life, pain, suffering and yoga. Suddenly having found a purpose and a lady (who hosted the lecture-meetings in her house), Karim's dad was more cheerful than ever. The lady, Eva, obviously more generous than just hosting his meetings, soon became his father's only real obsession, and his mother's worst fear.

This book, which Hanif published in 1990 (at the age of 36) reflects to a large extent his maturity at handling dramatic situations, and his ability to dramatise situations, partly due to his skills as a screenplay writer (he wrote 'My Beautiful Laundrette' in 1985). However, ‘The Buddha…’ was his first novel, which is why it won the Whitbread award in the 'best first novel' category. Words flow quite freely for Hanif, who started his career as a pornographic writer in the '70s, but very soon moved on to write about serious issues such as racism, immigrant problems, nationalism and sexuality.

I would say 'The Buddha..' was the true beginning of his literary ventures into the plethora of issues he is so passionate about, with the book stressing the vanity of Indians trying to establish an identity, trying to erase Bombay from their minds, be-littling India, cajoling themselves to love London and everything else about it, but not quite finding the ground to secure themselves. And then there are a lot of these unique and interesting characters, both Indian and English, with their strong beliefs and adamant behaviour, with egos and vanities, with aims and eccentricities, with erratic sexual preferences and strange stories -Hanif gives it all and a lot more. But the icing on the cake is none other than the character of Karim's father, which has been very carefully developed throughout the story, his various moods, his changing outlook, his ascent to become the God -Hanif blows you apart with his funny descriptions of his father's activities by referring to him as 'God'.

Then there is this strange guy called Anwar, his father's friend who becomes eccentric with age, and his daughter Jamila, whom he forces to marry a Muslim from Bombay by the name Changez, whose only condition for coming to London and marrying Jamila was to be provided with the full volumes of Sherlock Holmes series by Conan Doyle. It is these eccentricities of characters interspersed with some serious thoughts on racism, identity conflicts, distinction between the urban and suburban and the punk culture of the '70s and '80s that define the course of the story with Karim moving on and experiencing all of them, through a period of apparent aimlessness, but finally landing up in the theatre business as an actor.

Hanif writes beautifully, the book flowing smoothly like a song, keeping the reader quiet engrossed with its intermittently witty remarks like '...there could be nothing more suburban than suburbanites repudiating themselves'. I suggest this book is worth giving a read; it encompasses and even surpasses an era in the British lifestyle!