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Having merited both the Nobel Prize and knighthood for his services to literature, V.S. Naipaul's oeuvre of over twenty published works mark the career of a prolific writer dedicated to his contributions to the English canon.
With novels such as "A Way in the World" and "A Bend in the River," V.S. Naipaul has solidified a critical reputation for exhibiting a masterful, yet delicate command of the English language. Born in colonial Trinidad of an Indian family, Naipaul attended Oxford University by way of a government scholarship; Naipaul never lost sight of his provincial identity, despite displaying a reluctance to return home.
His latest work, "Half a Life," details themes quite familiar to Naipaul, as the novel's protagonist – Willie Chandran – attains both his sensual and sentimental education abroad, railing against the incomplete sense of identity enforced by self-imposed exile.
Refreshingly, the main strength of this work finds centering not in theoretical conventions or flashy stylistic nuances, but rather in the tightly-wound, yet fully-developed story of Willie Chandran's life. Born of a religious ascetic father and lower-caste African mother, Chandran's sole hope for social mobility rests in leaving India to study in England, as he could never transcend the familial dishonor of his father's marrying below caste. Learning little of life and love from his parents and familial situation, Willie Chandran accepts a government scholarship to study in London, claiming solely a suitcase and his W. Somerset Maugham namesake.
Having landed in the literary Bohemia of 1950s Notting Hill at a time of unprecedented sexual liberation and celebration, Chandran learned to maneuver deftly between communities of fellow expatriates and established members of London society as he attempted to find his place in a world far removed from provincial Indian life.
The reader watches as Willie Chandran convincingly learns to function in this performative environment of strong personalities and foreign sensibilities. Willie observes that social success as an expatriate most directly stems from one common source: having an interesting personal story to tell.
Naipaul writes, "So, playing with words, he began to re-make himself. It excited him, and began to give him a feeling of power." With this newfound power to entertain and interest, Willie took the up the pen for the BBC, developing radio documentaries with a provincial slant.
Naipaul deftly manages the blurring of Chandran's literary persona and the reality of his familial backdrop with the calculated assuredness of an inveterate expatriate, and this infuses Willie's story with the power of believability.
Perhaps ironically, the culmination of Willie Chandran's re-writing – a published collection of purported semi-autobiographical short stories – results in the springboard that would facilitate another continental leap and the direction his life would take for the subsequent 18 years.
Choosing to ignore the pleas of his sister and father, upon receiving his degree, Willie seeks security in the accepting arms of Ana, the person most convinced by the synthetic history Chandran had fashioned within his writing. Following Ana to her provincial home in Portuguese East Africa, Willie Chandran aspired to a life devoid of social posturing; however, Willie found the explicit antithesis of the life he expected upon arrival in the racially segregated and economically motivated provincial capital. Receiving an education in infidelity, interracial tensions and imperial overstretch, Willie Chandran leaves Ana and retreats to find his sister in Germany at age 41. Middle-aged and forcibly well-versed in the ways of the world, Willie has led an arguably unfulfilled life and the reader has remained privy to each stage of the misadventure.
Naipaul leaves the reader to contemplate the narrative at this point; half of Willie Chandran's life has past and still he has developed no secure sense of self-identity. Though Willie Chandran presents his narrative account with the confidence of a seasoned storyteller, the reader understands the underlying uncertainty driving his life actions; impressively, Naipaul manages such contradictions without detriment to the believability of his main character.
Willie Chandran may misrepresent himself throughout the novel, yet Naipaul's control over his character pervades the narrative with an unquestioned honesty.
The reader – cognizant of the balance achieved by Naipaul – remains awestruck by his ability to simultaneously craft so a cogent narrative, in addition to the social and political commentary interweaved throughout. Necessarily, "Half a Life" details issues of racial tension, colonialism, postcolonialism and exile, issues endemic to the novel's various politicized settings. Though his personal position as an outsider would afford him the perspective to pronounce an informed judgment on colonial failings, Naipaul never uses Willie Chandran as a mouthpiece for his political persuasions.
Adding to the taught nature of the novel itself, V.S. Naipaul's primary concern remains the primacy of literature, as opposed to postcolonial politics.
Fused with the details of Chandran's life, the title of Naipaul's work – "Half a Life" – forces the reader to consider the possibility of ever achieving a fulfilled life in exile. Having never repatriated himself, Naipaul exhibits familiarity with this question and the reader trusts his observations and insights implicitly.
"Half a Life" leaves the reader with a complete appreciation of the work as a whole, a near-perfect survey of Naipaul's authoritative style of writing.
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