The writer and his wife and other stories

by Rabindranath Maharaj

Maharaj's characters struggle heroically, though sometimes comically and oddly, to make their mark on the earth. It is as if the more frustrating their outward circumstances, the more intense their inner lives. Bashir Ali, the librarian, has developed an intimate relationship with his books, and a passionate hatred of their borrowers. 'Bhaji and rice! You put bhaji and rice on top of Virginia!' Hoobnath Hingoo, the metalwork technician, imagines a dire fate for the arrogant young engineers who lord it around the oil refinery. 'Barbecue the whole side of them. Grill them nice and black. Afterwards we could have a sale. Grill engineers. Going cheap. Eat as much as you like...' And of course there is Roop, the writer, who wants to escape from his gas station 'to write that book... about everything I ever thought of since I born.'

180 pages, Paperback

First published August 1, 1996

About the author

Rabindranath Maharaj was born in the fifties in South Trinidad. He received a B.A., M.A. and Diploma in Education from the University of the West Indies, Saint Augustine. In Trinidad he worked as a teacher and as a columnist for the Trinidad Guardian. In the early 1990s Maharaj moved to Canada and in 1993 he completed a second M.A. at the University of New Brunswick. Since 1994 he has been living in Ajax, Ontario and teaching high school there.Maharaj is now well recognized in Canada for his published fiction and short stories, which tend to deal with everyday situations that challenge and stimulate the lives of men and women from Indo-Caribbean communities in Canada and in Trinidad.
Both the Toronto Globe and Mail and the Toronto Star recognized his literary worth when his book, The Lagahoo’s Apprentice, was published. A previous novel, Homer in Flight, had been nominated for the Chapters/Books in Canada First Novel Award.
Two collections of short stories, The Book of Ifs and Buts and The Interloper were nominated for a Regional Commonwealth Prize for Best First Book.
His most recent novel A Perfect Pledge, published in 2005, seems to engage some of the issues and themes that Vidia Naipaul, who was also born in Trinidad, tackled in his earlier novels. Maharaj’s approach, however, is less scathing and dismissive. Although he obviously sees the shortcomings and inadequacies of life in this “now for now” immigrant society of Trinidad, he treats his characters with greater sympathy and with humane understanding.
Rabindranath Maharaj is also one of the founding editors of Lichen a literary magazine that in his own words: “ferrets out new voices, throws the spotlight on recognized ones, and adds to the broth a distinct flavour: a mix of city and country, of tradition and innovation.”