In Custody

by Anita Desai

Book Overview

In this sensitive portrayal of human nature, Anita Desai, one of India's foremost writers, paints an intimate portrait of lives impacted by the quest for identity and purpose. Deven, a Hindi lecturer... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 043418635X
• ISBN13: 9780434186358
• Release Date: January 1984
• Publisher: William Heinemann
• Length: 204 Pages
• Weight: 0.75 lbs.

Customer Reviews

Is there a way to save a dying culture?

This novel was written in 1984. It is long before the emerging power of India today in the field of software and computer technology. It is centered on one junior lecturer in Hindi literature in a provincial college, the archetype of failed ambition and thwarted interests, a typical prisoner of a situation that does not and cannot provide him with the future he wants but also of his own lack of technical, economic and moral qualifications to confront the real world. A novel about frustration. Deven is a frustrated Urdu poet, Urdu intellectual, husband and father who married the wife that was arranged and chosen by his family, Hindi lecturer because he does not really like Hindi literature and does it only for survival, adventurer who accepts to do something he had dreamed of for years but without understanding the obstacles he will have to negotiate. So he ends up completely at the mercy of others, subservient to others, the perfect victimized prey of all kinds of incompetent publisher, editor, high-tech dealer and technicians, a poet and his wives, a brothel Madame and her bouncer, etc. Even and especially his supposed friends. In other words he is in custody, i.e. in jail. But there is something worse in this situation. Deven is unable to set limits to other people and hence to protect himself because he feels in charge of taking in custody what they represent. That is particularly true of the poet Nur. He becomes then the custodian of the poet, of his poetry and he does not realize that this positive side of the relation not only gives him a responsibility to take care of this poetry that is entrusted to him, but also makes him the exploited slave of the poet himself. By taking the poet's poetry in custody, becoming the poet's custodian he is at the same time taken in custody, i.e. jailed, trapped by the poet and his wives, the dealer and his helpers, the publisher and editor, even his own wife and son. This double-entendre of custody is nothing but the tip of the iceberg. Deep under, another duality is galloping with rage, the heritage from Indian history with the two colonizations of the recent centuries: the Mughal empire and then the British empire. This is represented in the division of Indian society between the Moslem and Hindi communities. The former smaller but more enterprising in commerce and business, particularly wide open to the Moslem world, the Middle East and the Arab world. The latter more closed onto itself as a full entity that has the tendency to reject others, hence to become jingoistic. Each community is built around its praying place, a Mosque or a Temple. We discover, in a vaguely specified background, the British created the problem because the resistance from the Moslem community was repressed by them, encouraging the jingoism of the other community. They sowed the very seed that was going to destroy them: the hostility between the two communities, religions, cultures, and even languages, Urdu versus Hindi. They pla

Great BUT only if...

...you are familiar with Urdu and the nuances of life in the Indian sub-continent. Am not at all surprised by some of the negative reviews; it is almost impossible to understand this book if you cannot attempt to relate to an unfamiliar culture and are looking for fairy-tale character transformations. Though the main theme of the book (decadence of something that was once majestic) is universal, the means of exploring it is decidedly ethnic. This book will give you a fascinating glimpse into the life of a minor celebrity and other commoners in small-town India. Having grown-up in India, I can swear I met a few of the characters in the book, so real they seem. Be prepared for a serious read for Anita Desai's style is that of a strict and no-nonsense school teacher. You feel some power in her sentences and any humor is unintentional; this is her lament for the (probable) extinction of Urdu. But the flow is straight-forward and the book is completely accessible and so you can finish it fairly quickly. And while you are at it, watch the movie as well. Directed by Ismail Merchant, it captures the spirit of the book and holds its own as a mini-classic with stellar performances and mellifluous music.

A beautiful novel

Touching and wonderfully funny. "In Custody" is woven around the yearnings and calamities of Deven, a small-town scholar from Mirpore in the north of India. An improvised college lecturer, Deven sees a way to escape from the meanness of his daily life when he is asked to interview India's greatest Urdu poet, Nur. But every attempt will only end up in desaster.A beautiful book, mingling melancholy, disappointment and lots of humour. I recommend it most warmly.

Good depiction of real life

It's been a while since I've read it, but am inspired to write about it since this book is far superior to the one I'm reading now by the same author (Journey to Ithaca). I loved this book. I feel that Desai truly captured the feeling of a bygone time (which was bygone already in the story). The frustration the poor lecturer felt at his failed attempts to record the great Urdu Ghazal master, which led to one disaster after another...poor loser, is felt by the reader. If you've ever been to India, you can just imagine the setting, the streets, the buildings, the city where the lecturer goes to make his recordings. The underhandedness of the Master's mistress, and the drunken stupidity of the "chumchas" is so typical, as is the nagging wife of the lecturer who just doesn't understand his artistic pursuits. Desai gave this book a wonderful ending too. Despite all that went wrong, the Master still saw through his drunken haze the sincerity of the lecturer and left him "In Custody," of his compositions. A masterful, bitter sweet ending.

Interprets the standard of Urdu Poetry very elegantly.

I have read the novel, and watched the movie also. To me both seemed great. But, its absolutely not for those people who are ignorant with the standard of Urdu Language and Urdu Poetry. Urdu Language is a mixture of different beautiful languages, including Arabic and Persian. In my opinion, people related to literature, who do not understand Urdu Poetry are missing something very important. This novel In Custody is a story of a teacher who is asked by his friend to go and take interview of a very famous Urdu Poet, Nur Saahib. He was inspired by Nur Saahib poetry from his childhood, but when he meets him, Nur Saahib is not the kind of man he had an image of. Anyways, as he was bound to take his interview he does his best to do it, but different difficulties rose from Nur Saahibs wives, friends and other characters. Ultimately in the end, Nur Saahib sends his collection of Poetic Pieces to Deven (The person who interviews), and leaves this world. Asad I Khan.