“You Are My Dear Friend”
by Madhuri Vijay
from the August 17, 2020 issue of The New Yorker
Madhuri Vijay is the author of The Far Field, which Grove Press published in 2019. I haven’t read it, but it was longlisted for the PEN/Hemingway Prize and the Dylan Thomas Prize, two prizes that are worth paying attention to when looking for up-and-coming authors. I’ve not read anything by her, but this is a nice opportunity to fix that.
I hope to get some thoughts of my own in the comments this week, but in the meantime, please feel welcome to leave your thoughts on the story or The Far Field.
Madhuri Vijay’s short story, “You Are My Dear Friend” has different layers of meaning incorporated within. It’s a woman’s story that suggests the protagonist makes difficult and perhaps mistaken life choices from having lived a hardscrabble life. It could be a woman in America so I really wonder what women reading this story think of the protagonist. The term au pair is so derogatory and demeaning where women are valued for how well they take care of children which also shrewdly discusses how some wives are valued similarly if the family is not rich enough to afford a childcare professional. So I really liked that part of the story. The India part of the story seems so brilliantly worked out. The “You Are My Dear Friend” cheap jewelry sort of personifies British feelings towards people from India. And also the rich Indians’ feelings towards the Tribals or Naxalites or Maoists who attempt to destroy the upper, middle and lower classes who are attempting to destroy their way of life by buying their land and bringing about modern development of residential hi-rise buildings and malls and whatnot. That she is named “Rani” which is Hindi for “Queen” is ironic in terms of the wealth a real queen has versus the “queen of the house” that the eight year can become, displacing the mother being all too real since rightly or wrongly even very young children can be seen to have a primitive side. And Vijay seems mindful of how problematic the struggle to make something of one’s life in India from the time one is born no matter their family especially if the wife seems the weaker in the parents relationship. Vijay seems to have a strong feeling for original India harshly affected by the caste system before the British, before foreign investment was allowed in India in the early 1990s and before the most recent very new rich and exponentially expanding middle class. The Tribals and indigenous communities are being displaced and don’t readily absorb into the new India. Which has parallels in the U.S. Vijay’s writing is simply yet seamlessly evokes the damage that colonialism or a difficult life leaves after the fact on people who are trying as best they can to survive. I haven’t read “The Far Field” but Kashmir is another very fragile part of original India, whose survival is threatened by nationalist Hindu ideas and terrorism battling it out for strategic regional dominance and all the populace in the area caught in the middle. I think Vijay articulates and illuminates difficult realities about life in India and about life in general in deceptively simple but brilliant prose. The only American writer that comes even at all close to being similar is Mary Gordon. And though Madhuri may not have won the PEN/Hemingway or Dylan Thomas Prize, she actually did win The JCB Prize for Literature in India. If you’re wondering about if that prize can actually predict a new up and coming international author, you should know that it is worth 25 lakh rupees, which translates into about $33,389. Is there an equivalent American literary award to that?
I read her “The Far Field”. Vijay is a wonderful writer and The Far Field comes close to Greene’s “The Quiet American” is showing how someone with good intentions can make life hell for people she loves or claims to love. I love both the film adaptations of the Greene novel and hope someone decides to make “The Far Field” into a film.
This story unfortunately doesn’t seem to be as well written as her novel. It took me sometime to figure out that the entire story is set in Bangalore- everything seemed so non-Indian in the initial few pages – no one calls a nanny an “au pair” in India. There were a number of other false notes. No Indian, as rich as to own a large property in the center of Bangalore with kids from a previous marriage – would marry a nanny who has only studied until the 10th grade and promise to convert to Christianity and attend church services in India.
Also, it is near impossible to adopt a kid so fast in India.. the couple needs to be married for at least two years, neither partner must be over 55 (I think Srikanth is 53 at the time of marriage, which makes him ineligible by the time they complete 2 years). Even assuming they somehow managed to bribe their way through and adopt, it is nearly impossible to adopt an 8 year old – usually babies of a few months of age are put up for adoption. Having done all this – to have made Rani such a dislikable figure is what kills the story – already weakened by all these improbable occurrences. A much better horror story on the same subject is Haneke’s film “Cache”. Maybe this story has been written to make Geeta the heroine, but to make an 8 year old the primary villain makes one very uncomfortable.
If anyone wants to read a longish short story or short novel based in Bangalore involving strong women, “Ghachar Ghochar” by Vivek Shanbhag masterfully translated by Srinath Perur is a wonderful read.
Admittedly, I’m speaking from a position of extreme ignorance as someone who has never been to India. However, I’m not convinced by avataram’s criticisms. It is the non-Indian Western expats, the Bakers, who use the term “au pair”. Although Srikanth promises to convert to Christianity, he never does this nor intends to.
I can see where the term “au pair” seems foreign to India because it is relatively recent in India. But au pairs supposedly make better money than nannies and it is mostly considered a stepping stone used by younger women for a shorter duration and as something that looks good on one’s resume. I’m wondering if there could be a few really large mansions left in Bangalore so that that was not a bad choice. I think an arrogant rich man even in India would want to marry a woman with less education since she probably wouldn’t be as demanding and more like accept has broken promise to covert. Plus the man probably would have married a better educated woman rather than searching for a wife in the bazaar or market place. Plus he probably knew he was not any kind of “gift” of a man to a really decent woman. And the eight year old was a Tribal child, like adopting an Aborigine child in Australia. Plenty of cultural and economic differences would undermine a usual middle upper class upbringing.
Larry, I think the term “au pair” is probably out of place in India. But that’s exactly the author’s intent. The Bakers are portrayed as expats who have remained ignorant of the traditions, vocabulary and customs of where they’ve settled.
Paul,
I agree. Even if you google it and it shows up as existing there it still seems very foreign and conveys an ugly American type but actually British colonialist ambiance. But the Vijay’s idea that women from poor backgrounds can make poor spouse choices and can have issues child rearing as well. That fact that Greta’s adopted daughter Rani was born in the Tribal area forms possibly more complicated issues. Maybe if one of the adoptive parents is native Tribal unless two Indian adoptive parents are better than no parents or bad parents. The economic disparity can cause problems just as when both white parents adopt a Black child of whose birth parents are both Black. Still it seems a more compelling short story for all the possible mental, physical and familial conflict of one sort or another that is pretty much inherent within it. A more gentle handling of all the aspects of it wouldn’t impinge or engage readers as much.
A well written story. Powerful and sustained narrative. Conventional 3rd-person viewpoint, neutral telling, and covers a long time span. It reminded me of Bharati Mukherjee.
I like it because it portrays a woman’s real struggle to become a person, how she almost makes it, but then falters. These 3 steps are shown in three sentences:
“Why doesn’t your daughter call you?”
‘She heard herself say to her husband, ‘”Yes.”
“The girl stands there blazing exposed, and Geeta circles her, unable to look away,”
William,
Interesting that Madhuri Vijay reminds you of Bharati Mukherjee. They both earned MFAs from Iowa Writer’s Workshop which is difficult to get into because it is supposed to be the Harvard of graduate creative writing. And Mukherjee considered herself more an American writer rather than an expatriate south asian writer. They both seem highly aware of a woman’s situation as regards survival whether from inside south asia or starting all over in England or America or just generally a woman’s survival no matter where in the world she was born.
Thanks for those insights, Larry. “A woman’s survival” — quite pertinent. This woman survives, but at a great price.
Although, now that I think about it, that last graf holds some hope. Her desire to become has not died.
William,
Thanks for your hopeful thought about women that I hadn’t considered. Geeta does survive but at great cost as you mention. Sometimes I wonder why American women are not more aware of their Indian sisters who boldly speak out for women’s rights. “Period Leave” has been debated in India and writer Twinkle Khanna made an interesting observation:
“Are we really saying we can’t give women leave or the prospect of working from home for that one day? My opinion of gritting our teeth and bearing it, fighting our biology so we can say we are as good as men has changed over time. We are equal, not identical”
Madhuri Vijay’s story is faintly and disarmingly feminist in that way and she is outspoken through addressing what could be everywomen’s situation indirectly. Part of the power of a good short story is to sometimes get us thinking about things that are always there but aren’t thought about or considered important enough to try to change even a little.
We are lucky that “My Dear Friend” combines an Anglo-Indian sensibility in an unobtrusive way.
Interesting thoughts.
I found this engaging and it shifted tone from something seemingly sociological to a darker perhaps even masochistic drama although the social would continue thru Rani being a “tribal girl.” But…what motivates the main character otherwise besides that people tend to get married, have children etc. Her inner life seems foreclosed to us while her husband is just a rather lumpish stereotype and Rani seems borderline demonic. I couldn’t really locate these characters’ desires or characteristics nor was the class/race metaphor clearly drawn here either. Yet…there is something here nevertheless.
This vagueness I found in the characters extends to the setting per comments above that either describe things as implausible within Indian society or describe how the setting isn’t even very clear except for the fact that it is stated to be Bangalore.
What motivates the main character? I think this is the core of the story. My sense is that for the first part of the story she has no motivation. She floats along being pushed by others. This remains true for the first pat of her marriage. Then her husband decides she needs a child to care for to keep her occupied. Note that she never says “Yes, that’s what I want.” She just accepts his decision.
At first she lets the girl boss her around too. Then she begins to push back a bit — not letting the girl take her jewelry. More important, she starts seeing that a female person, even a very young female person, can assert herself. When the husband throws the girl out, she speaks up to him for the first time and affects the course of events.
Eventually the husband “convinces” her that the girl must go. She reverts to acquiescence. The line is something like: ‘”Yes,” she said to her husband.’
However, in the final scene, we see that she is no longer the passive person she started out as. She is fascinated by the brash young girl at the perfume counter, who is similar to the adopted girl. The girl both attracts and repels (scares?”) her. Which way will she go? We don’t know. But we can see that her life has moved from the cute, obedient English girls for whom she was au pair to a rougher, more actualized type of girl.
I think William’s assessment of the story is spot on. I think Ken is right, there are some aspects of the story that are a little ambiguous but William offers some excellent clarification. Also tribals in terms of caste become dalits, who are the untouchable caste. So even if there is supposedly no longer caste in India, the wife basically adopted an “untouchables” daughter. The situation of the tribals is impoverished which doesn’t justify the little girl’s behavior but provides mitigating factors. Agree that there is not much that is specific about the story being set in India. I think the author wanted to make the situation more generic so it would get a larger readership. Stories set in India don’t get much attention unless they are of the “poverty porn” genre that features excruciating poverty, suffering and outrageous cruelty. This story avoids that, following the lines of a woman’s realizations about her choices in life. It reminds me a bit of Henry James short novel, “Washington Square” whose heroine, Catherine, is much like the heroine in this short story in how she is negatively affected by the husband or prospective husband in the case of Catherine. There is a new film streaming on Netflix called “Dolly Kitty Aur Woh” that examines the life of a married woman in India. The wife in an unsatisfactory marriage invites her younger cousin, who is single to come live with her family and the situation of the wife in “You Are My Dear Friend” is amplified in a specifically women in India context. I think the ambiguity in Vijay’s story makes it a more universal take on any women’s situation. I am going to reread the story with William’s annotations in mind.
Apologies, the film “Dolly Kitty Aur Woh” is only streaming on Netflix India. But the text of “You Are My Dear Friend” can be streamed on the New Yorker magazine website.
After reading “The Far Field,” I fully agree with avataram that Madhuri Vijay is a wonderful writer. I see avataram’s point of view that the protagonist, Shalini, personifies a Western ugly American kind of person, although I think she is more sensitive than that. Her more detached kind of feeling derives more from the influence of her mother and father and how she grew up. I think there is much more depth to what Vijay is describing and it is not easily pidgeon-holed into a more generalized Western way of thinking characteristic in British diplomacy towards Indians and India. I had a few more thoughts on what makes Vijay’s writing quite special and different from a more usual south Asian novel written partially for a Western readership.
“From the beginning, I adored Suneyna for her shy smile and her habit of unconsciously reaching out to touch me whenever we were working. Her little hand would wander out and graze some part of my face, my chin or nose, and then she would go on as before, busily choosing blocks, unaware that she had shaken me deeply.”
Such is one of the more compelling small moments in Madhuri Vijay’s first novel, “The Far Field.” These little beats of simple action are all the more welcome as they randomly emerge amidst a very grim fictional though realistic landscape.
The protagonist, Shalini, from Bangalore, India, journeys northeast to Kashmir, soon after she has arrived at an uncertain crossroads in her life at age 30.
She resolves to look for someone who visited her family, who she greatly admired when she was young. She is as emotionally involving as a well-drawn but very updated Dickens protagonist.
The characters are so vivid in this story, especially the people of the mountain villages. There is an openess, a direct manner of address that Vijay captures in the various people Shalini meets. Their warmth is unique and nicely contrasts with Shalini’s less trusting more cautious big city manner. There are some of the barest of small mud and wood houses though clean and optimized for spartan habitation that overlook mountain meadows. Another world.
In Vijay’s short story, “You Are My Dear Friend” emotions are held back within the actions of the protagonist or do not seem to exist when there is conflict.
Although “The Far Field” might be characterized as a womens’ novel, the men are not stereotyped and are as interestingly drawn as the women. Kashmir is such a mindless tragedy of a once very beautiful place that keeps continually replaying the brutal disconnect between Hindus and Muslims after the Partition of India in 1947.
In modern times, emotional sensitivity is regarded as mental weakness and psychotic emotional overreaction is seen as a more normal though slightly sick form of mental control over others. Variously seen as progressive or not really but nevertheless necessary though degraded, “The Far Field” probes the obscene collateral damage of polarizing hatred and plain ignorance.
It is a very fine first novel by a sensitive writer who brilliantly contrasts the lack of feeling or emotion in our modern geopolitical landscape where different ideas and singular individual differences are not to be tolerated in the best interests of an outwardly benevolent one world attitude. Excellent writers and poets chart the changes in the emotional and philosophical social-sphere as T. S. Eliot did in “The Wasteland” or Anthony Burgess in “A Clockwork Orange”.
“The Far Field” would make an awesome film about Kashmir to join “Haider” and “Fitoor” in its finest moments. The renown Hindi actor, Tabu would be perfect as Shalini’s mother. It could be produced by Anushka Sharma’s film production company, Clean Slate Filmz, for theatrical release after the pandemic. Ironically proving the point of Vijay’s novel, it would actually be virtually impossible to shoot the film in Kashmir. So an excellent film location expert would need to scout a substitute location. And a skilled diplomat would also be needed to deal with any reservations film censors may have regarding the making of such a film in and about India.
“The Far Field” displays a mature emotional feeling that doesn’t seem to appeal as much to American readers as much as it once did in earlier American writers. It’s emotional landscape is very relatable to today’s tough times all over the world. The emotions and travails that Americans face are very similar to those that middle or lower upper class professional people experience in India or anywhere else in the world. The gulf between the well-monied and privileged people’s existence contrasted to the more ordinary living of everyday people has never been as extreme as it is today.
“The Far Field” wisely observes interactions among urban outsiders not at all aware of the maybe more ordinary but “different” in some ways, people of innately unique spiritual substance that they might meet.
One caveat. It is quite sad but not anymore so than the pandemic and everything else that is wrong in the world these days.