Urupasi
Reading S. Ramakrishnan’s novel, ‘Urupasi’ at first gave me the feeling that I was seeing the world from behind a moving camera that spun around at arbitrary angles every other minute. Despite this sensation, I was soon hooked.
(pic courtesy Uyirmai Padippagam)
The novel uses an imaginative style, where three friends get together over the death of a fourth one, and the narrative moves back and forth between each of them, and sometimes even flutters over them, allowing us to see all three of them from an outsider’s perspective. Sampath, the dead man is the one whose perspective is missing, and yet, he dominates the novel through the eyes of the other three.
This style makes for some interesting, even if at times, difficult reading. At times, the jumps from one character to another are so abrupt that it is difficult for the reader to make the shift easily. And yet, each character’s narrative, once you get into it, is completely coherent and insightful. Ramakrishnan’s style is somewhat twisted and the sentences take some unravelling, but they match perfectly the mood of the novel which feels like an excursion into the darkness of the human mind.
None of the speakers talk about themselves very much; the conversations revolves around their youth and always, always comes back to Sampath. Yet, in the process, in almost Camus-like fashion, the incomplete-ness of their lives is revealed. Sampath, the dead man is the loser, the one who couldn’t ‘make it’, the one who almost wilfully destroys himself, and yet, by the end of the novel, we see that viewed against the backdrop of youthful idealism, each one of the men is a loser.
Publishers: Uyirmai Padippagam
Price: Rs. 75
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