Clear Light of Day

 

About the Novelist

Anita Desai was an Indian English novelist and a professor of humanities at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Born in Mussoorie in 1937 as Anita Mazumder to a German immigrant mother and a Bengali businessman father.

Desai completed her higher secondary in the Queen Mary’s higher secondary school. Later she received her B.A. in English from Miranda House of the University of Delhi.

She has been thrice shortlisted for the Booker Prize and also the recipient of the prestigious Sahity Akademi Award in 1978 for her novel “Fire on the Mountain”.

She won the British Guardian Prize for “The Village By the Sea”.

She is also on the advisory board of the Lalit Kala Akademi.

She is married to Ashvin Desai and the mother of the Booker Prize winning novelist Kiran Desai.

Influenced by Emily Bronte, James Joyce, D.H. Lawrence, Virginia Woolf and so on.

She read Wuthering Heights at the age of 9.

Important works 

• The Zigzag Way
• The Artist of Disappearance
• Baumgartner’s Bombay
• The Village By the Sea
• Fire on the Mountain
• In Custody
• Clear Light of Day (1980)

Structure of Clear Light of Day 

The novel gives a chronicle of Das family.

It is divided into 4 parts:-

• first part set in present.
• second part set in summer 1947.
• third part set in even earlier period of Das children’s childhood.
• fourth part returns back to the present.

The four parts of the novel parallels with Four Quartets of T.S. Eliot.

The structure facilitates to present reality from different angles.

Non-linearity and use of the stream of consciousness technique is used.

Narrated through a third person omniscient observer giving detail account of the inner world of the characters.

Bim, 

“Youth? Yes, I am glad, too, it is over – I never wish it back. Terrible, what it does to one.”

The quoted expression denotes the unfulfilled childhood and youth of the character Bim expressed by her to Tara in summer 1947.

Time is an important element in the novel, acting both as a destroyer and a preserver.

Time is used as structural device also as change and continuity.

Narrative Techniques :

Psychological Novel

Desai , brought a new dimension to Indian English fiction by focusing on the inner world of her characters.

Preoccupied with the individual psychic complexities which sets her apart from her contemporaries.

She ushered the psychological novel in Indian English fiction.

The Interior world of characters:

Forte is the exploration of the interior world of the characters and bringing into relief the hidden contours of the human psyche.

Exterior world is unimportant because it is only possible through the inner perception of characters towards it.

Desai says, it is the individual, the solitary being, is of truest interest. One must be alone, silent, in order to think contemplate or write.

Fragmentation of reality. She brings the prismatic quality of reality.

Reality is merely one tenth of the iceberg that one sees above the surface of the ocean.

Prefers to write novels than short stories because it requires a good deal of thought and time.

The Alienation :

Bim is portrayed as melancholic, disillusioned and withdrawn yet through it all we also see her sacrifice, courage and tolerance.

Bim’s breakdown at the end of the book results in remarkable clarity of thought. In this insight, she concludes that the bond of family is greater than any other thing in this world, that she felt their pains, and that she couldn’t live without them.

Bim’s inability to forgive Raja demonstrates that,

“The deepest hurts come from the closest bonds.”

However she does find it in herself at the end of the book to forgive Raja for the insult and realize the importance of family.

Bimla is alienated and single-handedly faces the ferocious assault of existence but finally finds her freedom at the end.

Characters in Desai’s novels are generally “neurotic females, highly sensitive and engage with dreams and imagination and are alienated from their environment”.

The protagonist often differs in opinion from others and embarks on a long voyage of contemplation in order to find the meaning of existence. The protagonist usually suffers more due to their relationship as compared to the other characters.

Her protagonist are not static figures; they attempt to know themselves and in the process, “undergo transformation leading to self-illumination

The Treatment of Time in Clear Light of Day

It’s the central motif of the novel and deals with the paradox of change and continuity.

Time also acts both a preserver and destroyer, evidenced from the last scene of the novel where Bim goes with Baba to hear Milk Mishra and his guru sing.

“She saw before her eyes, how one ancient school of music contained both Milk, still an immature disciple, and his aged exhausted guru with all the disillusionment and defeats of his long experience.

Non-linearity :

The sequence of events in the novel has not been shown chronologically but in a nonlinear way.

Time has not been treated as an imitation of chronological perception but an emotional sequence of events.

The story is told through the technique of stream of consciousness, which makes the nature of events rather emotional than recorded.

The reader sees through the eyes of the characters and assess the situation.

The narrative is realised gradually and skillfully through the shifting point of view, the frequent time lapse and the interior monologue of the characters. On

The Partition and the Time :

The partion of the country parallels with the partition of Das family and time deals differently with different characters.

The forward and backward treatment of time :

This treatment of time is used by Desai to bring about two things, 1) the final pattern of the novel that gives a perspective to the meaninglessness around and 2) to show the growth of her characters.

For instance the bee episode at the Lodi gardens, at the recollection of the events Tara feel immensely guilty for leaving Bim behind to escape the attack of the bees. Accordingly, she apologies to Bim for her cowering behaviour and selfishness.

The Political Dimension of the Novel

Political undercurrent is very much visible in the Clear Light of Day.

The novel although contains events of 30s and 70s but is set in the summer of 1947.

The national history is not directly presented but Desai foregrounded the history of Das family through the turbulent happenings of national history.

The personal emotions of Das family parallels with the national storms.

Partion of India symbolises the break up of the Das family.

Like the post independent India, looking for a new direction and identity, the Das family have also suffered from a crisis relating to the past.

Bim , particularly find herself amidst the crisis of modern India where she couldn’t find herself a new role relating to the past.

When she finally does she locates herself to the distant past of harmony and peace among the communities.

Again almost all the political leaders of the partion period were mentioned in the novel by various characters. Leaders like Jinnah, Nehru, Gandhi, Churchill, Mountbatten and so on.

The novel also emphasized the need for the formation of Pakistan.

During the partion riot, the terminally ill, Raja felt frustrated at his helplessness towards saving the Alis.

Again, Raja is secular which is why he was shocked to find that it is the community discrepancy for which his father forbade him to join a Muslim college like Jamia Millia Islamia.

Raja, also foresees the partion riot and the violence that is to follow after the death of Gandhi.

Finally, it was the leaving of Ali’s from Delhi that indicates the changed political atmosphere of the nation.

The Characterization of Raja

An important character in the novel. Initially was absent from the novel but later the arc of his story played a pivotal part in the workings of the central theme.

In the novel, Raja is used by Desai for a number of reasons.

Through his relationship with Hyder Ali Desai shows us the Hindu/Muslim harmony that existed in the pre partition period.

Through his association, Raja get to expose to the parties of Hyder Alia which is indicative of the decadent lifestyle that existed in the pre-partioned India also of the need of the Muslim community to have a separate country for themselves.

Raja’s secular tone in politics is also show through his exposure to the bigotry of his fellow colleagues of a Hindu College.

And the mounting tension between the two communities during those time has shown through the interaction of Raja with his father and other colleagues.

He contributes significantly to the political arc of the novel. And also a central figure to the storyline of the novel.

It is the breakdown of his and Bim’s relationship that forms the core of the novel.

They were once very close and had shared interest in literature and music. But as the novel progress and a much deeper plunge to their earlier days occurs, we get to know the immediate cause of the breakdown.

It was the patronizing letter that Raja wrote to Bim, allowing her to stay in the house of Hyder Ali, his father in law from whom he inherited the house, for as long as she wants with the same rent.

This showy generosity humiliated Bim as she was counting on Raja to take the responsibility of their family business after the death of their father.

It is in this sense that Bim felt betrayed by Raja the second time. The first being the time when he walked out on the family to be with the Alis.

But with time and the effort of Tara, by the end of the novel Bim and Raja put their differences aside and reconciliated their relationship.

Conclusion :

In 25 years of storytelling Clear Iight of Days is the best of Anita Desai. It will continue to command attention and respect.