R. K.

Narayan
R. K. Narayan (10 October 1906 13 May 2001), full name Rasipuram Krishnaswami Iyer
Narayanaswami, was an Indian writer, best known for his works set in the fictional South Indian
town of Malgudi. He is one of three leading figures of early Indian literature in
English (alongside Mulk Raj Anand and Raja Rao), and is credited with bringing the genre to the
rest of the world.

R. K. Narayan was born in Madras (now Chennai), British India.[1] His father was a school
headmaster, and Narayan did some of his studies at his father's school. As his father's job
entailed frequent transfers, Narayan spent part of his childhood under the care of his maternal
grandmother, Parvati.[2] During this time his best friends and playmates were a peacock and a
mischievous monkey.[3][4][5]

His grandmother gave him the nickname of Kunjappa, a name that stuck to him in family circles.
[6]
She taught him arithmetic, mythology, classical Indian music and Sanskrit.[7] According to his
youngest brother R. K. Laxman, the family mostly conversed in English, and grammatical errors
on the part of Narayan and his siblings were frowned upon.[8] While living with his grandmother,
Narayan studied at a succession of schools in Madras, including the Lutheran Mission School
in Purasawalkam,[9] C.R.C. High School, and the Christian College High School.[10] Narayan was
an avid reader,

Narayan moved to Mysore to live with his family when his father was transferred to the
Maharajah's College High School. The well-stocked library at the school, as well as his father's
own, fed his reading habit, and he started writing as well. After completing high school, Narayan
failed the university entrance examination and spent a year at home reading and writing; he
subsequently passed the examination in 1926 and joined Maharaja College of Mysore. It took
Narayan four years to obtain his Bachelor's degree, a year longer than usual. After being
persuaded by a friend that taking a Master's degree (M.A.) would kill his interest in literature, he
briefly held a job as a school teacher; however, he quit in protest when the headmaster of the
school asked him to substitute for the physical training master.[9] The experience made Narayan
realise that the only career for him was in writing, and he decided to stay at home and write
novels

His first published work was a book review of Development of Maritime Laws of 17th-Century
England.[15] Subsequently, he started writing the occasional local interest story for English
newspapers and magazines.

In 1930, Narayan wrote his first novel, Swami and Friends,[15] an effort ridiculed by his uncle[17] and
rejected by a string of publishers.[8] With this book, Narayan created Malgudi, a town that
creatively reproduced the social sphere of the country; while it ignored the limits imposed by
colonial rule, it also grew with the various socio-political changes of British and postindependence India.[18]
While vacationing at his sister's house in Coimbatore, in 1933, Narayan met and fell in love with
Rajam, a 15-year-old girl who lived nearby. Despite many astrological and financial obstacles,
Narayan managed to gain permission from the girl's father and married her

Narayan's writing technique was unpretentious with a natural element of humour about it. [72] It
focused on ordinary people, reminding the reader of next-door neighbours, cousins and the like,
thereby providing a greater ability to relate to the topic.[73] Unlike his national contemporaries, he
was able to write about the intricacies of Indian society without having to modify his characteristic
simplicity to conform to trends and fashions in fiction writing. [74] He also employed the use of
nuanced dialogic prose with gentle Tamil overtones based on the nature of his characters.
[75]
Critics have considered Narayan to be the Indian Chekhov,

1.Swami and Friends,1935

2. The Bachelor of Arts (1937)
3. The Dark Room (1938) was about domestic disharmony,[25] showcasing the man as the
oppressor and the woman as the victim within a marriage,

In his first three books, Narayan highlights the problems with certain socially accepted practices.
The first book has Narayan focusing on the plight of students, punishments of caning in the
classroom, and the associated shame. The concept of horoscope-matching in Hindu
marriages and the emotional toll it levies on the bride and groom is covered in the second book.
In the third book, Narayan addresses the concept of a wife putting up with her husband's antics
and attitudes
His first collection of short stories, Malgudi Days, was published in November 1942, followed
by The English Teacher in 1945.
Narayan started his own publishing company, naming it (again) Indian Thought Publications;
Narayan's writings took a more imaginative and creative external style compared to the semiautobiographical tone
Mr. Sampath, was the first book exhibiting this modified approach
The Financial Expert, considered to be his masterpiece and hailed as one of the most original
works of fiction in 1951.[36][37] The inspiration for the novel was a true story about a financial
genius, Margayya,

Waiting for the Mahatma, loosely based on a fictional visit to Malgudi by Mahatma Gandhi, deals
with the protagonist's romantic feelings for a woman, when he attends the discourses of the
visiting Mahatma.
Next Sunday (1960), was a collection of such conversational essays, and his first work to be
published as a book.[45]Soon after that, My Dateless Diary, describing experiences from his 1956
visit to the United States, was published
Narayan's next novel, The Man-Eater of Malgudi, was published in 1961. The book was reviewed
as having a narrative that is a classical art form of comedy, with delicate control
With his success, both within India and abroad, Narayan started writing columns for magazines
and newspapers including The Hindu and The Atlantic.[48]
In 1964, Narayan published his first mythological work, Gods, Demons and Others, a collection
of rewritten and translated short stories from Hindu epics
Narayan's next published work was the 1967 novel, The Vendor of Sweets. It was inspired in part
by his American visits and consists of extreme characterizations of both the Indian and American
stereotypes, drawing on the many cultural differences
Narayan travelled to England, where he received the first of his honorary doctorates from
the University of Leeds.[51] The next few years were a quiet period for him. He published his next
book, a collection of short stories, A Horse and Two Goats, in 1970.[52] Meanwhile, Narayan
remembered a promise made to his dying uncle in 1938, and started translating the Kamba
Ramayanam to English.The Ramayana was published in 1973, after five years of work.[53] Almost
immediately after publishing The Ramayana, Narayan started working on a condensed
translation of the Sanskrit epic, the Mahabharata. While he was researching and writing the epic,
he also published another book, The Painter of Signs (1977). The Painter of Signs is a bit longer
than a novella and makes a marked change from Narayan's other works, as he deals with
hitherto unaddressed subjects such as sex, although the development of the protagonist's
character is very similar to his earlier creations. The Mahabharata was published in 1978.[54]
Narayan was commissioned by the government of Karnataka to write a book to promote tourism
in the state. The work was published as part of a larger government publication in the late 1970s.
[55]
He thought it deserved better, and republished it as The Emerald Route (Indian Thought
Publications, 1980).[56]The book contains his personal perspective on the local history and
heritage, but being bereft of his characters and creations, it misses his enjoyable narrative
In 1983, Narayan published his next novel, A Tiger for Malgudi, about a tiger and its relationship
with humans.[59] His next novel, Talkative Man, published in 1986, was the tale of an aspiring
journalist from Malgudi.[60] During this time, he also published two collections of short
stories: Malgudi Days (1982), a revised edition including the original book and some other
stories, and Under the Banyan Tree and Other Stories, a new collection.[61] In 1987, he
completed A Writer's Nightmare, another collection of essays about topics as diverse as the
caste system, Nobel prize winners, love, and monkeys. The collection included essays he had
written for newspapers and magazines since 1958. [62][63]
Living alone in Mysore, Narayan developed an interest in agriculture. He bought an acre of
agricultural land and tried his hand at farming.[64]
in 1990, he published his next novel, The World of Nagaraj, also set in Malgudi.

Narayan then published his final book, Grandmother's Tale., in 1994.

In May 2001, Narayan was hospitalised. A few hours before he was to be put on a ventilator, he
was planning on writing his next novel, a story about a grandfather. As he was always very
selective about his choice of notebooks, he asked N. Ram to get him one. However, Narayan did
not get better and never started the novel. He died on 13 May 2001, in Chennai at the age of 94.
[10][71]

Malgudi is a fictional, semi-urban town in southern India, conjured by Narayan. [85] He created the
town in September 1930, on Vijayadashami, an auspicious day to start new efforts and thus
chosen for him by his grandmother.[86] As he mentioned in a later interview to his biographers
Susan and N. Ram, in his mind, he first saw a railway station, and slowly the
name Malgudi came to him.[87] The town was created with an impeccable historical record, dating
to the Ramayanadays when it was noted that Lord Rama passed through; it was also said that
the Buddha visited the town during his travels.

Awards and honours[edit]

Narayan won numerous awards during the course of his literary career.[103] His first major award
was in 1958, the Sahitya Akademi Award for The Guide.[104]When the book was made into a film,
he received the Filmfare Award for the best story. In 1964, he received the Padma
Bhushan during the Republic Dayhonours.[105] In 1980, he was awarded the AC Benson Medal by
the (British) Royal Society of Literature, of which he was an honorary member.[106] In 1982 he was
elected an honorary member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters.[74] He was nominated
for the Nobel Prize in Literature multiple times, but never won the honour.[107]
Recognition also came in the form of honorary doctorates by the University of Leeds (1967),
[108]
the University of Mysore (1976)[109] and Delhi University(1973).[110] Towards the end of his
career, Narayan was nominated to the upper house of the Indian Parliament for a six-year term
starting in 1989, for his contributions to Indian literature. [66] A year before his death, in 2001, he
was awarded India's second-highest civilian honour, the Padma Vibhushan.[111]
Narayan's greatest achievement was making India accessible to the outside world through his
literature
Novels

Swami and Friends (1935, Hamish Hamilton)

The Bachelor of Arts (1937, Thomas Nelson)

The Dark Room (1938, Eyre)

The English Teacher (1945, Eyre)

Mr. Sampath (1948, Eyre)

The Financial Expert (1952, Methuen)

Waiting for the Mahatma (1955, Methuen)

The Guide (1958, Methuen)

The Man-Eater of Malgudi (1961, Viking)

The Vendor of Sweets (1967, The Bodley Head)

The Painter of Signs (1977, Heinemann)

A Tiger for Malgudi (1983, Heinemann

Talkative Man (1986, Heinemann)

The World of Nagaraj (1990, Heinemann)

Grandmother's Tale (1992, Indian Thought Publications)

Non-fiction

Next Sunday (1960, Indian Thought Publications)

My Dateless Diary (1960, Indian Thought Publications)

My Days (1974, Viking)

Reluctant Guru (1974, Orient Paperbacks)

The Emerald Route (1980, Indian Thought Publications)

A Writer's Nightmare (1988, Penguin Books)

A Story-Teller's World (1989, Penguin Books)

The Writerly Life (2002, Penguin Books India)

Mysore (1944, second edition, Indian Thought Publications)

Short story collections

Malgudi Days (1942, Indian Thought Publications)

An Astrologer's Day and Other Stories (1947, Indian Thought Publications)

Lawley Road and Other Stories (1956, Indian Thought Publications)

A Horse and Two Goats (1970)

Under the Banyan Tree and Other Stories (1985)

The Grandmother's Tale and Selected Stories (1994, Viking)

Mythology

Gods, Demons and Others (1964, Viking)

The Ramayana (1973, Chatto & Windus)

The Mahabharata (1978, Heinemann)