Freedom Song [Paperback]

Not that it will put you to sleep, but rather it will lift you up from your banal surroundings and take you to a place far, far away.. (well, I'm in Harrisburg, PA and Calcutta and Bombay are just magical places- both very far, far away!) How beautifully he narrates the stories derived from his own childhood memories! I loved his writing style, his language, his humor, the characters in all three stories and most importantly his insights. He transforms the most flavorless moments of life into genuinely funny material. I found myself laughing out loud- laughing with Chaudhari and at myself- at many instances. I truly enjoyed reading this book and recommend it to anyone who enjoys good use of language and vivid pictures painted in green and orange and purple and blue and pink and yellow.. you get the point! :)

I came across this book in the college bookstore by chance and decided to buy it. I must say it was an extremely good decision. This is one of the most relaxing and beautiful books that I have read so far. Especially the first novel, "A strange and sublime address", was the one which I especially liked. I too, like Chaudhuri, used to live in Bombay and used to visit Calcutta every year during the summer vacations, and reading Chaudhuri was like reliving my own experiences once again. Chaudhuri in all three of these novels has no plot or particular story to tell, but goes on to describe day to day living and experiences. This is what I liked most in his novels. He brings out beautifully the modes of thinking and subtleties in behavoiur peculiar to the culture of the Indian middle class. Reading this book would give anyone a pretty thorough insight into the life of the educated urban indian middle class. In short, if you want to read a book without any melodrama, wherein all you have to do is surrender yourself to its prose and let its narration of seemingly ordinary events weave its magic around you, leaving you thoroughly refreshed in the end, then this set of three novels by Chaudhuri is definitely the one for you. Chaudhuri is excellent and is definitely in league with the other great Indian novelists such as R.K.Narayan who write about India and her life with such mastery and exquisite craftsmanship in the English language.Absolutely enchanting reading.

As someone whose childhood reading included Banaphool and Bibhuti Bandopadhaya(notably Adarsha Hindu Hotel), for me Amit Chaudhury's Freedom Song is another celebration of lyrical prose. I managed to read the British publication of the novel by the same name. As many reviewers have complained,here nothing happens in terms of events, yet everything seems to evolve in to a tapestry of human emotions recollected in tranquil prose. If you like to read Robert Ludlum or Stephen King instead of Chekov or Maupassant then dont waste your time and effort on Freedom Song. For the Indian readers I can say if you are missing Satyajit Ray since his death, here is an ersatz Ray. For the American audience this book can be described as some kind of a Jerry Seinfeldesqe rendition of middle class Calcuttans. Like Seinfeld no subject is a taboo for the writer including the undercurrents of Hindu nationalism surfacing in the Marxist state. However there is a slip showing in the facts narrated in this book. Writer alludes to middle class bengalis from Calcutta going away to Darjeeling and Gopalpur for vacations and pilgrimage respectively(page 51). If he meant Gopalpur in the neighbouring province of Orissa, then he must have meant Puri,with its sea beach and Jagannath temple. As some one hailing from there I can vouch for the bengali tourists flocking to Puri all year round in their Calcutta colors. I could not resist the temptation to include some of my favourite excerpts from the book.: >> But then during the curfew, when shops and offices,and everything else had been closed -ten days of nothing happening-.....It was as if a train they had been on had halted somewhere unexpectedly and they had been forced to take a holiday. She had found that he was not interested in discussing what was happening at all-the riots, the anger, more interested in rereading old copies of the Statesman which he had accumulated during the last week in a drawer. >>Pigeons rose suddenly into the sky between the buildings; their conversation evaporated rather than ended; the child began to make sounds as if it had had enough. (NOTE: Child is inanimate here and is referred to as it). >>When the meeting with the 'girl' and her parents was set to take place at an open air cafe near Salt Lake, Bhaskar, oddly,seemed both indifferent and cooperative and full of nimble self-assurance. >> Though the last cook, whose fragrant preparations of goat's meat and fish head dal were well known, had died two years ago of cholera, the present cook too had a reputation.>> >>But it was as if his recent eloquence in politics had left him inarticulate about personal matters. >>No one could decipher from her serenity that she had already seen in the same capacity a cost accountant, a marine engineer, and a lecturer.... >>'What did you think of her?' His mother put this question to him a few days later, deliberately absent-minded, as if she were questioning the air. A mongrel's bark followed the silence.