Book Review: A Suitable Boy, by Vikram Seth (1993)

The first thing you should be aware about this book is its length, which is considerable – 1,474 pages, to be precise. That’s with small print, meaning there’s a lot of words on each of those pages. Towards the end, one of the characters, Amit, a budding poet and novelist, states his dislike of overly long books. His reasoning is that if the book is bad it is an unnecessary waste of time, and if it is good, the reader becomes a social recluse. This, presumably, was intended to be ironic.

A Suitable Boy is not a bad book, nor did it turn me into a recluse. Rather, it took me a very long time to read, well over a year. As a rule, long books appeal to me, possibly simply for the challenge they present. I’m not a fast reader, but I generally get to the end of any book I start (even if other books come in between). In this case, the start was very slow, which possibly helped, as there are many characters to become familiar with, and their Indian names need repeating several times before you can be confident of who is who. My original intention to read the book was settled after I heard the author interviewed on Test Match Special. Jonathan Agnew even read out a few pages from the book – the passage featuring a cricket match – which was undoubtedly very well written. I now know that you have to read pretty much the whole novel before you arrive at the cricket, and thus can confirm that the quality of the writing is maintained throughout.

It should be acknowledged that the process of reading A Suitable Boy is not too taxing. It is divided into nineteen parts, with each of these further divided into short mini-chapters, typically two or three pages long, making the reading very easy to interrupt. It is clearly, therefore, not a book to choose if you’re in a rush, but certainly a great choice if you are looking for something to serve as a companion for an extended period of time. It is also a work you can get lost in. The characterisation is excellent, and from the varied cast you will easily learn who you sympathise with, who your favourites are, who you want to prevail, and who you take an aversion to. You will also learn a lot. The backdrop to the story is a detailed account of India around the middle of the last century. This was shortly after independence from the British and the partition of India and Pakistan. The narrative provides a fantastic insight to the politics, cultural themes, legal issues and religious tensions of the country at that time. Although ‘Brahmpur’, the town in which the story is mainly set, is fictional, and the majority of the characters are invented, the land and the events and the customs and traits they are subject to were real. At least, as much as I have been inclined to cross-reference has proven to be accurate. For example, Nehru was a great leader of India. There was a momentous general election in early 1952. King George VI did die while the votes were being counted. And a relatively weak England (MCC) cricket team did tour India that winter. The first four tests were drawn, including the match played in Calcutta over New Year, England did win the fifth test, and India the sixth – their first ever test match victory. No doubt a large percentage of the Indian population tuned in to listen, as did several of the Mehra, Kapoor and Chatterji family members in A Suitable Boy.

But what actually is the story of A Suitable Boy? Despite this broad, sweeping, momentous backdrop, the crux of the saga is relatively simple. Lata, as a young woman reaching the end of her university education, needs to find a suitable boy to marry. Or rather, a suitable boy needs to be found for Lata to marry. This fact is not disputed by anyone. But what actually constitutes ‘a suitable boy’ is not so straightforward, especially between the conflicting opinions of Lata herself, and her overbearing, overly/mock-sensitive, interfering, paranoid (somewhat selfish) mother, Mrs Rupa Mehra. Hence, enter three boys, each championed or chastised by the various family members or friends surrounding Lata:

1. Kabir – athletic, handsome, sincere, but critically of the wrong caste.
2. Amit – intelligent, witty, intriguing, but lacking urgency.
3. Haresh – hardworking, correct, disciplined, but paan-eating, colour-blind, and somewhat awkward.

Which boy will win Lata’s hand, and why? How rebellious will Lata be, and how accommodating her mother? If nothing else, learning the answer to these questions will spur you on to the end of the book, you will have your own opinion as to which suitor Lata should choose, and thus will have a one-in-three chance of not being disappointed.

I, myself, was somewhat disappointed, as it was my second preference who prevailed. And here is my biggest qualm with A Suitable Boy. Like the Ganges, the book meanders on at its own pace and has its own rhythm, akin to the train journeys that feature in the story, one of which, in fact, Lata and her new husband are undertaking when the book ends. Yet this point at which the curtain falls feels almost arbitrary, as if the writer finally felt inclined to draw a line under proceedings, or perhaps ran out of ink. Yes, we know who Lata marries, but the consequences of her decision for all involved are entirely overlooked. This leaves the impression that the book is as long as it is merely for the sake of it and, lacking any great climax, could have ended at any point, or indeed continued indefinitely. A sequel is supposedly upcoming, set in the present day, entitled A Suitable Girl. If only to learn the fate of the characters I already know so well, I will undoubtedly pick up a copy at some point. It has apparently already missed numerous submission deadlines, suggesting that if I ever do get to read it, I will be doing so for a long time.

Favourite character: Maan – lazy, conflicted, reckless to the brink of his own downfall, but repeatedly demonstrates that he has a good heart.