The Bus Stopped

by Tabish Khair

A very angry bus driver, abandoned by his wife and going nowhere in his career; a sanctimonious conductor; a nervous, half-Indian businessman clutching a briefcase full of cash; a right-wing Hindu matriarch; a young boy returning to his village after robbing his employer. They all meet—and witness a tragic event—only because they are all travelling on the same bus, in the same direction, on the same day. With exceptional poise and beguiling simplicity, Khair introduces a range of voices, thoughts, ideas and identities, allowing each individual's story to unfold gradually.

Genres: Novels, Indian Literature

200 pages, Paperback

First published April 1, 2004

About the author

Tabish Khair was born and educated in Bihar, India. He worked in Delhi as a Staff Reporter until his late twenties and is now a professor at Aarhus University, Denmark. Winner of the All India Poetry Prize, his novels have been shortlisted for the Man Asian Literary Prize (Hong Kong), the Hindu Best Fiction Prize and the Crossword Vodafone Literature Awards (India), the Encore Award (UK) and for translation prizes in Denmark and France.

Reviews

[Manav · Rating 3 out of 5]

And time stands still....should aptly have been the title of the book. Yet again another novel in English by an Indian writer (though this one is settled in Netherlands) which is rich in painting a lyrical picture of small town India and its inhabitants. And like a painting, the visualisation of static imagery appeals to the literary senses of the reader but that's where the bonding between the book and reader stops. The characters have been developed but they haven't got any motive and without any motive the story lacks motion. There are many separate stories and each one has its own muses and wanderings like the brownian motion - each one moving a bit but within the confines of its fate and habits. And once you understand the confines of the space, the novelty of the character wears off. Fortunately, the writer does realize where his literary skills start slackening and adeptly moves on to weave the next strand of the story.

And like a woven rope, the novel appears the same all across the length. And like a woven rope, the novel has frayed edges in the beginning and the end. And like a woven rope, the strands keep alternating on the surface. And like a woven rope, there are twists and turns in each strand but alas it is still static.

[Debarun · Rating 4 out of 5]

He has the voice. The voice. The voice that's important, and strangely like a person whom you have known for a long time, maybe that's just because he is an Indian. Who cares?! The book works. It does. Maybe it worked for me cuz I read it on a long train ride and well, I want to read more of Khair. He has a voice strangely similar to Adiga but better in some ways.

[Preetam Chatterjee · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Bus Stopped unfurls the account of a bus journey without following an immaculate story line. The storyline is bedecked with more than one tale, yet there is almost no fixed silhouette given to many of them.

A teeming embroidery of scenic frames is laid out in front of the reader, awash with sarcasm, pure hilarity, and at times sardonic tones. The stories give an impression of a tumbling, uneven movement, as monographs shadow one another in wheezing stride.

In the back-and-forth movement of this book's structure we are taken to Patna's urban colony, in the high rise apartment of Mrs Sharma and Mrs Prasad. Mrs Sharma's three daughters work hard for getting through the harsh exam for Civil Service. Mrs Prasad has a help named Chhotu who is later on seen to be moving in the same bus, furtively holding a lavish Benarasi Sari to his chest, avoiding others' scrutiny.

Later on we learn that the police are on the stalk for him, for it is rumoured that he is absconding, after committing the murder of Mrs Prasad….

The opening chapter depicts the battered condition in which the driver of the bus lives and billows about it everlastingly.

The next chapter slides back in time to tell us about another decrepit set of circumstances that turned a happy child into a eunuch with a Muslim female forename, Farhana.

Residing in the rock layer of commonplace human existence, he qualms that even the status of eunuch has become deteriorated merely into iconic filth of the earth.

In this book, one can find in an almost mosaic-like design, touches of Charles Dickens, Arundhati Roy and Salman Rushdie.

Brilliant!! Most recommended.

[Sister Boom · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a book for people watchers. It pulls fragments of people's lives together as they travel randomly on the same bus. There were many small nuances I lay in bed thinking about after like that between the "pious" or self-proclaimed "religious" character and the more crude "sinner" who gave the charity most willingly..these little asides make the story.

[Baljit · Rating 3 out of 5]

It is written from many different perspectives although the story line is v simple: a bus journey. All the different characters with their own baggage- literally and figuratively.
The language is simple yet descriptive and eloquent. It's an easy read, and thought provoking

[Nishtha · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed reading it♥️ loved the way of telling the story from various perspectives

[Saint No Stopping Us · Rating 1 out of 5]

Three out of ten.

Bizarre stories about a group of people on a bus travelling through India. No real story or plot and tenous links between the different characters.

[Keerthi · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a ride.

[Jayaprakash Satyamurthy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked this a lot. The emphasis is on perspectives and characters rather than plot, although the characters are sort of grouped around a bus journey from Patna to Phansa. Khair shows us the whole tapestry of Indian society, from the wealthy business class to indigent tribals. No one point of view is necessarily privileged although the author does confront the fact that maybe there is only so far he can take us into the lives of those from different walks of life from his own. We see the effects of inequality and how divides of caste, religion, class and race impact lives. Nothing is soft-pedaled, but neither does Khair reach for easy binaries. Very lyrical and intricately structured with its shifting perspectives and voices, a portrait of a specific time and place in India but also something that touches on universal human experiences. What I didn't like was a certain unsubtlety in some of the musings that are in the voice closest to the author's, some things that could have been left unsaid or left more ambiguous.

[Rob · Rating 3 out of 5]

After reading the first 40 or 50 pages of "The Bus Stopped" I was not sure I would like it especially with the introduction of a number of characters so quickly. I thought the book to be confusing.

However, the author Tabish Khair pulls all these seemingly disconnect threads into a tapestry of life that I won't soon forget.

I finished reading the book with the thought to reread it after the first of the new year as I will have returned from a trip to India which will include some bus trips as well.

[Venkat · Rating 4 out of 5]

A well crafted book with interwoven Vignettes of several lives. Only thorn is it is slightly(hinting) condescending in its nature.

[Cynthia]

Beautiful ... what is home? it was a little choppy at parts - not sure who was narrating - but it all comes together

[Alka · Rating 3 out of 5]

it is a multi-threaded account of life in small towns of Eastern India...truthfully depicted...but i was kind of missing a story line