In the solitude of a human mind

Tamil writer Devibharathi has written a gripping novel about revenge, called ‘The Solitude of a Shadow’ 

By Shevlin Sebastian 

The first sentence of ‘The Solitude of a Shadow’ written by veteran Tamil writer Devibharathi, and nicely translated by N. Kalyan Raman, creates a sense of foreboding: ‘Karunakaran had turned up before us like an evil spirit after nearly thirty years.’ 

This is the thought process of the nameless, first-person protagonist, who is a clerk in a government school. Let us name him Rajasekaran, for ease of narration. 

Karunakaran, the owner of a loan shop, had come to see the headmaster. It was clear from the reaction of the headmaster and the staff that he was a man of influence. Later, Rajasekaran came to know that Karunakaran was a successful entrepreneur and the president of the school’s Parent-Teacher Association. It was through his efforts new classrooms had been made. 

The reason for Rajasekaran’s shocked reaction was that Karunakaran had raped his sister Sharada three decades ago. Their mother had told Sharada: “It’s nothing. You will be all right.” Rajasekaran was only 12. And he remembered shouting at Karunakaran, “No matter how long it takes, I won’t rest until I have chopped you into pieces. I’ll avenge this, da.” 

Karunakaran laughed. Then he told their mother, “The boy watches a lot of movies, it seems. Such a small runt. You are no bigger than a crab, but you stood there with a sickle in your hand and threatened to kill me.” Unfortunately, the siblings could not inflict any revenge. 

That evening, when Rajasekaran mentioned the reemergence of Karunakaran to Sharada, Devibharathi writes: ‘the smouldering embers of her vengeance had begun to shed the layers of ash deposited by time.’ After calming down, Sharada asked her brother to wreak vengeance on Karunakaran. 

Rajasekaran wrote an anonymous letter describing the rape of Sharada. He sent it by post to Karunakaran’s home. 

‘I wanted him to feel on his dead tongue the salt of the tears that had flowed from Sharada’s brown eyes as she stood before him trembling like a wounded bird,’ writes Devibharathi. ‘He would never have imagined that I would follow him like a vengeful serpent and that he would struggle to protect himself from the panic that would follow.’ 

Now begins the cat-and-mouse game between Rajasekaran and Karunakaran, as they interact with one another all the time. It is intriguing, suspenseful and mysterious. No rising heat wave or a falling water table can distract the reader from enjoying this superb novel. 

Devibharathi has been a government employee, political activist, a managing editor of a literary magazine and scriptwriter. He won the Sahitya Akademi award for 2023. ‘Nizhalin Thanimai’ (‘The Solitude of a Shadow’), published in 2012, is his first novel. 

In four decades, Devibharathi has published two short story collections, four novellas, four novels, a play and two non-fiction anthologies which contain his essays and memoirs. One hopes that more books of Devibharathi will be translated into English. 

(Published in the Sunday Magazine, The New Indian Express, South India and Delhi)