Whimsical and dreamy, this collection of short stories by Keki Daruwalla allows one that special pleasure that only poetry and short stories can offer: that of dipping into it at will and coming up with something delightful. These stories slows you down, take you to magical, imagined islands. The island functions as a sort of leitmotif, a thread that sews these 16 stories together. As one leaps from story to story, the larger ocean emerges.
In his afterword, Daruwalla explains that his intention was to write stories about people as islands and, indeed, in a way that is what this book is about. For some reason, I felt compelled to read the stories in the order in which they appear. It occurred to me, after about the third story, that all short stories are like small islands containing life; that Daruwalla’s islands are connected by the boat of the mind. It is hard to treat these stories as stand-alone pieces. They are not meant to stand alone In fact, some come in pairs. And yet, each one has something different to tell. Each has an island-like quality.
Of the lot, I found only ‘Island Sermon’ somewhat clichéd. To my mind, it employed the all-too familiar stereotype of the holy man impregnating a visiting devotee, a white American woman. Neither character nor dialogue was convincing. The rest of the stories were many sea-miles ahead of this one and they didn’t disappoint. ‘Grotto’ reminded me of that Marquez story ‘The Handsomest Drowned man’. though in this case, the drowned man posthumously worshipped as a holy man, never leaves the island. He comes to be seen as its guardian spirit. The story’s neat irony and the absurdity of the situation it portrays hit home beautifully.
On first reading ‘Island at the edge of the current I’, I was all set to be dismissive. This seemed like another of those stories about an unhappy woman battered by life setting off to find herself. But, on reading its companion piece with its charming little cameo about the mysterious, bearded man, I was forced to do a re-think. ‘The Amphibious Train’ had the lyrical quality of a poem. A surreal story about stories, it was, to my mind, the best of the lot.
Daruwalla has included, as part of this collection, stories that are not obviously about islands (as defined geographically). In doing so, he pulls off a neat trick with dexterity. ‘Ghost Mist’, for instance, is set in Srinagar. No hint of an island there! But the protagonist is marooned in the “dark waters of amnesia” and memory has to return. Perhaps a bigger sleight of hand is ‘Night Mists over the Gompa’ about a wild Khampa who finds himself outside the pale of civiliSation, “lost in his island of mist”.
One can’t help remembering that Daruwalla is a poet, that he has behind him 12 books of poetry. His prose carries unmistakable traces of this. Often, his central characters end up speaking small poems! In ‘Island at the Edge of the Current II’, for instance, the protagonist tells the Sergeant who is questioning her: “Solitude is something to be found within, officer. It’s a question of burrowing within yourself, silence around you, tide coming in on the sand, breeze moving into pine trees, pine-needles dropping.”
In his afterword, Daruwalla writes: “For me, I hope my love for the sea comes through. The beauty of small islands, living with the roar of the sea sinking into you, the solitude inbuilt in the very word island, and the metaphor it stands for, that itself could be the end.” He also writes of his hope that nature’s slow rhythms will influence our pace. That hope, I am glad to say, is entirely realised. In reading these stories, one begins, unconsciously, to mimic their slow, dreamy pace. At least, for an island of time.
Islands;Keki N. Daruwalla, Tranquebar, Rs.325.
