The God of small things

They were, all three of them, wearing saris, (old ones, torn in half) that day, Estha was the draping expert. He pleated Sophie mol’s pleats. Organized Rahel’s pallu and settled his own. They had red bindis on their foreheads. In the process of trying to wash out Ammu’s forbidden kohl, they had smudged it all over their eyes, and on the whole looked like three raccoons trying to pass off Hindu ladies.

* * *

They visited him in saris, clumping gracelessly through red mud and long grass and introduced themselves as Mrs.Pillai, Mrs.Eapen and Mrs.Rajagopalan. Velutha introduced himself and his paralyzed brother Kuttappen (although he was fast asleep). He greeted them with utmost courtesy. He addressed them all as Kochamma and gave them fresh coconut water to drink. He chatted to them about the weather. The river. The fact that in his opinion coconut trees were getting shorter by the year. As were the ladies in Ayemenem. He introduced them to his surly hen. He showed them his carpentry tools, and whittled them each a little wooden spoon.

It is only now, these years later, that Rahel with adult hindsight recognized the sweetness of that gesture. A grown man entertaining three raccoons, treating them like real ladies. Instinctively colluding in the conspiracy of their fiction, taking care not to decimate it with adult carelessness. Or affection.

It is after all so easy to shatter a story. To break a chain of thought. To ruin a fragment of dream carried around carefully like a piece of porcelain.

To let it be, as Velutha did, is much harder thing to do.


Arundhati Roy,
The God of small things.



I finished reading the book yesterday night.

And the excerpt given above is my most fav. Part of the book. The more I read it, the more I appreciate it.

People, who themselves are afraid of dreaming in case they might not come true, who tell others who do to stop dreaming ‘unrealistic’ dreams. Who ask kids to shed their innocence and grow up. Who fail to hear the voice of the kid within themselves.

Being told by many “grown-ups” that I live in ‘my own fantasy world’ and hearing statements like ‘Open your eyes to the real big bad world’ every once in a while, I wish there were more people like ‘Velutha’ around.