<em>New York Times</em> plants “Seeds” in year’s best

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December 11, 2004

New York Times plants “Seeds” in year’s best

The New York Times book review placed V.S. Naipaul’s “Magic Seeds,” and Hari Kunzru’s “Transmission” on its list of the year’s 100 best books.

Nobel prize-winning Naipaul’s “Magic Seeds” is a sequel to “Half a Life,” and finds its protagonist making an eyebrow-raising return to India. Hari Kunzru’s “Transmission” is the author’s second book, and follows the travails of a desperate Indian programmer who unleashes a destructive computer virus.

Neither novel advanced to the paper’s top 10, which will be published in tomorrow’s edition.

The New York Times: 100 notable books of the year (free registration required)
Sepia Mutiny: NYT reviews Naipaul’s “Magic Seeds”

Literature

POSTED BY apul @ 5:46 AM

2 comments

1 · Manish Vij on December 12, 2004 6:20 AM · Direct link

Transmission was much weaker than Kunzru's first book, The Impressionist, in part because the tech bubble novel and the Bollywood novel have been done before. I'm also struck by how much he seems to dislike his protagonists; within 50 pages of The Impressionist, he had his boy violated in every way. But it was a relatively entertaining book. Rushdie's spoiled me.

2 · prakruti on December 12, 2004 12:28 PM · Direct link

Apul interesting article.

Both kunzru and naipaul have interesting styles of writing. Kunzru follows the traditional story telling style with interesting plots sweeping the protagonist in different directions.Kunzrus story telling skills are very good and his protagonists are weak and more controlled by the society around them. And Kunzru is telling a story that happened in the past which is real hard so he is very imaginative and recreate a old 1900 or earlier india in his book Impressionist.Rushdie also does the same in his books "midnight children" etc.,That way Kunzru is more creative than naipaul with great imagination but I agree with Manish Rushdie is more imaginative and has better writing skills than kunzru and I like rushdie's weird sense of humor too.

Naipaul doesnot follow the traditional story telling skills. He has plots but not sweeping suspense thriller plots. He just lets his protagonist go through a journey and narrate his experiences without much attachment. His protagonists are mature strong people who just put themselves in different situations for just the sake of the experience. And Naipaul is getting old so u can see in magic seeds he keeps telling a reader about what he feels about Gandhi and others though they are not directly related to the story. Naipaul is trying to get his philosophy( about gandhi and indian politics) out through this book like aynrand did it in atlas shrugged about objectivism.And also naipaul describes india and places.

Manish,I just felt that Hari kunzru doesnot dislike his protagonist. He wants the readers to sympathise and feel something for the suffering protagonist who is just a helpless man controlled by powerful people. And after reading the first 50 pages of Impressionist, u kinda feel sad for the protagonist and keep reading the book to see if the protagonist is able to get out of those shackles and can free himself.

Manish hope u are having fun in india. I saw a lot of emails with suggestions for u about places to eat, see in india. Elephenta caves near bombay, ajanta ellora caves,mysore city (maharaja palace,brindavan gardens, chamundeswari temple), rajasthan ( u can take pink city train from delhi and see jaipur,udaipur,hava mahal and all that). U can try eating indian spicy chat shoppers stop or lifestyle shopping malls(they are in every big city) where they have a restaurant at the top,chat there is safe healthwise and place is clean. u can get chat at other places but I tend to fall sick when I eat anywhere else). And jahangir art gallery, gurjari gujarati emporiums, leepakshi emporiums in bombay are good places to shop for indian things u want to hang on walls as decoration.

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