2 - Thoughtful Citizen: Narayan's Essays

Summary

Narayan would probably chuckle if we spoke of his ‘thought’, but I have in mind his own title for a three-issue journal he brought out in 1941. He called it Indian Thought. His novels in India have invariably been published by him under the aegis of Indian Thought Publishers. We are perhaps then justified in suggesting that Narayan had a life as a thinker, apart from his life as a writer of fiction, not to speak of the thought latent in his fiction. It will be interesting to look at his occasional essays in this context and to attempt a construction of a world of ideas and the ideas primarily prevalent in the world of Narayan's creation. This would become significant if we can link what he says in his characteristic tongue-in-cheek pieces with his fictional writings and also with his other discursive forays like the travel writings, the books on Indian mythology and his autobiographical works.

Narayan wrote journalistic pieces for The Hindu every Sunday for many years in the early 30s as well as the subsequent decades. He would write these on the basis of personal observation, reflections during his long walks in Mysore city and around the Kukanahalli Tank, and as a result of his meetings with innumerable characters in the city as eccentric as his own fictional characters.