I am reading The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver right now. (Harper Perennial, 1998, E Pub edition April 2007, ISBN 9780061804816)
It is a long novel of some 470 pages and I am just half way through but it has caught me by the scruff of my neck and I am forced to think.
The plot involves Reverend Price who one day just leaves his parish in Georgia, USA and comes to a remote spot in Congo to spread the message of Jesus Christ. He brings his wife and four daughters along. The oldest daughter is sixteen years old and then there are twins - one of them with a deformed leg.
The priest's wife and daughters are doing their best to adapt to the new situation. The Reverend has promised them that after one year they would return. The narrative is by each of the daughters and slowly it reveals what a cruel man their father is. He was a soldier who fought in Indonesia and suffered brain damage. After coming back home he becomes a preacher who is fond of quoting the Bible - chapter and verse. He has lost the capacity to think and reflect. He does not understand his family's needs. He habitually strikes them and his wife and the daughters are punished by being made to copy portions of Bible for every wrong they commit.
The place in Congo where they land is a village and the previous preacher has left in disgrace. The natives are absolutely stoic about the preaching. They have a very flexible approach to religion. When an epidemic spreads during the rainy season and some infants are killed, they turn to Christianity and those who became Christian earlier, abandon it. The natives keep quiet in front of the Reverend who does not understand anything. His wife and daughter piece together what is happening around always after the event.
There is a plot by CIA to murder Patrice Lumumba and the Prices are advised to leave Congo. The Reverend would not listen although his wife and one daughter have fallen ill and must be brought back to America if they are to be saved. A calamity strikes. And so on.
Reverend Price is a mad man but missionaries have worked hard all over the world and met with little success. They have had to put up with immense hostility. Now of course, in the 21st century, they cannot do much but in the 20th, they tried hard. Those were innocent times. How frustrated they must have been. And how courageous to undertake something like this!
Communists tried the same thing with less conviction and for a shorter time. I remember my aunt who used to talk to everybody about the importance of bringing workers together. She had the cheek to ask the children of one acquaintance to switch off TV and listen to her! However, that experience made her admit that people resented her preaching.
Imagine going to remote rural places all over Maharashtra and talking about workers' unity! Farmers with their love for land were reactionary forces in Marxian scheme of things. So she addressed them and ignored their problems. Farmers are cunning people. They listen to everybody, pretend to be very foolish and finally do what they want to.
Later NGOs started mobilizing people. My aunt dismissed them. They offered money to people to attend their programmes while she and other party functionaries simply 'enlightened' people and influence them for mass action when their reading of the situation and the goal were all wrong.
All that has faded now but in the process of nation building all such work was zealously carried out once upon a time.
It is a long novel of some 470 pages and I am just half way through but it has caught me by the scruff of my neck and I am forced to think.
The plot involves Reverend Price who one day just leaves his parish in Georgia, USA and comes to a remote spot in Congo to spread the message of Jesus Christ. He brings his wife and four daughters along. The oldest daughter is sixteen years old and then there are twins - one of them with a deformed leg.
The priest's wife and daughters are doing their best to adapt to the new situation. The Reverend has promised them that after one year they would return. The narrative is by each of the daughters and slowly it reveals what a cruel man their father is. He was a soldier who fought in Indonesia and suffered brain damage. After coming back home he becomes a preacher who is fond of quoting the Bible - chapter and verse. He has lost the capacity to think and reflect. He does not understand his family's needs. He habitually strikes them and his wife and the daughters are punished by being made to copy portions of Bible for every wrong they commit.
The place in Congo where they land is a village and the previous preacher has left in disgrace. The natives are absolutely stoic about the preaching. They have a very flexible approach to religion. When an epidemic spreads during the rainy season and some infants are killed, they turn to Christianity and those who became Christian earlier, abandon it. The natives keep quiet in front of the Reverend who does not understand anything. His wife and daughter piece together what is happening around always after the event.
There is a plot by CIA to murder Patrice Lumumba and the Prices are advised to leave Congo. The Reverend would not listen although his wife and one daughter have fallen ill and must be brought back to America if they are to be saved. A calamity strikes. And so on.
Reverend Price is a mad man but missionaries have worked hard all over the world and met with little success. They have had to put up with immense hostility. Now of course, in the 21st century, they cannot do much but in the 20th, they tried hard. Those were innocent times. How frustrated they must have been. And how courageous to undertake something like this!
Communists tried the same thing with less conviction and for a shorter time. I remember my aunt who used to talk to everybody about the importance of bringing workers together. She had the cheek to ask the children of one acquaintance to switch off TV and listen to her! However, that experience made her admit that people resented her preaching.
Imagine going to remote rural places all over Maharashtra and talking about workers' unity! Farmers with their love for land were reactionary forces in Marxian scheme of things. So she addressed them and ignored their problems. Farmers are cunning people. They listen to everybody, pretend to be very foolish and finally do what they want to.
Later NGOs started mobilizing people. My aunt dismissed them. They offered money to people to attend their programmes while she and other party functionaries simply 'enlightened' people and influence them for mass action when their reading of the situation and the goal were all wrong.
All that has faded now but in the process of nation building all such work was zealously carried out once upon a time.
