By Alaka Sahani - Express India - Mumbai, IndiaFriday, August 17, 2007
M. G. Vassanji was half-way through writing a novel on a Sufi saint who came to Gujarat in the 13th century when riots broke out in the state — changing its course and that of the nation.
The Assassin’s Song, which the Indian-Canadian writer had started in 2000 and took the shape of a heartbreaking ballad of life tainted by the bigotry, was released here in Mumbay on Friday.
“The book about the Sufi saint taking refuge in Gujarat from Mongolian invaders was in a slightly different form earlier. But after the 2002 violence, I decided to begin the story in Gujarat,” the Indian-Canadian author says. Gujarat has seen the worst kind of violence with fascist elements creeping in, he adds.
This could be the reason why the Nairobi-born writer doesn’t feel at ease in Gujarat. “For the last few years, I’ve been visiting Porbunder, Jamnagar and Kathiawad. But Pirbaag, the shrine of the Sufi saint Nur Fazal, around which the story revolves, is set close to Ahmedabad,” says Vassanji, the author of six novels.
The Assassin’s Song oscillates between the ancient, when Nur Fazal came to Gujarat, and the present with Pirbaag, the dargah in Haripir, destroyed, and its heir Karsan Dargawalla caught between filial responsibility and personal yearning. His father, Pir Saheb, is killed and brother, Mansoor, turns radical.
The author sees a reflection of himself in Karsan. “Like me, he has literary sensibilities, can’t take sides and is caught in middle,” Vassanji says.
Akin to The Assassin’s Song taking different shape mid-way, Vassanji’s foray into the world of literature happened after working as a nuclear physicist for more than a decade after a PhD at the University of Pennsylvania.
He moved to Canada in 1978 to work at a nuclear laboratory in Ontario. In 1980, he moved to Toronto to begin his writing career and, a year later, Vassanji and his wife Nurjehan Aziz founded The Toronto South Asian Review with some friends.
The 57-year-old writer went on to receive a Commonwealth Writer’s Prize for his debut novel The Gunny Sack in 1987. This was followed by both The Book of Secrets and The In-between World of Vikram Lall receiving the Giller Prize.
“Almost once a day I’m asked why I chose writing. But it’s not a career, it’s a calling,” Vassanji says. “And I’m no longer a nuclear physicist.”
[A different review at: http://tinyurl.com/2zwcac]
[Buy at The Sufi Store http://astore.amazon.com/wilderwri-20]
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