The oddity of cult books
When it comes to books that have gained a cult following, The Catcher in the Rye is the very definition of a cult book.
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Express News Service
BENGALURU: When it comes to books that have gained a cult following, The Catcher in the Rye is the very definition of a cult book. On the night Mark David Chapman shot dead former Beatle John Lennon, Chapman was caught with a copy of this book, in which he had written “This is my statement”. He identified with the novel’s narrator to a degree that he wanted to change his name to Holden Caulfield.
It was in December 2000 that Upamanyu Chatterjeeâs
The Mammaries of the Welfare State was published. The satirical piece of fiction was read as a sequel to his 1988 debut novel
English, August. Two decades later, the imperative of wide state intervention in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic has ensured the sequel has gained renewed currency. Today, it can be read in a different, and immediately familiar, light for its satirical portrayal of the whims, rituals and time-hardened attitudes seen in the bureaucratic and political responses to the epidemic-hit fictional district of Madna.
The sequel had a formidable predecessor.
English, August, which introduced us to the journey of the confused IAS probationer Agastya Sen, was relished for being one of the defining coming-of-age novels in modern Indian writing with some seeing it as an Indian answer to JD Salingerâs