Rereading Barrister Parvateesam After Four Decades

 

Barrister Parvateesam is a novel that delights as well as instructs. It uses humour to expose cultural differences between the east and the West. Written a century ago , it still is highly readable although it language seems somewhat remote now but relevant at the time of writing .

In the first   part we find Parvateesam in his childhood , school life, adolescence in which he  joins nationalist movement to the cost of education resulting in failure in studies and  later decision to go  abroad to become a barrister. It is the most humorous part depicting pranks in school days, competition for place in merit order and initially he comes out on flying colours. His father chides him for failure  and asks him to look after agriculture. Then Parvateesam leaves his village without  informing his parents. His train journey shows many humorous incidents from taking ticket, tying his bundle to chain used to stop the train, use of washroom . When he gets down in Madras he haggles with cart drivers, changes  his hairstyle, buys  sundry things which are needed in England , goes to a shopping mall and falls while trying to walk on tiles instead of on carpet. On board steamer to Colombo to Marseilles, he faces troubles due to his vegetarianism, sea sickness and uncertainity about his future.                

In the second part written after forty six years at the behest of Narla Venkateswara Rao and Puranam Subramanya Sarma  , the reputed editors  of Andhra Jyoti , the novelist  shows subtle humour arising out of cutural clash. Parvateesam reached London and was fortunate to have  a friend like Menen and later Raju to allay is fears in the beginning stage.  Menen familiarizes him with life in England taking him to otels. Picture houses and explaining intricacies of social behaviour. Raju helps Parvateesam a lot. When Parvateesam joins Barrister at law In Edinburgh university, Raju helps  him find a residence, familiarizes the apt  behaviour , takes him to  picture houses  and familiarizes him with games like golf. Parvateesam soon learns things quickly , becomes a good player of golf and earns name whne he recites Telugu poems in the presence of  Anant  Kumara swamy . Duggirala Gopala Krishnaiah, later a veteran freedom movement leader appreciates him a lot .  Parvateesam’s experiences in his rented house with his land lady and her two daughters as a good soul. He puts up with their pranks and takes them to see plays .  his love with a  Scottish girl shows him as a young man given to emotions but prudent enough not to cause nay suffering to his family. He realises his limitations and bids her farewell with much anguish. While on return journey, he and other passengers pass through a perilous journey due to the world war going on at the time.  In the part we find Parvateesam growing into a man of good manners. Knowledge, responsibility and unblemished  moral sense. Humour comes out in misunderstanding new cultural norms . Two examples are that Paravateesam when invited to a party feels shy to ask for washroom in host’s house and urinates at the street cornet and even discloses it thoughtlessly. He also takes to task one new comer from India who goes to an evening  party in the morning itself and wants to stay there even in the night without bothering about inconvenience to his hosts.                   

In part three, we find Parvateesam’s return to his native place, the innocent questions by the curious villagers about his life and education there . It is like the coming back of Ulysses. Here the novelist describes the foreign returnee’s reflections, loneliness , agreeing for  arranged marriage thanks to the trick by his friend and well wisher Raju . The protagonist enjoys reunion with his parents , their love and affection and initial reluctance to tie the knot and final succumbing to tradition. The story is told in a style of subtle humour. Paravteesam goes to Madras and meets eminent lawyers such as Narayana Murty and Tanguturi  Prakasam( the real character in Andhra history) and becomes a practising  lawyer in high court . He also gets his wife Saraswati educated .He gains name in a short span  but both of them  he slowly gets attracted to nationalist movement, meet stalwart leaders like Duggirala Gopalakrishnaiah   at the cost of his practice and economic status. He relates many humorous anecdotes in lawyering.  He gets very active in nationalist movement  , finds the increasing suppression of the people in movement by the  British , gets disillusioned by lack of ethics in lawyering  practice and undergoes  even jail term in the cause of freedom movement. At last he goes back to his native place, refuses his father-in-law’s advice to carry on his practice and decides to listen to his father who wants to take care of their agricultural lands. We find a sort of parallel between this part and Kodavatiganti Kutumbarao’s ‘Chaduvu’ . The difference is that Sundaram’s saga has completely happened in India where as Parvateesam is a foreign returnee. But both of them have got influenced by traditional mores and also  national movement . Their education has not turned them into careerists but as people who responded to the call of the nation.  

The novel has a few things which are  more  politically incorrect  these days. His reference to nonvegetarian food as ‘malakoodu’ and depicting the reaction of the other  customers at   his entry  in a  hotel ‘as if they saw an untouchable amidst brahmin meal’ in the first part. But this only reflects the bias of the novelist  prevailing at the time  and even now casteism has not been eradicated completely from  our social system. The travails of Parvateesam are reflection of conflicts faced by the    middle class and upper caste  Indian youth  caught in the cultural conflict between the East and the West a century ago.