A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry 1995 Giller Prize Winner

I first read A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry in 2002, so I shouldn’t have been surprised when I saw how big it was when I picked it up at the library. But I was. It is a saga of 748 pages.  When I read it in 2002, I wrote the following in my Book Diary: Well written, a marvelous picture of corruption and class/caste in India 1970-80's. Overwhelming at times. I cried at the end! So, what did I think of it this time? It is a wonderful, well-written book. Perhaps because I have read a couple of non-fiction books that describe life in Mumbai and Calcutta, I did not find it as overwhelming this time. While I didn't cry at the end, I did have a lump in my throat.

A Fine Balance has four main characters: Dina Dalal, a Parsi widow; Ishvar and his nephew Omprakash (Om), tailors; Maneck Kohlah, a student from a hill station in the Himalayas and son of one of Dina’s school friends.They come together at Dina’s home when Ishvar and Om are seeking jobs as tailors and Maneck arrives to board with her while he is studying in the city. From this beginning, during "The State of Internal Emergency" in the mid-70's, we slowly learn each protagonist’s past.

Their stories begin before Independence and continue to the time we meet them at Dina's flat. Ishvar and Om were born in a small village, into a caste of leather workers considered untouchables. Ishvar's father decides to send his sons to a nearby town to learn to be tailors to break this cycle. For a time it seems the family has managed to build new lives for themselves, but soon caste violence shatters their reality. Leaving only Ishvar and his nephew Om who head to the city to find work.

Dina overcame her brother's objections to marry the man of her choice, only to be left a widow after three years. Following her husband's death she lives with her brother's family, but finally returns to her flat to live her own life.

Maneck feels uprooted and pushed out by his parents who want him to get an education in the city. Conditions in the student dorms and the politics on campus are very unsettling for him.

For all of these characters it seems that they just can't get ahead. Every time they make progress with happiness and security, some thing or some one disrupts that progress. Sometimes you do just want to say...ah, come on....give them a break!  The first time I read this book, there was an event at a Vasectomy Clinic near the end of the book that caused me to yell, out loud..."No...you can't do this to him!" You do find yourself wondering if so many bad things could happen to one person.  Putting that feeling aside, it is a wonderful saga that made me consider why some people can triumph over adversity and others can't. It is enthralling while you are reading it, and leaves you with much to think about when you finish.

The book is also filled with a wonderful array of other characters including: Rajaram, the hair collector; Shankar the legless beggar;  Beggarmaster, who can be a great ally or a terrible enemy; and so many more. They all add to the richness of the story. 

The first time I read it I didn’t really pay any attention to the quotation at the front of the book. This time I noted the appropriateness.

Holding this book in your hand, sinking back in your soft armchair, you will say to yourself: perhaps it will amuse me. And after you have read this story of great misfortunes, you will no doubt dine well, blaming the author for your own insensitivity, accusing him of wild exaggeration and flights of fancy. But rest assured: this tragedy is not a fiction. All is true.  Honoré de Balzac, Le Pére Goriot

When I am reading books, I often encounter words that I don't know. But in this book I found it annoying because it disrupted the flow of my reading. I thought the words were strange. Here are a few examples: sortilegious serpent; made his skin horripilate; were triturated with food. 

I really liked some of his phrasing:
- "Unused for years, the lipstick poked up its head reluctantly as she rotated the base. She made a false start and smudged the lip line, but the labial acrobatics soon came back to her, the pursing and puckering and tautening, the simian contortions that seemed so absurd in the mirror."
- "For politicians passing laws is like passing water. It all ends up down the drain."
- "What an unreliable thing is time - when I want it to fly, the hours stick to me like glue.  And what a changeable thing, too. Time is the twine to tie our lives into parcels of years and months. Or a rubber band stretched to suit our fancy. Time can be the pretty ribbon in a little girl's hair. Or the lines in your face, stealing your youthful colour and your hair.....but in the end, time is a noose around the neck, strangling slowly."  

I have read three books by Rohinton Mistry: A Fine Balance, Such A Long Journey and Family Matters. My favourite of the three is Family Matters.

 NEXT: 1996 - Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood