Rising Over Ruins (Part 2/3)

by Amanda T. McIntyre

The work of V.S Naipaul challenges stereotypes about East Indians in Trinidad and Tobago.

This had not been done, on the same scale, before his literary advent. This social group first came to Trinidad in 1845 as indentured labourers. Trinidad was in a post-emancipation/pre-independence mode and race relations still meant a white/black binary that did not consider the presence of other indigenous groups on the island. The introduction of another race changed this dynamic. They were a labouring class with strong agrarian associations, most notably with the sugar cane industry. However, with no socio-cultural connections in Trinidad, at the time, they were regarded as outsiders and were marginalized. The little that was known about them by wider society was not reliable and this skewed information was resolved into caricatured projections of the East Indian person. Professor Bridget Brereton wrote in her essay, ‘The Experience of Indentureship: 1845-1917’ that:

…Trinidadians evolved certain ideas and judgements about Indians which by repetition became stereotypes. The nineteenth century was an age when the more sinister aspects of Hindu culture fascinated and horrified people; practices like suttee, infanticide and thugee… made Englishmen associate Indians with violence and massacre. The Trinidad Press in the later nineteenth century contained many articles or letters warning that Indians were felt to be violent people and the famous “coolie wife murders” became an essential part of the Creole view of the Indian. The idea grew up that Indians held their women in contempt and that “chopping” was their national way of resolving differences. (Calcutta to Caroni, 29)

My great uncle referred to the Tulsi family that he remembered from when he was younger and as a patron of their shop that was on the ground floor of the Lion House, as “the Bombays”. He used to call light skin East Indians ‘Bombays’ and dark skin East Indians ‘Madras.’ Even though our family was closely related to East Indians, he still had this ultimately racist distinction. Indeed, he was no exception. There was, in Trinidad and Tobago, a problematic body of information about East Indians that cast the group in unflattering light. They were not shown to be actualized people with an extensive scope of feelings, motivations, expressions and intentions. The work of V. S. Naipaul contradicted this limited understanding and fleshed out in characterization complex aspects of the lived experiences of this group at a time when stereotypes of them were still rife. He manufactured images of East Indian social life in Trinidad that was, of course cast in his heavy and easily criticized personal politics but also, started the important and necessary work of filling in what was previously an absence of representation. Dr. Gabrielle Hosein, Head of the Institute of Gender and Development Studies at The University of the West Indies, says in a personal reflection:

“I walked with The Mystic Masseur in my head, with Biswas’ obsession with a house, with the Tulsi family, with all its unfiltered eye on Indian families; so without ‘defending’ the man who clearly could insult everybody, I think there’s some sensitivity hoped for in relation to what he provided and why there was the deep gratitude that so many, and I’d argue, particularly Indians, feel. Indians have long been attacked for saying that there were things in his writing that spoke from and to them in ways few other writers have, which indeed was at odds with so much that didn’t speak to them or anybody, but the two can coexist and exploring the question might bring more cultural understanding.”

Naipaul had something that perhaps every writer hopes for; a subject for which there has not been sufficient exploration.

He observed and wrote about East Indian culture in Trinidad and Tobago from the perspective of his own experience, as part of the demographic. Of course his work dealt with much more and gave readers access to social and domestic life that was not limited to the East Indian experience but his inclusion and development of characters and narratives crystalized in West Indian Literature what was before, a vague portrayal of the group. In The New York Review of Books Naipaul says:

“Every serious writer has to be original; he cannot be content to do or to offer a version of what has been done before.

And every serious writer as a result becomes aware of this question of form; because he knows that however much he might have been educated and stimulated by the writers he has read or reads, the forms matched the experience of those writers, and do not strictly suit his own.”

This is part of his achievement; taking note of what was there before, addressing its deficiencies and presenting a more reliable product. Thus, in my deliberation on the point of view from which to approach this material, I revisited aspects of the author and his work that were both socio-cultural and personal.

Despite his representation of the country in his literary offerings Naipaul made no secret of his distaste for Trinidad and Tobago. His early works made him appear like a celebrant of this country, but as his career advanced internationally, it became clear through his writing and interviews that he was disillusioned by the country of his birth. Furthermore,  he made no hesitation in iterating that his only remaining associations to the country were through his work. Perhaps the blow of this softens, when consideration is given to his dislike for people in general. His publisher tells of trouble to get him to be gracious to benefactors. There is the account of emotional abuse towards his ailing wife. Also, his speaking engagements left a slew of quotes that qualify his prejudices and an apparent lack of basic social diplomacy.

The trajectory of V.S. Naipaul has a pattern similar to the way in which vulnerable narcissists appropriate the space, time, will, energy, love, culture and image of the people around them, to selfishly contrive and establish their ideas of themselves. His treatment of Trinidad and Tobago for example, illustrates the process of narcissistic abuse: the initial consumption, the eventual expressed dissatisfaction, the bitter attacks, the open rejection and the disposal for another.  He manipulated prose to project versions of himself, his environment and his desire through the prism of language to create compelling work, that while brilliant are insufficient as apologies for the abuses meted out by the problematic writer on the other side of the prism.

On a personal level, the complexity of V.S. Naipaul raises these questions: what criteria determines literary or cultural worth and what qualifies literary or cultural heroism?

Literary heroism, however it is defined, does not grant those who hold the title, absolution for their abuses. This would deny those negatively affected by their words and actions safe space and this is not justice.

Following Naipaul’s death there was mixture of grief, expressed nonchalance, hatred and bitter criticism but, there was no denial of his skills as a writer and his outstanding contribution to literature. When I got the news, the first thing I wrote and published online was a brief note that read:

“Dear Trinidad and Tobago,

Before you are gas-lit by the seemingly endless tributes at this time, remember, you are worthy of writers who love and treat you well.

With kind regards, ATM “

This was followed later in the day by a scathing critique who responded saying he was pained my angry the tone. I responded with, “I don’t owe kind words to anyone and certainly not to V. S. Naipaul.” I was upset not only by the recollection of how cruel a person he was, but also by how much post-death pampering was being given to a man who did not care for my country and who would have been mean-spirited towards me on a number of accounts, notably  being a black, woman writer from Trinidad.