In a culture where others constantly attempt to define individuals, how does one determine their identity for themselves?
Sripathi -
As the protagonist in the novel and the father of the impoverished Brahmin family on which the novel focuses, Sripathi's development is by far the most in-depth and explored.
As a young man, Sripathi's identity was easily defined and concrete. However, over the years, somehow he lost sight of himself and who he was, and he becomes a mess. A tangled, twisted mess of confusion between who he wishes to be, who others want him to be and who he has become. Part of this can be attributed to his despondent childhood, suppressed by a father who resented him for not being exceptional and seen as naught but a disappointment by his mother who sees him only as his failures. Rising above this period in his life, Sripathi's years as a young man are his brightest. He feels that he has found a place for himself, in his career in writing at the advertising agency, as a husband to his bride and then as the inexperienced head of a young family. His luck fluctuates for the next period of his life, at the offer of a new job that he must turn down at Ammayya's insistence and then back into a seemingly steady positive streak brought about by his daughter Maya. His pride soars as she first receives admission to an American university, and then bursts as she receives a marriage proposal from a well-off, kind family.
Soon, however, his pride and happiness turns sour, as he must exile his precious daughter in order to comply with the expectations of the traditions he has been weaned on and the culture that he is surrounded by. Here, the change in his identity is most tangible and noticeable. He loses sight of what is important to him in the face of the adversity of his surroundings. His love of his daughter is suppressed and he uses the anger grown from his surprise, hurt from her betrayal and even jealousy that Maya was able to live so fully, continue to fuel his refusal to give in. At this point, his own identity, that of a loving and proud father and husband, has all but disappeared. The one strand of his previous self that he holds on to is his letter writing. He still clings to the notion that he can change the world for the better, even with all the hate and bitterness he harbors. He loses touch with his wife and son, and treats them as his mother treated him: as disappointments. At this point, his identity grows off of everything negative in his life. His shortcomings, his minute influence, his regrets are all part of who he becomes. Blame fills the Rao household. Ammayya blames Sripathi for her unhappiness, which Sripathi blames on Arun and Maya, while Putti and Nirmala are left adrift.
Sripathi's road to recovering his identity is gradual and is made up of several stages, the first being acceptance. It takes him time to assume responsibility for his actions, to repent to Nirmala and to accept that he may have been mistaken in shutting Maya from their lives for nine long years. He realizes that regretting what he did is pointless now and that he can only look forward. The beginning of this transition occurs as he arrives back from Vancouver. "Sripathi had gone from being an intensely rational man to a deeply superstitious one." (p. 160, Rau Badami). In this quote we see that although his discontentment with his life is still as powerful as ever, he has now begun to look for reasoning and meaning in it. The second stage that is noticeable is his change in his relationship towards Putti. In the early morning as he awakes one day, before the pressures of life can set in, they share a conversation, the first of its kind. Although in life she could not, through her death Maya has unknowingly brought brother and sister closer together. Because their age gap was so substantial, Putti and Sripathi had very little in common over the years. But a love for Maya, sweet, smart Maya that managed to be on everyone's good side, is something they both share deeply. Somehow Sripathi had never made the connection that Ammayya was the reason why Putti's marriage proposals are always turned away before. So when later in the novel, it comes time to take action, because the gears were set in motion, ready to go, Sripathi takes the final step and does the right thing for Putti, not Ammayya.However, before Sripathi is ready to take that leap, he faces himself, who he has become.
Over the course of the novel's time span, Sripathi has developed a mental disorder which makes him excessively conscious of his own body and suffers from hallucinations that certain appendages have vanished. His feet disappearing could mean he feels as though he is losing his independence, his ability to be successful by himself. He feels that he is too far gone, beyond recovery and salvation. This all comes to a pinnacle on the night when Nandana was lost. Sripathi has no sense of the world around him and what is going on, utterly lost in the madness of his own mind. As he makes his way home, Sripathi remembers his own innocence from previous years, making rash promises and bettering the world head on, without considering failure for a moment. "It had all seemed so simple then, all problems solved with the sweep of a long brown seed pod." (p. 309, Rau Badami). The sudden truth hits him overwhelmingly in the streets. It is simple. He can become himself again, a man that above all else he respected and admired. It didn't matter how much money he had in the bank or what career he may have decided to turn against. The will to live is all it takes. And he does find a way. Sripathi finds a way, through this beautiful little girl to forgive himself and to forgive others. Through Nandana, Sripathi is reminded of the man he once was, a man he respects. A man who is gentle, curious, proud. A man always cracking jokes with undertones of love for his family. A healed man, one who has forgiven his father and mother for the pains they put him through and has learned so as not to repeat this trials with his own children.
For Sripathi, the way to recovering his self, his true self whom he had the pleasure of understanding in his earlier years, was to forgive. To forgive himself for his guilt, to forgive his family for their roles and needs, and to forgive his world, his universe for throwing roadblocks in the way. Sripathi, with the wisdom of an old man, understands as the novel comes to a graceful stop that good and bad come together, that we are all fated to live through some bad times along with the good. Unlike earlier in the novel, where he complains that "It seemed to him that everything good in the world came with an edging of not-so-good." (p. 134, Rau Badami) and wonders why it must be so, he understands that through good and bad, he is willing to live. He understand that the fight to survive is worth it. Life is worth it. And in the dusky evening on the beach in Toturpuram, he is finally accepting of that fact. As he shares that moment with Arun, he is comfortable with who is, and who those who surround him are. As himself in full, Sripathi's life can be lived with wisdom that few ever manage to attain. "Sripathi thought about the chanciness of existence, the beauty and hope and loss that always accompanied life, and felt a boulder roll slowly off his heart." (p. 355, Rau Badami).
As the protagonist in the novel and the father of the impoverished Brahmin family on which the novel focuses, Sripathi's development is by far the most in-depth and explored.
As a young man, Sripathi's identity was easily defined and concrete. However, over the years, somehow he lost sight of himself and who he was, and he becomes a mess. A tangled, twisted mess of confusion between who he wishes to be, who others want him to be and who he has become. Part of this can be attributed to his despondent childhood, suppressed by a father who resented him for not being exceptional and seen as naught but a disappointment by his mother who sees him only as his failures. Rising above this period in his life, Sripathi's years as a young man are his brightest. He feels that he has found a place for himself, in his career in writing at the advertising agency, as a husband to his bride and then as the inexperienced head of a young family. His luck fluctuates for the next period of his life, at the offer of a new job that he must turn down at Ammayya's insistence and then back into a seemingly steady positive streak brought about by his daughter Maya. His pride soars as she first receives admission to an American university, and then bursts as she receives a marriage proposal from a well-off, kind family.
Soon, however, his pride and happiness turns sour, as he must exile his precious daughter in order to comply with the expectations of the traditions he has been weaned on and the culture that he is surrounded by. Here, the change in his identity is most tangible and noticeable. He loses sight of what is important to him in the face of the adversity of his surroundings. His love of his daughter is suppressed and he uses the anger grown from his surprise, hurt from her betrayal and even jealousy that Maya was able to live so fully, continue to fuel his refusal to give in. At this point, his own identity, that of a loving and proud father and husband, has all but disappeared. The one strand of his previous self that he holds on to is his letter writing. He still clings to the notion that he can change the world for the better, even with all the hate and bitterness he harbors. He loses touch with his wife and son, and treats them as his mother treated him: as disappointments. At this point, his identity grows off of everything negative in his life. His shortcomings, his minute influence, his regrets are all part of who he becomes. Blame fills the Rao household. Ammayya blames Sripathi for her unhappiness, which Sripathi blames on Arun and Maya, while Putti and Nirmala are left adrift.
Sripathi's road to recovering his identity is gradual and is made up of several stages, the first being acceptance. It takes him time to assume responsibility for his actions, to repent to Nirmala and to accept that he may have been mistaken in shutting Maya from their lives for nine long years. He realizes that regretting what he did is pointless now and that he can only look forward. The beginning of this transition occurs as he arrives back from Vancouver. "Sripathi had gone from being an intensely rational man to a deeply superstitious one." (p. 160, Rau Badami). In this quote we see that although his discontentment with his life is still as powerful as ever, he has now begun to look for reasoning and meaning in it. The second stage that is noticeable is his change in his relationship towards Putti. In the early morning as he awakes one day, before the pressures of life can set in, they share a conversation, the first of its kind. Although in life she could not, through her death Maya has unknowingly brought brother and sister closer together. Because their age gap was so substantial, Putti and Sripathi had very little in common over the years. But a love for Maya, sweet, smart Maya that managed to be on everyone's good side, is something they both share deeply. Somehow Sripathi had never made the connection that Ammayya was the reason why Putti's marriage proposals are always turned away before. So when later in the novel, it comes time to take action, because the gears were set in motion, ready to go, Sripathi takes the final step and does the right thing for Putti, not Ammayya.However, before Sripathi is ready to take that leap, he faces himself, who he has become.
Over the course of the novel's time span, Sripathi has developed a mental disorder which makes him excessively conscious of his own body and suffers from hallucinations that certain appendages have vanished. His feet disappearing could mean he feels as though he is losing his independence, his ability to be successful by himself. He feels that he is too far gone, beyond recovery and salvation. This all comes to a pinnacle on the night when Nandana was lost. Sripathi has no sense of the world around him and what is going on, utterly lost in the madness of his own mind. As he makes his way home, Sripathi remembers his own innocence from previous years, making rash promises and bettering the world head on, without considering failure for a moment. "It had all seemed so simple then, all problems solved with the sweep of a long brown seed pod." (p. 309, Rau Badami). The sudden truth hits him overwhelmingly in the streets. It is simple. He can become himself again, a man that above all else he respected and admired. It didn't matter how much money he had in the bank or what career he may have decided to turn against. The will to live is all it takes. And he does find a way. Sripathi finds a way, through this beautiful little girl to forgive himself and to forgive others. Through Nandana, Sripathi is reminded of the man he once was, a man he respects. A man who is gentle, curious, proud. A man always cracking jokes with undertones of love for his family. A healed man, one who has forgiven his father and mother for the pains they put him through and has learned so as not to repeat this trials with his own children.
For Sripathi, the way to recovering his self, his true self whom he had the pleasure of understanding in his earlier years, was to forgive. To forgive himself for his guilt, to forgive his family for their roles and needs, and to forgive his world, his universe for throwing roadblocks in the way. Sripathi, with the wisdom of an old man, understands as the novel comes to a graceful stop that good and bad come together, that we are all fated to live through some bad times along with the good. Unlike earlier in the novel, where he complains that "It seemed to him that everything good in the world came with an edging of not-so-good." (p. 134, Rau Badami) and wonders why it must be so, he understands that through good and bad, he is willing to live. He understand that the fight to survive is worth it. Life is worth it. And in the dusky evening on the beach in Toturpuram, he is finally accepting of that fact. As he shares that moment with Arun, he is comfortable with who is, and who those who surround him are. As himself in full, Sripathi's life can be lived with wisdom that few ever manage to attain. "Sripathi thought about the chanciness of existence, the beauty and hope and loss that always accompanied life, and felt a boulder roll slowly off his heart." (p. 355, Rau Badami).