The Flat on Malabar Hill The Flat on Malabar Hill tells the story of three generations of an Indian family headquartered in an apartment in an affluent neighborhood of Mumbai. As a result, in the narrative, as expected, births and deaths; marriages and divorces; education, career building and retirement; birthdays, rites of passage, health issues, and revelations of family secrets punctuate day to day life. Because the members of this clan have all traveled or lived abroad, especially in the United States but also in Europe, multiculturalism flourishes in the pages with the complexity it deserves. In fact, this book reflects the intricacies of the real, emerging global society of professionals in which national identity gives way to a richer, more international and at the same time more individual identity honed through education, travel, work, social interaction, and emigration. The novelist provides the reader with an intimate look at the process of negotiating the boundaries of one culture through the prism of another or others, a challenge experienced by several family members, young and old and in the East as well as in the West. Thus, the characters no longer are Indian or American, conservative or liberal, always perfect or always flawed–although it pretty much looks that way in the first part of the story– nor do they judge the actions of each other with pristine clarity or static vision. Societal pressure–the culture in which they currently reside–often looms large and alters their decisions and their behavior. At times a disturbing dichotomy emerges between what the characters seem to stand for and what they do. This is a tale about constant accommodation.
Of all the figures, Shanti, the matriarch, who views the world in a horizontal way, seems most adept at going with the flow of life–and, for that matter, the flow of death. At once traditional, cosmopolitan, and broad minded, she forms clear opinions about issues and interactions, but she knows when to keep silent. She also knows how to get her way. A fascinating, savvy protagonist, she welcomes all family members into her network even when their ideas or actions betray her expectations. Shanti’s faith and her rituals, incomprehensible to some, serve as the grounding force in the grounding figure of the narrative. Her relationship with Vinod, her husband–thanks to an arranged marriage– and patriarch of the clan, who views the world in a vertical way, illuminates the entire book.
The author develops a lavish texture in her novel by including naturally detail after detail of the sensorial (the sights, sounds, smells, feel, and tastes) and cultural (customs of the most varied kinds) components that complement the characters and give rise to the intricate world they inhabit in Mumbai and in the United States. As a consequence, a memorable richness awaits the reader of this captivating saga of three generations of the family associated with The Flat on Malabar Hill. : Piety and religious devotion run alongside addiction and bigotry in a Mumbai family. Told from multiple view points, The Flat on Malabar Hill pits traditional values against modern ways in an ethnic novel which spans two continents and three decades. In this family, two sons provide devout mother Shanti and morally upright father Vinod their greatest joy and deepest anguish. Kishore is handsome, brilliant, and an MIT graduate. His Americanized wife, Anjali, has spent years in the U.S. and struggles to adjust to Mumbai. The younger son Dev plays drums at nightclubs and shares drugs with his idle rich friends. When he wants to marry an uneducated, low-caste, Anglo-Indian night-club singer, Vinod threatens to disown him. Years later, Vinod has bypass surgery and Shanti is diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. Kishore, a member of the sandwich generation, uproots his family from Seattle, where he works for Microsoft, and moves them into the Malabar Hill flat, which his father deeds over to him. Anjali begins to redecorate, but each brush stroke erases Shanti’s and Vinod’s memories. Shanti’s mind continues to fade, and Vinod feels powerless to help her. He makes a momentous decision, leaving a painful legacy for the family.
The Flat on Malabar Hill
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