An Apartment Building as a Microcosm of Indian Society: New Historical Reading ofManil Suri'sThe Death of Vishnu
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Central Department of English
Abstract
Manil Suri’s novelThe Death of Vishnu(2001) has tried to represent the different
aspects of contemporary India. Vishnu, the odd-job man in a Bombay apartment block,
lies dying on the staircase landing. Around him the lives of the apartment dwellers unfold
–the warring housewives on the first floor, the lovesick teenagers on the second, and the
widower alone and quietly grieving at the top of the building. In a fevered state Vishnu
looks back on his love affair with the seductive Padmini and comedy becomes tragedy as
his life draws to a close. By including such events within a single apartment building Suri
has observed the follies and miseries of Indian society. Through outThe Death of Vishnu
is a constant co-mingling of the physical, material and mundane with the spiritual and
divine. Covering only a twenty-four hour period this “soap opera” scenario is
transformed, however, into a microcosm of society that provides Hindu insights into the
nature of reality. In short through the window, of a Bombay apartment building Manil
Suri creates an intimate and intricate portrait of life in a great Indian Metropolis.