Note: Cover is different than that shown. I picked this up at Goodwill and I plan to read it as one of my books from Africa for the 5x5x5 challenge.

V.S. Naipaul was born in Trinidad but travelled around the world. If this book is anything to judge by, he became immersed in the culture and politics of the countries he visits.

This book is set in an unnamed country in central Africa but it seems clear that the country is fashioned on the Democratic Republic of Congo which called itself Zaire for a while after independence but has reverted to its former name. The time is the 1960s shortly after the country achieved independence from it colonial masters. Salim is a Muslim of East Indian ancestry but he grew up on the east coast of Africa. He comes to the town at the bend of the river to be the proprietor of a small shop that he bought cheaply from a family friend. The town is still feeling the effects of the war of independence and business is slow. There are few other non-
African citizens in the town but they tend to band together. Salim has very little interaction with the Africans other than the customers in his shop and the prostitutes he visits. His closest relationship with an African is with his shop assistant, Metty, who is the son of slaves his family owned on the coast. Then one of his customers asks him to look out for her son, Ferdinand, who is coming to the town to attend school. Metty and Ferdinand become quite close friends and Salim is somewhat of a mentor to Ferdinand. The town is becoming more prosperous and Salim’s shop is doing fairly well. However, there is always the threat of violence. The head of the school is decapitated while visiting bush villages looking for African art. Salim’s life is quite lonely and aimless. This period ends when an old friend, Indar, takes a job teaching at the technical school the President of the country has established on the outskirts of town. Indar introduces Salim to the academics at the school and Salim finally feels he is in touch with people who matter. Indar is having an affair with the young wife of the school’s principal, Yvette. When Indar’s job term ends, Salim and Yvette have a passionate affair. Meanwhile the political situation for non-Africans is getting worse. One of the Greek merchants quietly sells out and moves to Australia. However Salim cannot contemplate doing this because of Yvette. Eventually the affair ends and in the final scene between them Salim strikes and verbally abuses Yvette. Salim leaves the town for about 6 weeks to visit the family friend from whom he purchased his store who now lives in London. While there he becomes engaged to the friend’s daughter although they have not even kissed. He returns to the town to sell up but finds that in his absence the store has been taken over by the state and given to an African and he is expected to manage the shop for him. Since he does not expect to receive anything for the shop he goes into smuggling in order to make enough money to leave Africa. When his activities come to the attention of the police he is thrown in jail. Fortuitously, Ferdinand is now the Commissioner of the town and he arranges for Salim’s release and a berth on the river steamer. Salim leaves town with nothing more than he can carry.

I thought this book was very well-written but bleak. Considering this book was written in 1979, well before the horrific events in Rwanda and also the Congo, it clearly shows the roots of those conflicts. One of the passages really struck me as showing how privileged my life is. Indar is speaking to Salim about his world view (page 147):
“There may be some part of the world – dead countries, or secure and by-passed ones – where men can cherish the past and think of passing on furniture and china to their heirs. Men can do that perhaps in Sweden or Canada. Some peasant department of France full of half-wits in chateaux; some crumbling Indian palace-city, or some dead colonial town in a hopeless South American country. Everywhere else men are in movement, the world is in movement, and the past can only cause pain.” And so it becomes for Salim.

I probably would have given this book an even higher rating except for the violence in the last meeting between Yvette and Salim. I never feel there is any good reason for a man to strike a woman and in this case it seemed particularly gratuitous. After, Salim has no remorse about his actions and he is treated by Metty as though he is the one who deserves sympathy. I can’t help but wonder about Naipaul’s own relationships with women. I will probably read more books by Naipaul who did receive the Nobel Prize for literature in 2001.

RELEASE NOTES:

I will release this book on the shelf tonight. This release is for the 2006 Never Judge a Book by its Cover challenge - Week 52 (anything goes).

*This book will be waiting at Le Garage to be taken home by a lucky new reader!

picked up at the bookxing monthly meetup

RELEASE NOTES: