The Early Novels of R.K.NarayanThe Early Novels of R.K.Narayan—a Perspective and a Bi-text is a unique three-in-one secondary source on the highly-acclaimed and popular R.K.Narayan. Drawing upon his five decades of sustained interest and research—see John Thieme’s comment above and R.K.Narayan’s letter reprinted in this book-- Ranga Rao offers a detailed critique of Narayan’s five early novels: Swami and Friends, The Bachelor of Arts, The Dark Room, The English Teacher (Grateful to Life and Death) and Mr Sampath (The Printer of Malgudi), all of them underrated and even misinterpreted by several reputed critics and writers, like V.S.Naipaul; Ranga Rao also posits, on the strength of the textual analysis and study, a new conception of Comedy, ‘Gunas Comedy’; and Ranga Rao post-scripts his critique with wide-ranging end-notes, supplements and complements with a copious source of facts and filiations, drawn from critics and friends and interviewers of Narayan: and from Narayan’s own non-fictional work. Rao also adds a list of topics for further exploration by interested readers; and a distinctive bibliography in four sections, a boon to students of Narayan and literature.
The other book on Narayan by Ranga Rao, a monograph, R.K.Narayan—an Introduction for the common Reader is already available in Kindle Books.
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