A
MEETING WITH
MULK-JI
(all pictures
courtesy of Stewart W Fraser)
To mark the 95th birthday of Mulk Raj Anand, Tim Bennett-Goodman looks back on a pilgrimage to visit the great writer in his historic home by the sea in Bombay, India
Firstly, a confession. Before encountering Mán Melá Theatre Company, I'd never heard of the Indian writer, Mulk Raj Anand. The enthusiasm of Mán Melá's artistic director, Dominic Rai, inspired me to read some of his work. Starting with Across the Black Waters, I, too, was hooked - as much by Anand's life as by his writings. If ever there was a case of truth stranger than fiction, his was surely it!
In January 2000,
I flew to India for an extended trip with my partner, Stewart
Fraser. By February, we had reached Bombay, or Mumbai as
it is now known
Mumbai (when in Rome!) came as an exhilarating cosmopolitan whirlwind after the sedate South. The teeming megalopolis reminded me more than somewhat of London - red double-decker buses and all. Sophisticated, in parts elegant, worldly, rather louche, the city lives up to its reputation as the Hollywood of the East - the home of Bollywood. the Hindi film industry.
Installed in Shelleys, a '30s hotel overlooking the bay a short, waterside stroll from the Gate of India, we were able to escape by boat to the cool rock-carved temples of Elephanta Island when the urban melee became too much.
After a few days of desultory sight-seeing in the steadily increasing heat I felt the time had come to look up Mulk Raj Anand as Dominic had requested should I find myself in Mumbai.
The next morning, I penned a letter on hotel headed paper and ordered a taxi to take us to Cuffe Parade, which turned out to be not far away. The drive took us past some grand colonial mansions and one in particular intrigued us, a gloomy pile of Moorish arches, pillars and minarets which had seen better days. The driver of the taxi (one of Mumbai's fleet of 50,000 yellow-and-black vehicles which buzz about the city like a swarm of angry bees in place of the auto-rickshaws which are banned from the inner-city) was unable to locate number 25, our destination. We decided to continue the search on foot.
Enquiries of several uniformed 'compound' guards failed to locate a number 25 and nowhere looked likely. Exasperation was beginning to set in after half-an-hour's fruitless trudging up and down the same stretch of street.
Just as we were about to give it up as a bad job, we encountered a janitor who knew of a Mr Mulk Raj Anand at number 25. Where was this? Just round the corner - the very Moorish pile we had remarked in the taxi! (It turned out that Cuffe Parade had been extended onto land reclaimed from the bay in the '60s, leaving the original stretch isolated and unmarked - oh for an A-Z!)
Pushing open the rusty iron gate, we were met by an elderly security wallah who directed us under the ornate port cochere of the facade to a side door which, though open, betrayed no signs of life within. The bell I rang tinkled deep in the dark interior of what was obviously a cavernous ground floor flat.
After an age,
an elderly lady appeared and we gently explained our mission,
handing over the note for Mulk. She told us that he was
out of Mumbai, (receiving yet another honorary doctorate, apparently)
but would be flying back at the weekend and would be able to
see us on his return. At this point it became clear that
the lady was Mrs Anand, a tiny figure whose erect and stately
bearing showed, as we knew, that she had once been a dancer.
When the appointed day arrived Stewart prepared the camera and mini-disc recorder so that we could do a proper interview. Mulk was sitting on his makeshift verandah by the door when we arrived. This was obviously where he did his writing in the shade, accompanied by his old black mongrel dog. We felt like acolytes approaching the dais of the master!
Any feelings of trepidation were soon dispelled as he rang for tea, called Mrs Anand to meet us, settled us down on rattan stools and asked questions about Dominic, Mán Melá and England in general. Although rather frail and unsteady after a fall in which he had broken his hip, he was, at 94, as alert and sharp as a man half his age (probably sharper!).
I had prepared some trite questions but, thankfully, the production of the microphone stimulated a flow of anecdote and reminiscence sufficient for the disc to run out. He showed no sign of tiring but, racked with cramp from crouching on the stools holding the equipment, we were forced to call a polite halt by suggesting photographs while the light held.
There is no doubt
that he loves the camera, and it returns the compliment.
He responded like an old pro and was obviously aware of cultivating
the image of the great writer. His concern to preserve
the magnificent but sadly dilapidated mansion spurred him to
mount, despite his stick, the imposing flight of steps to the
entrance for us to get the best shots of him in his natural habitat.
The house is under imminent threat of demolition for re-development and he is desperate to publicise its plight to a largely indifferent public. The turn-of-the-century, Indo-Saracenic (ie Moorish) style Arab merchant's seaside villa is a monument not only to Mulk Raj Anand but to the "Quit India" campaign whose proponents visited the house in the days before its conversion into flats, when the main ballroom accommodated up to 300 patriotic luminaries.
Hopefully, the house will be preserved as a shrine to one of India's greatest writers in English, philosophers and patriots. His flat is stacked floor-to-ceiling with manuscripts, artworks and gifts of appreciation from foreign governments and institutions. It should be saved for the nation and the world, but India has pressing problems to address at present. If we in the west with an interest in the arts of the sub-continent can help, we should do so without delay.
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Last updated: 30 January 2001 - C. Goffin