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Title: A River Sutra by Gita Mehta ISBN: 0-679-75247-1 Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 28 June, 1994 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $13.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 3.91 (69 reviews)
Rating: 4
Summary: The Holy Narmada
Comment: One of the greatest strengths of A River Sutra is its ability to captivate the reader while at the same time, evoking thoughtful reflections through descriptive and powerful words. Each tale is so written that one cannot help but stop and think about the deeper implications the author is trying to convey. Set in the heart of India, the stories surrounding the holy Narmada River creates a mythical and mysterious atmosphere in which the reader is spellbound. Many of the main characters in the short stories seem to demonstrate a similar theme: the power of love, which can act both positively and negatively for the character. I think the author does a good job of balancing the two extreme sides of love. While some find happiness, however ephemeral, in the love they share with that special someone, Mehta sharply contrasts that with the painful sorrow evoked from the loss of such a love. Mehta reveals her themes in such a way that the reader must work hard to connect that main idea through the different stories. Nevertheless, at the same time, Gita Mehta's short stories shape the novel so that its main theme or themes are separated and somewhat disconnected. It is harder to discern exactly what the lesson is that one should learn when each narrative ends abruptly, to be followed by commentary from the narrator. While the main characters, such as Nitin Bose, the Courtesan, the Jain Monk, and the ascetic developed their personalities and learned from their experiences, the narrator remains oblivious to the moral lessons. In the end, he still cannot comprehend how Professor Shankar could have attained enlightenment be reentering the world and becoming a man again.
Rating: 3
Summary: A Must Read for Some, A Must Not for Others!
Comment: "A River Sutra" aided me in my knowledge of India. I found many of the religious customs and culture interesting. Although I am surrounded by diversity, this book gave me insight to the actual practices of Hinduism and Jainism, customs that I was not familiar with before reading this book. Each story carefully expressed a different theme yet they all intertwined. I would have liked to have more resolution in each tale. Each character disappeared after their tale was told. I understood each character's story and basic message of human emotion and habits but I was not sure if the narrator did. I feel that the book would have been more enjoyable if I could have understood the narrator more or if he had been more intelligent. Some of the stories could seem very realistic in a middle class American society, stories that I really can relate to. Although the setting was so unfamiliar to me, I could understand each story and identify with some of the characters.
Mehta's writing evokes clear, descriptive pictures in my head. Her style is easily understood, yet extremely thoughtful. Instead of stating the obvious, she leaves the reader to infer what could possibly have happened. Each story was pessimistic in that it was not the ideal happy ending many readers would have been content with reading. I enjoyed that aspect, but I also would have liked a little more clarity. As far as Mehta's diction, she uses many Indian words. The glossary was very helpful!! I would recommend this book to others if they were interested about learning about other cultures.
Rating: 4
Summary: To become human...
Comment: The body of water referred to in the title, A River Sutra, is the Narmada River which is India's holiest river believed to possess mystical healing and cleansing powers. The promise of the river attracts a variety of characters with different motivations. The stories are otherwise completely detached from each other in person and circumstance except for their common relation to the narrator; more so to the narrator's supposed renunciation of the world.
Many may argue that the mutuality of the stories would lie in the River Narmada; although the river does flow throughout the novel and it is an obviously strong force in each traveler's tale, it does not function as aptly a unifier as the narrator. The river is omnipresent in the background and it is the shared destination amongst the trekkers; yet it does not combine the stories in any other way. The narrator, however, receives a final enlightenment at the completion of the anthology which ties the novel together. Initially, he boasts that he has rejected the world in his decision to relocate to the jungle and he equates his distance from modern civilization to complete denial of the "real" world. However after he has heard the many versions of renunciation from the visitors and Tariq Mia, only then does he realize the true meaning of the word and the action. The sutra, or the common thread, of the book is the narrator's rejection of the world; the purpose of the book is to portray the narrator's romanticized renunciation versus the harsh reality of true abandonment.
Each narrative is embedded with an archetypal morally based theme pertaining to evolving stages of human existence and the penance that we must offer for our human faults. There are three objects of renunciation in the novel - material, love and life.
The book is about external sources erupting into the life of the unmasked narrator and catapulting him onto a spiritual awakening upon the backs of these people's narratives. The title utilizes the word "sutra" which signifies a collection of aphorisms; the book characterizes these teachings in the bodies and renunciations of the river's visitors and the narrator, as the student to these narratives, represents the common thread.
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Title: Fountain and Tomb: Hakayat Haretna by Naguib Mahfouz, Soad Sobhy, James Kenneson, Max Winkler ISBN: 0894105817 Publisher: Passeggiata Press Pub. Date: December, 1990 List Price(USD): $12.95 |
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Title: The Second Sex by Simone De Beauvoir ISBN: 0679724516 Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 17 December, 1989 List Price(USD): $17.00 |
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Title: Ceremony by Leslie Marmon Silko ISBN: 0140086838 Publisher: Penguin USA (Paper) Pub. Date: March, 1988 List Price(USD): $14.00 |
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Title: Darwin on Evolution: The Development of the Theory of Natural Selection by Charles Darwin, Thomas F. Glick, David Kohn ISBN: 0872202852 Publisher: Hackett Pub Co Pub. Date: October, 1996 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: Plato's Phaedo by Plato, G. M. Grube ISBN: 0915144182 Publisher: Hackett Pub Co Pub. Date: December, 1980 List Price(USD): $4.95 |
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