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Chapter I

Introduction

R.K. Narayan is one of those lucky writers, very few in number,

who have achieved recognition and acceptance, with their very first

publication. Narayan's Swami and Friends, his first publication, is a great

schoolboy classic in which Narayan gives us not only admirable pictures

of school life but also displays a penetrating insight into child

psychology, by depicting the world from the point of view of the boy at

school. His reputation has been gradually rising, his works have beentranslated into most of the important languages of the world, and he was

awarded the Sahitya Akademi Award for his The Guide which has also

been filmed, and the film has never failed to draw packed houses. Today,

he is regarded as the greatest of the Indo-Anglian writers of fiction.

Narayan has Indianised the novel, an essentially Western art-form.

Of all the Indo-Anglian novelists, Narayan alone has the distinction

of being a pure artist, one who writes for art's sake and not for propagati g

his views, political, economic, moral or religious. In each one of his

novels, he presents a slice of life as he sees it, impartially and

dispassionately. His perfect objectivity is to be contrasted with the

partiality of Mulk Raj Anand for the underdog of society, whose

propagandist and spokesman he is in each one of his novels. That is why

his novels have grown dated while those of Narayan have a perennial

freshness about them. They have the universal appeal of all great art He is

to be contrasted with Anand in another way also. His novels are not

disfigured by any such liberal translations of regional swear words and

idiomatic expressions, of the coarse and the vulgar, as mar the pages of

Anand.



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Narayan's is an art for art's sake, but it does not mean that he is a

writer without any vision of life. It simply means that there is no intrusive

message, philosophy or morality in his novels. They are entirely free

from all didacticism. But Narayan is a penetrating analyst of human

passions and human motives — the springs of human action — and this

makes him a great critic of human conduct. Human relationships within

the family circle — and relationships centring round sex and money — are

his ever-recurring themes and we can learn from them how to establish

right relationships. Whatever disturbs the norm is an aberration, a

disorder; sanity lies in the return to, and acceptance of, the normal. Life

must be accepted and lived, despite its many shortcomings, follies and

foibles. This may be said to be the Narayan's message, but it has to be

gleaned by each reader according to the light that is in him.

Narayan is the creator of Malgudi. He has put this particular region

of South India on the world map. His treatment of it is realistic and vivid

so much so that many have taken the fictitious to be the real and have

tried to identify the various geographical features and other landmarks

that constantly recur in his novels. Thus, some have thought that

Narayan's Malgudi is Lalgudi, while others have identified it with

Coimbatore. But like Hardy's Wessex, it is a pure country of the mind, a

dream-country in which physical features of various places, intimately

known to the novelist, fuse and mingle and are re-arranged, modified and

magnified. We see Malgudi growing from a small town into a large city,

and are also told of its history, customs and traditions. The recurrence of

the same landmarks serves to weld the various novels into an organic

whole. They may rightly be called Malgudi novels, just as Hardy s novels

are called Wessex novels.



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Narayan is a great regional novelist, but he is never parochial. It is

against the backdrop of Malgudi scenes and sights that Narayan studies

life's little ironies, which have always been the same in every age and

country. His novels are tragi-comedies of mischance and misdirection,

studies in the human predicament which, essentially, has always been the

same. From the particular Narayan rises to the general, and intensity and

universality are achieved by concentration. According to William Walsh,

"Malgudi, the locale of all his novels, is a symbol of India. Whatever

happens in the one, happens in the other, and also the reader begins to

believe whatever happens there happens everywhere" (54 Page).

Narayan is the creator of a whole picture-gallery of the immortals

of literature. A number of life-like memorable figures move in and out of

his novels and once we have been acquainted with them, we can never

forget them. He writes of the middle class, his own class, the members of

which are neither too well-off, nor too worried about money and position

nor dehumanized by absolute need. His hero is usually modest, sensitive,

ardent about himself and sufficiently conscious to have an active inner

life and to grope towards some existence independent of the family. The

family is the immediate context in which his sensibility operates and his

novels are remarkable for the delicacy and precision of the family

relations treated — that of son and parents, and brother and brother in The

Bachelor of Arts, of husband and wife and father and daughter in The

English Teacher, of father and son in The Financial Expert, of the

grandmother and grandson in Waiting for Mahatma.

The characteristic Narayan figure always has the capacity to be

surprised by the turn of events. His individuality has a certain



4

formlessness, a lack of finish, indeed, as though the definition of his

personality depended upon the play of external influence, which of course

is Indian, with immense weight of inherited tradition. This quality of the

incompleteness in the hero means a further capacity not just to be startled

by what happens, but, to be, at least in part, reconstituted by it. The

procedure in a Narayan's novel is almost invariably a renovation or

reforming of the central character in response to the encouragement or

provocation of events, which is never, however, totally enough to be

revolutionary, but sufficient to make a new bend in the flow of continuity.

Narayan's women may be divided into two categories. First, there

are the typical Hindu housewives, suffering and drudging through life but

always remaining faithful to their homes and their husbands. Sometimes

they may revolt against the tyranny of their husbands as does Savitri in

The Dark Room, but ultimately they come back to their homes and their

husbands. To the second category belong butterfly-type of women like

Rosie, Shanta Bi' and Shanthi. They are glamorous and charming, not

very particular about 'Chastity', 'Virtue', etc., and these butterflies often

cause discords within the family but ultimately peace and harmony are

restored. Rosie in The Guide is the most complex of these women

characters. She is enigmatic, mysterious, and both Raju and Marco fail to

understand her.

We also come across another kind of character generally

introduced into a novel rather late and assigned a minor role. He is a

mysteriously enigmatic character, showing that certain characters, certain

events, or certain experiences, like knots in wood, cannot be assimilated

into ordinary day-today life. Such are the Madras rake in The Bachelor of



5

Arts or the strange priest in The Financial Expert. The function of these

characters is to demonstrate, in keeping with Narayan's profoundly Indian

and religious view of life, the inexplicable in experience, the human

capacity for not being wholly susceptible to rational analysis.

Narayan's novels are so many studies in human relationships,

particularly family relationships. Of relationships within the family,

father-son relationship is most frequently studied. As his art matured, his

study of human relationships became more complex and intricate. Such

complex relationships which he explores are those which centre round

sex or money. These relationships are of particular importance in The

Financial Expert, The Guide, and The Man-Eater of Malgudi. In these

novels money and sex appear in different guises and are explored and

studied from different angles. Excessive pre-occupation with either

money or sex is an aberration which results in discords and disharmony —

in the disrupting of the normal family life, for instance — but peace and

harmony ultimately return and normalcy is restored. This is so much so

the case that the disruption of the accepted order and the ultimate

restoration of normalcy may be said to be the central theme of the novels.

Alone among Indo-Anglian writers of fiction, Narayan is the

practitioner of "serious comedy", a very difficult art form. His novels are

comedies of sadness. The sadness comes from the painful experience of

dismantling the routine self which, the context being Indian, seems less a

private possession than something distilled by powerful and ancient

convention and, secondly, the reconstruction or more frequently the

having reconstructed for one, of another personality. The comedy arises

from the sometimes bumbling, sometimes desperate, sometimes absurd,



6

exploration of different experiences in the search for a new, and it may be

done exquisitely in the appropriate roles. “ The complex theme of

Narayan's serious comedies, then, is the rebirth of self and the process of

its education” (20). In his novels the gay and the serious, the tragic and

the comic, often lie close together so that we smile through our tears.

Narayan is the greatest humorist among the Indo-Anglian writers

of fiction. He is a pure humorist whose aim is the entertainment of his

readers. There is satire also but it is usually kindly and tolerant. Immense

is the variety of his humour and like that of Shakespeare, it is all-

pervasive. Humour of character, farcical humour of situation, verbal

humour, wit, irony, etc., are all there. Margayya of The Financial Expert

is one of the greatest comic creations and towards the end of The Guide

there is an almost Shakespearean interpenetration of tragedy and comedy.

There are ironic contrasts. Narayan's eyes ever take on a merry twinkle,

as do those of the grown-ups when watching children at play, as they fall

on the follies and foibles of mankind.

He himself enjoys the tragicomic spectacle of humanity on the march and

has at his command a scintillating, lucid and powerful prose style to

convey his own enjoyment to his readers.

Narayan is a great artist who has achieved greatness by recognising

the limitations of his range, and keeping within it. Like Jane Austen, he

has achieved greatness by working on his "two inches of ivory." He knew

only one particular region most intimately and he rarely goes out of it. He

himself belonged to the middle class, intimately knew only this class, and

so he draws his characters from this class alone. He studies men in



7

relation to each other and not in relation to God or religion or politics

because such relationships were outside his range. Contemporary Indian

politics rarely enters his novels. Gandhi and his freedom movement are

introduced only in one of his novels, Waiting for Mahatma and the result

is rather unfortunate. Further, his range was limited by his comic vision

and so only such aspects of life are selected as are susceptible to comic

treatment It is for this reason that the passions, "the stormy sisterhood",

are eschewed and attention is confined to the surface reality of life. There

is no probing of the sub-conscious or the unconscious. Narayan does not

soar high because such soaring is incompatible with the comic mode.

Narayan as a novelist follows the tradition of story-telling as it

existed in ancient India, but adapts it to his form and style taken from the

West. The instruments of his critical strategy are comedy, irony and

satire. Narayan keeps very close to surface reality, for his aim is to reveal

the tragi-comedy implicit in ordinary life. His problem is to give the

reader a picture that strikes him as typical of everyday reality. For this, he

depends on selection. He, therefore, excludes from his picture such

aspects of reality as are not susceptible to comic treatment. His picture of

life is always true to facts, but to those facts only at which a reasonable

being can be expected to smile. He is also careful to survey his subject-

matter from an angle from which its coi lie aspects are most prominently

visible.

R.K. Narayan is one of those lucky writers who have achieved

recognition with the publication of their very first novel. He has ten

novels, about a hundred short stories, a number of articles and sketches,

to his credit and all this large body of work, with few exceptions (as The



8

Dark Room), is uniformly of a high standard. His first three novels deal

with three different stages in the life of the same character though he is

given different names. Swami and Friends, The Bachelor of Arts and The

English Teacher are novels of school and college life and they are deeply

autobiographical. The Dark Room, which came in between the last two,

and The Sweet-Vendor (1967) are also novels of domestic life. The

Financial Expert, Mr. Sampath, The Guide and The Man-Eater of

Malgudi deal with the careers of money-hunting men of the world.

Usually, Narayan takes no note of the stirring political events of the day,

but in Waiting for Mahatma, he has introduced the figure of the great

Mahatma, and the effect is rather melodramatic, but this, too, is not a

political novel. It was no doubt an artistic mistake to have dragged in the

great Mahatma, too big for any single work of art, but the Gandhian

movement is not its theme. Its real theme is the love story of Sriram and

Bharati, and it has been dealt with effectively and credibly. All this work

is remarkably even in the quality of its achievement. Naturally, his later

work is more complex, and more introspective than his earlier work, but

there can be no question about the quality even of his earlier work.

R.K. Narayan, like Jane Austen, has achieved greatness by

working on his "two inches of ivory." In other words, he recognised the

limitations of his range. He was born and bred in South India. It was there

that he was educated and he did not go out of this limited region till late

in life when his reputation as a writer was already well established, when

he had already found himself.

The formative years of his life were passed in this particular part of

the country, and, therefore, as a novelist he rightly confines himself to

this particular region. It is the life of Malgudi which he knew intimately,



9

which had fertilised his imagination, and he renders it accurately, vividly

and realistically, in one novel after another.

Of this particular region, it was the life of the middle classes of

which he had the most intimate knowledge. His memorable characters are

all middle class. Upper class characters and characters belonging to the

lowest sections of society were outside his range and so they are seldom

introduced with any success in his works. It is the day-to-day life of this

particular class — a class to which he himself belonged — the tensions and

conflicts, stresses and strains in human relations within the domestic

circle of this class he had himself experienced, and hence he rightly

makes them the basis of his works.

His early novels are all domestic novels studying the relationships

of husband and wife, parents and sons, brothers and brothers, etc., and in

his last novel he again returns to these domestic relationships. Even when

he covers a wider field as in The Guide or Mr. Sampath, the domestic

relationships are still explored and delineated. He depicts men in relation

to each other, rather than in relation to God, or some abstract idea, even

politics. Politics, even the contemporary struggle for independence, was

outside his range. He had never meddled with it, he had no first-hand

knowledge of it, and so he keeps it out of his novels. It is only in Waiting for Mahatma that the freedom struggle is brought in with disastrous

consequences. The introduction of the great Mahatma is certainly

melodramatic.

Narayan's range is limited in another way also. It is limited by the

comic vision. Only such subjects and characters as are susceptible to



10

comic treatment are introduced. As Paul Verghese points out: "Narayan

keeps-ery close to surface reality, for his aim is to reveal the tragi-

comedy implicit in ordinary life. His problem is to give the reader a

picture that strikes him as typical of everyday reality. For this, he depends

on selection. He, therefore, excludes from his picture such aspects of

reality as are not susceptible to comic treatment His picture of life is

always true to facts, but to those facts only at which a reasonable being

can be expected to smile. He is also careful to survey his subject-matter

from an angle from which its comic aspects are most prominently visible"

(60). Human oddities, follies and frivolities are all observed and

ridiculed. His eye takes on a merry twinkle as it falls on something odd or

comic in character and situation and he conveys his own amusement to

his readers. He paints with great skill the surface of life, the externals of

characters and manners, and passes by the vehement, the profound and

the enthusiastic, all that is not capable of humorous treatment.

According to Srinivasa Iyengar, "Narayan's is the art of resolved

limitation and conscientious exploration; he is content, like Jane Austen,

with his little bit of ivory, just so many inches wide; he would like to be a

detached observer, to concentrate on a narrow scene, to sense the

atmosphere of the place, to snap a small group of characters in their

oddities and angularities; he would, if he could, explore the inner

countries of the mind, heart and soul, catch the uniqueness, in the

ordinary, the tragic. Malgudi is Narayan's Casterbridge but the inhabitants

of Malgudi — although they may have their recognizable local trappings —

are essentially human and hence have their kinship with all humanity. In

this sense, Malgudi is everywhere" (65).



11

In short, there is careful selection and ordering of material and all

that is outside his range is carefully eschewed. By exercising such artistic

self-control, Narayan has achieved greatness. He works on his two inches

of ivory, but working within this limited range, he has achieved greatness.



Chapter II

Conflict between Good and Evil

The Man-Eater of Malgudi is the 9th novel of R.K. Narayan. It was

published in 1961 and, though CD. Narasimaiaha regards it as an

anticlimax, coming as it does after The Guide, an undisputed masterpiece,

it has been highly praised by a number of critics and has been regarded as

one of his finest works. Its popularity was immediate and it has also been

universal. On its publication, it was highly praised by the editors of Times

Literary Supplement in the following words:

"Narayan has now written his most delightful story of the

little world of Malgudi, his imaginary town in South India.

The good printer Nataraj and his close friends, a poet and a

journalist, find their congenial days disturbed when Vasu, a

power-hungry taxidermist, moves in with his stuffed hyenas

and pythons, and brings his dancing-women up the printer's

private stairs. When Vasu, in search of larger game,

threatens the life of a temple elephant that Nataraj has

befriended, complications ensue that are both laughable and

tragic. A not unwelcome death occurs, murder is indicated,

and the search for the guilty party who might have been

Nataraj himself or anyone of his friends, or even the temple

dancer — lends suspense to this bizarre, yet moving tale"

(75).

"Pungent as a Madras curry, gay, witty, the rueful wry gaiety

of Tamils and Telugus, Narayan's The Man-Eater of

Malgudi makes a most rich and satisfying mixture. Hilarity



13

and high seriousness are rarely yoked together in partnership

as effectively as they are in this book. Narayan's writing is

limpid and beautifully unforced" (80).

This praise has been echoed by successive critics of the novel. The

Man-Eater of Malgudi is an allegory or fable showing that evil is self-

destructive. The title is ironic, for the man-eater in the novel is no tiger,

but a mighty man, Vasu, who not only kills a large number of wild

animals in Mempi forest but can also kill a man with a single blow of his

hammer-fist.

The story is narrated in the first person by its tragi-comic hero

Nataraj, a printer of Malgudi. In his printing works, he is assisted by

Sastri who is a compositor, a proof-reader and a machine-man all

combined in one. Among his constant companions are a poet who is

engaged in writing the life of God Krishna, and Sen, the journalist, who is

always criticising Nehru. The smooth and congenial life of this small

group is disturbed when, H. Vasu, M.A. taxidermist, comes to stay with

them in a room in the upper storey of the printing press. This tall man, of

about six feet, with his bull neck, hammer-fist and rough and aggressive

behaviour, arouses fear in the hearts of Nataraj and his friends. Nataraj

tolerates him in his room upstairs till he makes himself unbearable by

robbing Mempi forest of its wild life and collecting dead animals in his

room for stuffing them.

When Nataraj's neighbours complain to him about the insanitary

conditions, he requests Vasu to find a new house for himself. The

taxidermist treats this as an insult and sues him fo~ harassing him and

trying to evict him by unlawful means. The timely help from one of his



14

clients, an old lawyer, his ability to prolong a case beyond the wildest

dream of a litigant, saves Nataraj from the clutches of law. Soon after,

Vasu starts bringing Rangi, a notorious dancing woman and some other

women like her, to his room to the great annoyance of all concerned. But

Vasu does not care for their feelings.

The crisis, however, comes to a head when the pitiless taxidermist

threatens to kill Kumar, a temple-elephant who is to be taken in a festival

procession organized to celebrate the poet's completion of a portion of his

religious epic. Nataraj is very fond of the animal. He naturally gets very

much upset, the moment he learns from Rangi that Vasu intends to shoot

it on the night of the proposed celebrations. Nataraj immediately

acquaints his friends — the poet, the lawyer, and other important people of

the town — with the taxidermist's wicked intentions. The matter is

reported to the police authorities but they express their inability to take

any action against him until the crime has been actually committed.

The very thought of Kumar's murder, however, drives Nataraj

crazy. Even while compelled to stay in his house owing to the agitated

condition of his mind, he continues thinking of Kumar. As the procession

passes in front of his printing press, his heart begins to beat with fear. He

waits every moment to hear the noise of gun shots and the cries of panic-

stricken people. He is surprised when the procession passes away without

any untoward incident.

Relieved of a great worry, Nataraj goes to his office as usual in the

morning. To his great shock and dismay, he learns that Vasu is dead. The

police authorities of the town soon start investigations. Murder is



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suspected and Nataraj, his friends, and Rangi, the temple dancer, are

interrogated by the police. From the medical report it is gathered that

Vasu has died of a concussion received on his right temple from a blunt

instrument. When the police fails to find any clue of the culprit, the

matter is dropped. Rangi later tells them that while striking a mosquito

settled on his forehead, Vasu slapped his temple and died instantaneously.

He thus died of a blow from his own hammer-fist.

The novel has a well-knit coherent plot and a fine gallery of vivid,

lifelike characters. The character of Vasu, the central figure, is a

masterpiece. The narration is enlivened by Narayan's comic vision which

frequently fuses and mingles with pathos. In short, it is a great and

complex work of art with a number of themes and ideas standing out of it.

The title of a literary piece of composition should be apt and

suggestive. Just as a signboard indicates the goods that are sold in a shop,

so a good title should indicate the theme of a novel. Let us critically

examine if the title The Man-Eater of Malgudi satisfies these

requirements.

The present title consists of two parts: (1) Man-Eater, and (2)

Malgudi. So far as the second part of the title is concerned, it is quite

appropriate for it at once indicates the particular place or locality where

the various events and incidents narrated in the novel take place. Malgudi

in South India, essentially a "country of the mind", provides the setting to

the novel. A number of its localities such as Market Road, Kabir Street,

Sarayu river, the Taluk Office, the Lawley Extension, the Mempi Forest

are mentioned. An account is also given of the professions, beliefs,



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customs, susperstitions, traditions, etc., of its people. Nataraj, the

unheroic hero, has his Nataraj Printing Works, and next door there is the

Star Press with its modern German printing machine. Malgudi is shown

to be a developing town. Important changes are taking place. The project

for the establishment of a veterinary Hospital has been cleared, and a

veterinary doctor is already there. However, the implementation of the

project has been delayed because of the apathy of the officials concerned

and the paucity of funds. At the foot of the Mempi forest there is the

Mempi village, and a Government bus plies between this village and

Malgudi.

The tenor of life is peaceful and the people, on the whole, are

happy and contented. They have ample leisure. They gossip for hours

together and make elaborate arrangements to take out processions to

celebrate some religious occasion. Sen, the journalist, dwells at length on

the mistakes of Nehru and a teacher-turned-poet writes an epic inmonosyllabic verse and recites the verses to Nataraj as the composition

proceeds. There are also jealousies, doubts and suspicions and women of

loose morals like the temple-dancer Rangi. An elaborate picture is

painted of Malgudi and its life, and so it may be concluded that the

second part of the title is quite apt and suggestive.

As regards the first part of the title, it, too, is apt and suggestive if

not in letter, at least in spirit. Man-eater means a tiger who has once

tasted human blood, has relished it, and so attacks human beings

whenever it gets an opportunity to do so. It causes death and destruction

and so is an object of terror to all in the neighbourhood. There is no man-

eater in Malgudi in the literal sense. But there is H. Vasu, the taxidermist,

who is as destructive as a man-eater.



17

Vasu is an aggressive bully and from the very first day of his

arrival in Malgudi, he creates death and destruction and spoils the

peaceful, carefree life of Nataraj and his circle. He treats the poet and

Sen, the journalist, with contempt, makes fun of them and passes sarcastic

remarks. The result of his aggressive behaviour is that Nataraj's friends

steal away as soon as he arrives. He takes possession of Nataraj's attic

without his permission and continues to live in it without paying any rent,

and refuses to vacate it when asked by Nataraj to do so. He treats the

printer's parlour — which is his drawing room and business place as an

extension of the attic and moves in and out of it at will, without caring or

paying any heed to decency and etiquette. In everything he gets his will

by his bullying conduct and tactics. Thus, he forces Nataraj to come in his

jeep for a few minutes, and refuses to tell him both of his purpose and his

destination. Poor Nataraj is forced to accompany him without his shirt-

buttons and without even a single pie in his pocket. He drives rashly, to

the great terror of Nataraj, and leaves the poor printer stranded in Mempi

village. The poor fellow returns to Malgudi late in the night after a long

and tiresome journey in a bus. Thus, he destroys Nataraj's peace of mind

and his professional efficiency. With his hammer-fist he can silence any

opposition, and send his opponents sprawling on the ground. All are

afraid of him and none dares even to contradict him.

Soon he converts Nataraj's attic into a charnel house. He shoots big

game in the Mempi forest without permission of the Forest Department.

He prowls there stealthily like a man-eater in search of its prey, and

brings to the attic the animals he kills in the forest. There he skins them

and stuffs them and then sells them at huge profit to himself. A hyena and

a snake are hung in the staircase and his attic is soon full of stuffed dogs,



18

cats, eagles, crows, etc. He shoots a pet dog in the street from the window

of his attic and the owner comes to Nataraj, with his complaint. Soon the

foul smell emanating from the attic causes the residents of the locality to

protest but Vasu does not heed such protests.

A man-eater kills man, but this man-eater kills animals as also the

peace of mind of all concerned. All protests, both from the citizens of

Malgudi and from the officials of the Forest Department, fail to move

him from his purpose. When at last his activities in the forest are

curtailed, he starts bringing women of loose character into the attic

without caring even a fig for the fair name and reputation of Nataraj, or

for the worry that his actions would cause to the helpless printer.

So destructive is he that he even plans to kill the sacred temple

elephant Kumar. This causes much mental agitation and spiritual anguish

to Nataraj and so on the day of the celebration he grows delirious and

loudly cries out 'Vishnu', which makes the agitated people rush to him to

see what has gone wrong. Vasu is evil incarnate, a rakshasa, and every

demon, as Sastri puts it, carries the seeds of destruction in himself. Vasu

dies of a blow of his own hammer-fist on his head to drive away some

mosquitoes. However, in death he proves to be more destructive than in

life.

Vasu dead proved a greater nuisance than Vasu alive. Anyone who

had anything to do with him for the past six weeks was summoned to the

press by the police. Muthu was there, away from his teashop, the poet

was there, the journalist was, of course, there, and the elephant doctor and

the tailor (who was bewailing all along that he had promised clothes for a



19

wedding and ought to be back at his sewing machine). A police van had

gone and brought them all. All, even his friends and his wife, suspect

Nataraj of being the murderer. "This was the greatest act of destruction

that the man-eater had performed; he had destroyed my name, my

friendships, and my world. The thought was too much for me. Hugging

the tiger cub, I burst into tears" (78).

Thus, the title of the novel is apt, suggestive and eye-catching, at

least in spirit, if not in letter.

Nataraj and Vasu are contrasted characters. Nataraj, no doubt

central figure and the action of the novel is viewed through his eyes. It is

his point of view that we always get. But he is an unheroic-hero, good at

heart but passive and inactive like most of us. Vasu, on the other hand, is

evil incarnate and, like Milton's Satan, he has all the fascination of evil

about him. He is an anti-hero, aggressive and bullying, and Nataraj is

both attracted and repelled by him. The novel makes it clear that theirs is

a Love – hate relationship.

Nataraj is the owner of a printing press, which is situated behind a

bule curtain, which keeps the goings-on there hidden from the view of the

visitors and clients. Narayan invests everything connected with Nataraj

with an aura of mysteriousness. The entire process of printing is shown as

shrouded in mystery and Nataraj is thought of as equipped for big tasks. It

is obvious that Narayan intends Nataraj to symbolise the mystery of

religion. In his morning rounds he recites a prayer to the Sun to illumine

his mind, which shows his religious bent of mind.



20

The parlour of Nataraj is frequented by two people, one a poet,

who in writing the life of God Krishna in monosyllabic verse, and the

other Sen, a journalist, who holds forth on the mistakes Nehru was

making.

Nataraj is upset when he finds that the sanctity of his premises his

violated by a stranger. He soon learns that this stranger's name is H. Vasu

and that he is a taxidermist by profession. A complex and strangely

fascinating relationship is formed between Vasu and Nataraj. As Nataraj

says, ―I began to feel intrigued by the man, I didn't wanted to lose him

even if I wanted to, I had no means of getting rid of him. He had sought

me out and I'd have to have him until he decided to leave."

Vasu is a Faustian character with his virtually insatiable curiosity

and thirst for power and knowledge. He holds his master's degree in

History, Economics and Literature and Nataraj says about him, "The

man's curiosity was limitless and recognised no proprieties." He soon

occupies the attic in Nataraj's press. He stands "in the middle of the room

like a giant". Nataraj, on the other hand, is a typical Narayan character

with a non-committal neutrality as his ideal. As he voices his philosophy:

"I left everyone alone. If they wrangled and lost their heads and voices, it

was their business and not mine. Even if heads had been broken, I don't

think I'd have interfered" (99). Vasu as is his habit, naturally quarrels

with everyone. He says, "We are not lone dwellers in the Sahara to live

self-centred lives. We are members of a society and there is no point in

living like a recluse, shutting oneself away from all the people around"

(102). But Nataraj finds him to be full of danger and destructiveness. As

he says about him, "Now it was like having a middle-aged man-eater in



21

your office and home, with the same uncertainties, possibilities and

potentialities" (125).

Nataraj is struck by Vasu's sweep of mind. He says about him: "He

was the lord of the universe, he had no use for other people's words."

Then he quotes his views on road-sense, marriage and prohibition.

Nataraj comes to realise that Vasu is a defiler of his precincts but he finds

himself helpless to do anything about it. He watches helplessly his attic

being converted into a camel house. In spite of the fact that Nataraj is

oppressed and harassed by the presence of Vasu, he does not cease

wondering at him. He says about him, "...now we were bitter enemies. I

admired him for his capacity for work, for all the dreadful "things he was

able to accomplish single-handed; short of creating the animals, he did

everything" (142).

Nataraj finds him so fascinating that he does not want to lose him.

Te says about Vasu, "He was a terrible specimen of human being, no

doubt, but I wanted to be on talking terms with him. This was a complex

mood. I couldn't say that I liked him or approved of anything he said or

did, but I didn't want to be repulsed by him" (143).

In short, the relationship between Nataraj and Vasu is a love-hate

relationship. Nataraj is himself passive and colourless, is attracted by his

forceful dominating personality, but he is also repulsed by him for he is

evil incarnate, a demon or a rakshasa. Vasu has all the fascination of evil,

like Milton's Satan, and this accounts for the attraction of Nataraj for him.

Theirs is a love-hate relationship. The weak, passive man hates the strong

active bully, but is still drawn towards him.



22

A writer may use ancient myths, legends and folklore

unconsciously in his works, or he may use ancient myths consciously as a

technique of narration. Narayan is well versed in the Hindu epics, like

Ramayan and Mahabharat, and other Hindu scriptures, as also in the

myths and legends which form a part of the Indian folklore. This is

clearly brought out by a study of his work entitled Gods, Demons and

Other Stories. Reference and allusions to such myths and legends abound

in his stories. But it is only in The Man-Eater of Malgudi that he has

consciously used myth as a technique in the manner of such modern

English writers as T.S. Eliot, W.B. Yeats and many others.

The writer who makes a conscious use of the mythical technique

goes to ancient myths and legends, juxtaposes them with the facts of

modern life, and in this way brings out the similarities and contrasts

between the past and the present. The mythical method is simply a way,

"of controlling, of ordering, of giving a shape and significance to the

immense panorama of futility and anarchy which is contemporary

history" (125). The modern artist is acutely conscious of the bewildering

variety, complexity and intricacy of modern life. His bewilderment is

further increased by his 'historic sense', by his consciousness that the

whole of literature forms a single whole, and this vast literary tradition is

dynamic, modifying and influencing literary activity in the present and

being modified in its own turn by such activity.

The problem of the contemporary artist is how to render in his art

this variety and complexity. He must impose some sort of order and

control, he must discover some pattern in this variety, otherwise the result

would be chaotic. The artist must convey a sense of the multiplicity of his



23

age, but he can only do so by imposing on it some sort of order and form.

Writers bring about this order and control by the use of the mythical

method.

All the myths and legends Narayan uses point to the fact that the

surface differences between the customs, beliefs and ways of life of

mankind tend to mask profound resemblances. Similarities lie beneath

contrasting appearances and there is a fundamental unity in diversity. He

thus discovers " a common principle underlying all manifestations of

life"; and he uses this principle as a pattern to impose order and unity on

the chaotic variety and complexity of his rendering of modern life. As

pointed out by a number of critics, Narayan has used this mythical

technique with remarkable success in The Man-Eater of Malgudi.

Vasu is evil incarnate. He frightens children, kills dogs, repels

neighbourhood people with the stench of his workshop and defies social

conventions by bringing in prostitutes. All these negative acts set him

apart from common human beings. Fairly early in the novel, Sastri

identifies him with the rakshasa, embodying forces of destruction. Vasu

corresponds to the letter with Sastri's definition of a rakshasa as a

demoniac creature, possessing enormous strength, strange powers and

genius, but recognising no sort of restraint of man or god. In The Man-

Eater of Malgudi also this demon gets swollen with his ego. He thinks he

is invincible, beyond every law, but finally he oversteps his limitations

and is destroyed.



24

The novelist has used the Bhasmasura myth as a conscious

technique, the mythical technique, the purpose being to stress the self-

destructive nature of Vasu, to enrich the texture of the novel and to link it

up with the Indian Classical tradition. Sastri says to Nataraj, "to deal with

a rakshasa one must possess the marksmanship of a hunter, the wit of a

pundit, and the guile of a harlot."

"Vasu shows all the definitions of a rakshasa", persisted Sastri and

went on to define the make-up of a rakshasa. He said, "Every rakshasa

gets swollen with his ego. He thinks he is invincible, beyond every law.

But sooner or later something or other will destroy him." He stood

expiating on the lives of various demons in Puranas to prove his point.

He displayed great versatility and knowledge. Nataraj found his talk

enlightening. He went on, his information was encyclopedic. He removed

his silver-rimmed spectacles and put them away in his shirt pocket as

being an impediment to his discourse.

He further said "There was Ravana, the protagonist in the

Ramayana who had ten heads and twenty arms and enormous yogic and

physical powers, and a boon from the gods that he could never be

vanquished. The earth shook under his tyranny. Still he came to a sad

end. Or take Mahisha, the asura, who meditated and acquired a boon of

immortality and invincibility and who had secured an especial favour that

every drop of blood shed from his body should give rise to another

demon in his own image and strength, and who nevertheless was

destroyed. The Goddess with six arms, each bearing a different weapon,

came riding for the fight on a lion which sucked every drop of blood

drawn from the demon" (155).



25

"Then there was Bhasmasura, who acquired a special boon that

everything he touched should be scorched, while nothing could ever

destroy him. He made humanity suffer. God Vishnu was incarnated as a

dancer of great beauty, named Mohini, with whom the asura became

infatuated. She promised to yield to him only if he imitated all the

gestures and movements of her own dancing. At one point in the dance,

Mohini placed her palms on her head, and the demon followed this

gesture in complete forgetfulness and was reduced to ashes that very

second, the blighting touch becoming active on his own head. Every man

can think that he is great and will live forever, but no one can guess from

which quarter his doom will come" (162).

Thus, Sastri stresses the parallel between Vasu and Bhasmasura

and hints at the manner of Vasu's sudden and unexpected death. He dies

like Bhasmasura with a blow of his fist on his own head and the novel

concludes with the following words of Sastri, "Every demon appears in

the world with a special boon of indestructibility. Yet the universe has

survived all the rakshasas that were ever born. Every demon carries

within him, unknown to himself, a tiny seed of self-destruction and goes

up in thin air at the most unexpected moment. Otherwise what is to

happen to humanity ?" (168). He narrated again for Nataraj's benefit the

story of Bhasmasura the unconquerable, who scorched everything he

touched, and finally reduced himself to ashes by placing the tips of his

fingers on his own head.

In short, in the novel Narayan has consciously used the mythical

technique, in the manner of Western writers like T.S. Eliot, W.B. Yeats,

Eugiene O' Neill and James Joyce.



26

In Narayan's novels there is not an organic compound of realism

and fantasy, but merely a mechanical mixture. In the later part of the

novels, fantasy predominates, and strikes one as incongruous in the

context of the realism of the first part. Savitri's attempted suicide in The

Dark Room ends in a miraculous escape, and she returns to her home and

children. Chandran's renunciation of life in The Bachelor of Arts, his

wandering as a sadhu, Krishna's communication with the spirit of his

dead wife, are all examples of such fantasy. All this is certainly

incongruous with the realistic content of the novels, though it cannot be

regarded as improbable in the Indian context.

However, H. Vasu in The Man-Eater of Malgudi is certainly

fantastic, he meets a fantastic death by his own hands reminding us of the

ancient Hindu myth of the rakshasa who died as in dancing he placed his

hand on his own head. Equally fantastic and incongruous is his scheme of

shooting the elephant. In Waiting for Mahatma, we have the fantasy of

the intrusion of Gandhi and Gandhian politics into the simple and realistic

love-story of Bharati and Sriram. In this very novel, there is even the

more fantastic coming to life on the cremation ground of an old woman

supposed to be dead. Even The Financial Expert and The Sweet-Vendor,

two of Narayan's finest novels, are spoiled by this uneven mixture of

fantasy and realism. In the former, there is the fantastic worship ritual and

fast to win the favour of Goddess Laxmi, and in the latter, as already

mentioned, there is the fantastic story-writing machine, besides many

other eccentricities and absurdities of character and event.

The word picaresque comes from the Spanish word Picaro,

meaning a rogue or a villain. A picaresque novel deals with the



27

adventures of a rogue or villain. The rogue or Picaro is the central figure,

and in the novel, he plays many roles and wears many masks.

A picaresque novel has a number of peculiar features of its own. It

is a string of incidents and episodes, which have no unity and coherence,

except the unity of the hero, that is to say, the same hero, the same picaro

or rogue, figures in each of them. It is episodic in character and the

characters are not rounded three-dimensional figures. They lack

individuality and are not fully developed. Most of the characters appear

and then disappear, never to make their appearance again. New characters

are introduced even towards the close of the novel, so that we know very

little about them.

The Man-eater of Malgudi has many of the features of a picaresque

novel. H. Vasu is a picaro, an anti-hero and adventurous wanderer. The

stress on his many roles and adventures makes the plot loose and

episodic. Vasu is evil and the novel gives the account of his wanderings,

of his adventures, and of the many roles he plays and the many masks he

wears. We are given a detailed account of his past, of his several

adventures, and roles, before he comes to Malgudi to play the role of a

taxidermist. He himself narrates his past to Nataraj: "I was in Junagadh —

you know the place — and there I grew interested in the art. I came across

a master there, one Suleiman. When he stuffed a lion (you know,

Junadgadh is a place where we have lions) he could make it look more

terrifying than it would be in the jungle. His stuffing's go all over the

world. He was a master, and he taught me the art. After all, we are

civilized human beings educated and cultured, and it is up to us to prove

our superiority to nature. Science conquers nature in a new way each day:



28

why not in creation also ? That's my philosophy, sir. I challenge any man

to contradict me" (172). He sighed at the thought of Suleiman, his master.

"He was a saint He taught me his art sincerely" (173).

Continuing with the account of his adventurous past and of the

many roles he has played, he further tells Nataraj that he was educated in

the Presidency College. He took his Master's degree in History,

Economics and Literature. That was in the year 1931. Then he joined the

civil disobedience movement against British rule, broke the laws,

marched, demonstrated and ended up in jail. He went repeatedly to prison

and once when he was released found himself in the streets of Nagpur.

There he met a phaelwan at a show. "That man could bear a half-

ton stone siab on his chest and have it split by hammer strokes; he could

snap steel chains and he could hit a block of hard granite with his fist and

pulverize it. I was young then, his strength appealed to me. I was

prepared to become his disciple at any cost. I introduced myself to the

phaelwan" (175). He remained thoughtful for a while and continued, "I

learnt everything from this master. The training was unsparing. He woke

me up at three o'clock every morning and put me through exercises. And

he provided me with the right diet. I had to eat a hundred almonds every

morning and wash them down with half a seer of milk; two hours later six

eggs with honey; at lunch chicken and rice; at night vegetables and fruit.

Not everyone can hope to have this diet, but I was lucky in finding a man

who enjoyed stuffing me like that. In six months, I could understudy for

him. On my first day, when 1 banged my fist on a century-old door of a

house in Lucknow, the three-inch panel of seasoned teak splintered. My

master patted me on the back with tears of joy in his eyes, "You are

growing on the right lines, my boy" (179).



29

"In a few months, 1 could also snap chains, twist iron bars and

pulverize granite. We travelled all over the country and gave our shows at

every market fair in the villages, and in the town halls in the cities, and he

made a lot of money. Gradually, he grew flabby and lazy, and let me do

everything. They announced his name on the notices, but actually 1 did

all the twisting and smashing of stone, iron, and what not. When I spoke

to him about it he called me an ungrateful dog and other names, and tried

to push me out. 1 resisted...and..." Vasu laughed at the recollection of this

incident. "I knew his weak spot. I hit him there with the edge of my palm

with a chopping movement...and he fell down and squirmed on the floor.

I knew he could perform no more. I left him there and walked out and

gave up the strong man's life once and for all" (183).

Thus, Vasu has been a scholar, a phaelwan, a patriot, an adventurer

in search of a career, and now he sets up as a taxidermist in Malgudi. As

he tells Nataraj, the fame of Mempi forests has brought him to Malgudi.

He now acts like an aggressive bully, begins to live in Nataraj's attic

without his permission and even without paying him any rent. He soon

turns Nataraj's parlour into an extension of the attic and makes fun of his

closest friends, so that they go away as soon as he comes in.

He cringes and flatters the forest officer in order to get his

permission to shoot big game in the Mempi forest and when the

permission is not given, he plays the role of a poacher and shoots wild

animals there. Soon the attic is turned into a charnel house and the foul

smell emanating from there gets intolerable. When at last he has to give

up poaching in the Mempi forest, he plays the role of a womaniser.



30

Rangi and other such women are frequently seen going up to the

attic and coming down. He is entirely unprincipled and immoral and

plans even to shoot Kumar, the temple elephant. He dies in mysterious

circumstances of a blow on his head from his own hammer-fist. Nataraj is

suspected of having murdered him and, so, this man-eater destroys his

reputation and peace of mind.

The plot of the novel is loose and episodic and the various

incidents and episodes have no unity except the unity provided by the fact

that the same person, Vasu, appears in all of them. There is much

superfluity. Too much space has been devoted to Vasu's varied activities.

A number of characters appear for a short duration, play their respective

roles and then disappear. The forest officer, the bus conductor and driver,

the D.S.R, the Inspector of Police, Muthu, the adjournment lawyers, etc.,

are such characters.

They are not rounded, three-dimensional figures. The phaelwan

and Vasu's guru Suleiman do not appear at all in the novel and Rangi

who, no doubt, plays an important role, is introduced very late. Even

Nataraj's son Babu and his wife, are merely background figures. Their

characters are not developed, and this applies also to the case of the poet

and the journalist Sen.



Chapter III

Summing Up

An allegory is a technique of vision. It serves to convey abstract

and mystic truths in an easy-popular way. For the common reader, the

writer merely narrates an entertaining story, but for the more discerning

reader the story carries a profound moral lesson. Thus, the allegory is a

literary composition with a hidden moral lesson. Medieval English

literature is largely allegorical. Morality plays are all allegorical,

depicting the conflict between the Good and the Evil for the possession of the human soul. The Man-Eater of Malgudi is also an allegory, for not

only does it narrate an interesting story, but it also represents the conflict

of the Good and the Evil, of the normal and the uncommon, of the passive

and the active. These allegorical implications of the story become clear, if

we compare and contrast the characters of Nataraj, the unheroic-hero, and

H. Vasu, the anti-hero

The New York Times reviewer read the novel as an allegory and

Edwin Gerow, in a perceptive analysis of the novel, has pointed out how

closely the novel follows the allegorical pattern of Sanskrit literature.

Even a casual reader will notice the allegorical nature of the novel. The

polarity between Nataraj, the meek and tolerant printer, and Vasu, the

dynamic man of action is too clear to be overlooked. Nataraj is mainly

passive, things happen to him and he has very little power to influence

events; while Vasu is the great advocate of individual achievements.

Vasu is alone, he comes from outside, and sets up his business of

taxidermy unaided by anyone, fighting with the Forest Department, on

one hand, and the Malgudi people, on the other. He secures a room, a jeep

and a game licence on his own initiative, and kills, processes, stuffs



32

animals, packs them in boxes and sends them out to different places

single handed, while "I (Nataraj) noted it all from my seat in the press and

said to myself from this humble town of Malgudi stuffed carcasses

radiate to the four corners of the earth" (185).

If action and inaction are the two attributes of Vasu and Nataraj,

associated with them are also the qualities of tolerance and intolerance as

is clear from the following dialogue:

Look here Vasu," I said, with a sudden access of

foolhardiness, "You should leave others alone; it will make

for happiness all around (187).

I can't agree with you," he said, "we are not alone, dwellers

in the Sahara, to live self-centered lives, and, there is no

point in living like a recluse... (188).

It should be noted, however, that in spite of his insistence on man

being a social animal, it is Vasu himself who is anti-social in his isolation

and egoism. He frightens children, kills dogs, repels neighbourhood

people with the stench of his workshop and defies social conventions by

bringing prostitutes home. All these negative acts set him apart from

common human beings. Fairly early in the novel, Sastri identifies him

with the rakshasa, embodying his definition of a rakshasa as a demoniac

creature, possessing enormous strength, strange powers, and genius, but

recognising no sort of restraint of man or god. In The Man-Eater of

Malgudi also, the demon gets swollen with his ego. He thinks he is

http://radi.nr/

http://radi.nr/



33

invincible, beyond every law, but finally he oversteps his limitations, and

is destroyed.

The opposition between Nataraj and Vasu is so clearly marked that

one is tempted to read in the story of their conflict an allegorical

implication. Theirs is the opposition between Sattva and Rajas. The battle

between the gods and demons, the suras and the asuras, is a recurrent

motif in Hindu mythology. The asuras were powerful, sometimes even

more than the gods, and many times they triumphed, threatening Indra in

heaven with chaos and confusion. But every time Indra's throne was

saved by some miracle of divine strategy whereby the demons caused

their own destruction and order was restored in the cosmos again.

The structure of The Man-Eater of Malgudi more or less follows

the same puranic pattern. The drawn blue curtain of the printer's room

stands for order and normalcy, as it were, and from the day the six-foot

tall, broad-shouldered giant, called Vasu, crosses the threshold intruding

into the privacy beyond the curtain, confusion begins. Vasu's very

philosophy of life is in opposition to the peaceful ordered universe of

Malgudi.

Vasu announces himself as a rival to nature soon after his arrival:

"After all we are civilized human beings, educated and cultured, and it is

upto us to prove our superiority to nature. Science conquers nature in a

new way each day: why not in creation also ? That's my philosophy, Sir,

1 challenge any man to contradict me" (190).



34

He goes on relentlessly in his fight against nature by stuffing dead

animals to make them look real. The conflict is not between Nataraj

alone, but between Vasu and society in general and Vasu's seeming

superiority over so vast a force merely underlines the fact that evil is

often far more dynamic than forces of goodness. Nataraj's fascination for

Vasu and his attempts to reestablish friendly relations with the

taxidermist indicate that evil is not merely stronger but also more

attractive than goodness.

Edwin Gerow says, ―In a sense the rakshasa represents evil, but,

this puts too moral a cast on it, he is rather an aspect of creation — the

chaotic, the disruptive, his weakness is not that he is bad, but that he is

ultimately not real‖ (195). Gerow goes on to state that the settled order of

the cosmos is in the Indian view the fundamental ontological fact. This

settled order was threatened with dislocation by Vasu. But the threat is

finally dissipated and the novel ends where it began with the enduring

cosmos.

It is evident that the story of The Man-Eater of Malgudi follows the

familiar pattern of a tale from the Puranas where a demon gets too

powerful, threatens the heavens with his elemental forces of disorder, but

finally goes up in the air like a bubble, leaving the universe as calm as

before. Vasu meets a similar fate. He destroys not only wild animals but

also the peace of mind, the fair name and reputation of Nataraj. But

ultimately the aggressive and bullying taxidermist, the anti-hero, and the

very incarnation of evil, kills himself with the blow on his head from his

own hammer-fist.



35

The moral obviously is that Evil carries within it the seeds of its

own destruction and like Bhasmasura, the rakshasa, it is bound to burn

itself out in the long run. The wicked and the uncommon like Vasu may

triumph for the time being, but their triumph is of a short duration while

the good and the normal like Nataraj, even though they may be unheroic

and passive, flourish and are long-lasting. It is good to be active, but this

activity should be benign and directed to good-doing. It must not be

destructive and harmful as is the activity of Vasu, the anti-hero. Nataraj

may be passive but he is quite active in doing good. His goodness is seen

in the help which he extends to Muthu, in his working hard to make

suitable arrangement for the temple procession, and in his efforts to save

the life of Kumar. He is a hero for this reason, though an unheroic one,

and the entire action is rightly viewed through his eyes.

The novelist has succeeded in driving home this moral truth. He

has told an entertaining story, but he has also conveyed deep moral and

religious truths of perennial significance. However, Narayan's morality is

not obtrusive, it can be acquired only by the discerning reader who can

read between the lines. The novel is to be read on two levels.

In every one of Narayan's novels, the usual order of life, i.e., the

normally, is disturbed by the arrival of an outsider into the sheltered

world of Malgudi or by some flight or uprooting, but in the end there is

always a return, a renewal and a restoration of normalcy. The normal

order is disturbed only temporarily and by the end we see the usual order

established once again and life going on as usual for all practical

purposes. Narayan perceives an elaborate system of checks and balances

operating in the universe, but in the end it is not the Absurd or the



36

Eccentric that is enthroned but it is the Moral order which is restored and

established. This theme can be easily studied through a brief

consideration of his novels.

In the present novel, normalcy is disturbed by the arrival of H.

Vasu, the taxidermist and the man-eater of the title, and it is restored

when he kills himself, and Nataraj is able to run his printing works as

usual. The disorder created by Vasu is symbolised by his act of removing

the blue curtain and intruding into the inner room of Nataraj's press, the

blue curtain itself being a symbol of the normal established social order.

Vasu is an aggressive bully. From the very beginning he throws to the

wind the established norms, and creates disorder all around. He passes

sarcastic remarks on Nataraj's friends so that they slink away quietly. He

takes possession of Nataraj's attic without his permission and without

paying any rent. His behaviour is abnormal and destructive of social

order, and inimical to peaceful social life.

Vasu does not allow Nataraj to carry on his business undisturbed.

When one day Nataraj is discussing business with the adjournment

lawyer regarding the printing of wedding cards urgently needed by the

lawyer, Vasu drags out Nataraj forcibly, so to say, and the poor printer

has to go with him in his jeep, without his shirt buttons and without a

single pie in his pocket. He drives recklessly to the great annoyance and

discomfiture of the poor printer. He leaves him at the tea stall of Muthu at

the bottom of Mempi forest and the poor fellow returns home late in the

night after suffering much humiliation and discomfort and worry. His

peace of mind is spoiled and his business is disrupted.



37

The taxidermist does not stop at anything. He shoots wild animals

even in the Mempi forest without the permission of the authorities and

soon turns Nataraj's attic into a charnel house. He shoots dogs moving

about in the streets, crows, eagles and other animals. He hangs a stuffed

hyena and a huge serpent on the stairs leading to the attic. A foul smell

soon emanates from the attic to the great anger and agitation of the

neighbours. He does not pay any heed to the protestations and

remonstrances of Nataraj and goes on in his disruptive activities

unconcerned. He even plans to shoot the temple elephant Kumar. Soon he

takes to womanising and brings in women of loose character, an activity

which causes much concern to Nataraj, a family man.

Vasu does not care for any social norms or for the established

social order. He threatens the police officer when he visits him and

pressures him to give up his antisocial activities. But all is to no avail. He

even goes to the extent of filing a lawsuit against the poor printer with the

Rent Control Officer.

Thus, there is a well-established order prior to the sudden arrival of

Vasu and this order is disrupted by him. There is disorder for some time,

but order is restored once again by his equally sudden death. Like the

Rakshasa Bhasmasura he kills himself with a blow of his hammer-fist on

his head. Evil is, thus, expelled and normal peaceful life once again

becomes possible for Nataraj. The blue curtain is drawn once again.

Nataraj and his wife are reconciled; they shake hands, so to say, over the

dead body of the Rakshasa Vasu and the printer carries on his work as

usual, as he did before the arrival of Vasu, symbolizing the forces of evil

and disorder.



38

In short, in the novel, the normal social order is distributed, there is

conflict between the forces of order and disorder, and in the end there is a

restoration of normalcy. It is not the absurd or the eccentric or the evil

that is re-established, but the good and the normal. There is always a

renewal of life love, beauty, peace. Despite temporary aberrations, life

must go on as usual. This seems to be the message of R.K. Narayan.



39

Works cited

Primary Source

Narayan R.K. The Man Eater of Malgudi. Chennai : Indian

Thought Publications, 1968. Print.

Secondary Source

1. Iyengar, Srinivasa. Indian Writing in English. New Delhi: Asia

Publications, 1962. Print.

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