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A Handful of Rice
A compulsively readable story of struggle for survival in a large modern city and how it demeans human life. Ravi, son of a peasant, joins in the general exodus to the city, and, floating through the indifferent streets, lands into the underworld of petty criminals. He falls in love with pretty Nalini, and marries her against all odds. She tries to change his way of life, but fate conspires against him... and the story moves to a memorable climax.
297 pages, Hardcover
First published June 1, 1966
19 people are currently reading
451 people want to read
About the author
Kamala Markandaya
19 books113 followersPseudonym used by Kamala Purnaiya Taylor, an Indian novelist and journalist. A native of Mysore, India, Markandaya was a graduate of Madras University, and afterward published several short stories in Indian newspapers. After India declared its independence, Markandaya moved to Britain, though she still labeled herself an Indian expatriate long afterward.
Known for writing about culture clash between Indian urban and rural societies, Markandaya's first published novel, Nectar in a Sieve, was a bestseller and cited as an American Library Association Notable Book in 1955. Other novels include Some Inner Fury (1955), A Silence of Desire (1960), Possession (1963), A Handful of Rice (1966), The Nowhere Man (1972), Two Virgins (1973), The Golden Honeycomb (1977), and Pleasure City (1982/1983).
Kamala Markandaya belonged to that pioneering group of Indian women writers who made their mark not just through their subject matter, but also through their fluid, polished literary style. Nectar in a Sieve was her first published work, and its depiction of rural India and the suffering of farmers made it popular in the West. This was followed by other fiction that dramatized the Quit India movement in 1942, the clash between East and West and the tragedy that resulted from it, or the problems facing ordinary middle-class Indians—making a living, finding inner peace, coping with modern technology and its effects on the poor.
Known for writing about culture clash between Indian urban and rural societies, Markandaya's first published novel, Nectar in a Sieve, was a bestseller and cited as an American Library Association Notable Book in 1955. Other novels include Some Inner Fury (1955), A Silence of Desire (1960), Possession (1963), A Handful of Rice (1966), The Nowhere Man (1972), Two Virgins (1973), The Golden Honeycomb (1977), and Pleasure City (1982/1983).
Kamala Markandaya belonged to that pioneering group of Indian women writers who made their mark not just through their subject matter, but also through their fluid, polished literary style. Nectar in a Sieve was her first published work, and its depiction of rural India and the suffering of farmers made it popular in the West. This was followed by other fiction that dramatized the Quit India movement in 1942, the clash between East and West and the tragedy that resulted from it, or the problems facing ordinary middle-class Indians—making a living, finding inner peace, coping with modern technology and its effects on the poor.
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Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews
February 27, 2025
If you are familiar with Ms. Markandaya's work, Nectar in a Sieve, you will not expect a happy story, even if the title doesn't already assure us this will be about a struggle for survival.
There are moments in the novel when we hope against hope for our protagonist, Ravi, son of a peasant, who has joined the exodus to the city and made a breakthrough up from the depths of poverty. He has married the beautiful and kind, Nalini, whom he loves, is welcomed into her family and begins learning the family business of tailor. But Ravi's youthful desires for more and frustration with the unfairness of the system which favors the upper classes sour his appreciation for what he has gained. Then when things happen which threaten his fragile situation, these undercurrents of dissatisfaction come to the fore. All the while in the background, there is the street gang which first took him in when he arrived in the city. These men make so much more and with so little effort. If only he weren't honest and upright, what he could have....!
Early on, I thought I knew where this story was going, but the author surprised me, and I love when that happens. Not what I anticipated, but still deeply tragic and powerful (with brief violence). Markandaya creates characters and situations impossible to forget. I only wish her books were more readily available.
There are moments in the novel when we hope against hope for our protagonist, Ravi, son of a peasant, who has joined the exodus to the city and made a breakthrough up from the depths of poverty. He has married the beautiful and kind, Nalini, whom he loves, is welcomed into her family and begins learning the family business of tailor. But Ravi's youthful desires for more and frustration with the unfairness of the system which favors the upper classes sour his appreciation for what he has gained. Then when things happen which threaten his fragile situation, these undercurrents of dissatisfaction come to the fore. All the while in the background, there is the street gang which first took him in when he arrived in the city. These men make so much more and with so little effort. If only he weren't honest and upright, what he could have....!
Early on, I thought I knew where this story was going, but the author surprised me, and I love when that happens. Not what I anticipated, but still deeply tragic and powerful (with brief violence). Markandaya creates characters and situations impossible to forget. I only wish her books were more readily available.
August 2, 2022
Somewhat atypical to Markandaya, in this novel, not a woman, but a man occupies the central position, and the narration is carried on by the omniscient novelist.
The foremost premises of this novel are urban scarcity, the emigration from the village to the city, and the dissolution of the rural lifestyle under the brunt of largescale industry.
Ravi, the protangoist of the novel, is the son of a meager peasant. He is exhausted of starvation. To get away from poverty and hunger he joins the general exodus to the city and journeys to Madras. He is disenchanted, and joins the group of paltry criminals.
Damodar instigates him in the mysteries of urban survival. Thus he becomes an element of the underworld of smugglers and bootleggers. Still he is penniless and drowns his cares and anxieties in drinking.
One day he penetrates the house of Apu, an aged tailor, and slumbers there by intimidating, him and his wife Jayamma. In the morning he finds himself tied hand and foot. Jayamma beats him black and blue. However, their humanity makes them take empathy on him. He admits that the previous night he was starving and that is why he was drunk. Jayamma feeds him and lets him go. The tailor has got a spinster daughter named Nalini. Ravi falls in love with Nalini, and decides to depart his criminal line of business.
The storyline carries on……..
The character of Nalini is gracefully drawn. She is the kind that can convert even as wayward a companion as Ravi. Criminal he may be, but he doesn't cease to be a convincing human being, always more sinned against than sinning.
Ravi is not so very dissimilar to us. His predicaments, his family, his contemplations and expectations are not very divergent from ours.
It is the gauge of Markandaya's success that she has given her novel this deft stroke of universality.
The foremost premises of this novel are urban scarcity, the emigration from the village to the city, and the dissolution of the rural lifestyle under the brunt of largescale industry.
Ravi, the protangoist of the novel, is the son of a meager peasant. He is exhausted of starvation. To get away from poverty and hunger he joins the general exodus to the city and journeys to Madras. He is disenchanted, and joins the group of paltry criminals.
Damodar instigates him in the mysteries of urban survival. Thus he becomes an element of the underworld of smugglers and bootleggers. Still he is penniless and drowns his cares and anxieties in drinking.
One day he penetrates the house of Apu, an aged tailor, and slumbers there by intimidating, him and his wife Jayamma. In the morning he finds himself tied hand and foot. Jayamma beats him black and blue. However, their humanity makes them take empathy on him. He admits that the previous night he was starving and that is why he was drunk. Jayamma feeds him and lets him go. The tailor has got a spinster daughter named Nalini. Ravi falls in love with Nalini, and decides to depart his criminal line of business.
The storyline carries on……..
The character of Nalini is gracefully drawn. She is the kind that can convert even as wayward a companion as Ravi. Criminal he may be, but he doesn't cease to be a convincing human being, always more sinned against than sinning.
Ravi is not so very dissimilar to us. His predicaments, his family, his contemplations and expectations are not very divergent from ours.
It is the gauge of Markandaya's success that she has given her novel this deft stroke of universality.
July 27, 2015
This is the first book I read by Markandaya. I was struck by its careful building of the world as experienced by the main character, a perpetually down-on-his-luck and somewhat shady common man. Overwhelmed by the world around him, he gets a chance to change his fate. True to life, he must continue to deal with the temptation to return to his old ways, but also feels compelled to go forward for the sake of those he has come to care about. The ending is a bit chaotic, but the story is well worth the read anyway.
October 5, 2007
This is an impressive story about an Indian family struggling to survive. Poverty, illness, analphabetism, work, family love are the topic of the book.
Read
April 17, 2012i want to download it
October 19, 2012
Certainly makes absorbing and enjoyable reading, the author has captured the mores, the lingo obtaining in the streets and by lanes of India.
May 27, 2013
A normal low class family's story set in the 80s.
October 27, 2019
This is a character-driven book about a man - Ravi - raised in poverty who falls in love with a respectable girl, daughter of a tailor. Before meeting her, Ravi is a petty crook working for a man named Damodar. Ravi leaves the criminal life and courts Ravi until he finally wins over her parents. After marriage, they live in a tiny room in her parents' house along with her sister & her husband, and 2 other people the father seems to pity. Ravi is deeply in love and happy at first with big plans for buying things and making their life better.
But then children come along and Ravi begins to feel the pressure of living on the edge of poverty - he has enough to eat, a roof over his head, but he cannot save and he becomes anxious. When his father-in-law dies, Ravi has to take over the tailoring business and he begins to lose customers and he gets into debt.
Ravi is not a very likable man - he is self-centered and driven by desire for money for his wife, etc. But when his desires are not fulfilled he clearly has no inner strength and he becomes violent or drunk and considers returning to crime.
The author captures all the psychological conflict and despair very well without being overly dramatic or graphic. And the reader feels the sadness of what happens in a marriage in which money is a constant worry.
But then children come along and Ravi begins to feel the pressure of living on the edge of poverty - he has enough to eat, a roof over his head, but he cannot save and he becomes anxious. When his father-in-law dies, Ravi has to take over the tailoring business and he begins to lose customers and he gets into debt.
Ravi is not a very likable man - he is self-centered and driven by desire for money for his wife, etc. But when his desires are not fulfilled he clearly has no inner strength and he becomes violent or drunk and considers returning to crime.
The author captures all the psychological conflict and despair very well without being overly dramatic or graphic. And the reader feels the sadness of what happens in a marriage in which money is a constant worry.
August 20, 2018
!????!??!?!??!!
Weird read. It started off well I guess -? And then just got too dreary. Dreary or realistic -? Can't say. Our protagonist doesn't seem to be a guy to root for - but the author does do a good job or making you empathize with him. On the whole, a weird read. Why did colleges prescribe these books even-?
Weird read. It started off well I guess -? And then just got too dreary. Dreary or realistic -? Can't say. Our protagonist doesn't seem to be a guy to root for - but the author does do a good job or making you empathize with him. On the whole, a weird read. Why did colleges prescribe these books even-?
June 3, 2020
Read in high school.
Read
May 2, 2021So well crafted to arouse in the reader that dull pain that one feels when reading about destitution and hopelessness.
April 12, 2015
Culture clash, convent education, desire for a fair wife. How often are these stories narrated. This one however goes down to the heart of it. Kamala has a tendency of getting to have each of the characters to be as gut wrenching as possible, makes this book intense. Picturing erstwhile Madras - flower decked women, temples, sweat permeating the air, all of course in the bylanes and sewers.
If you have a book which needs re-reading every few years, I'd have this on my list. Makes for thoughtful reading. Wouldnt throw this in when you want to head out on a holiday, lest you start researching the context of it.
If you have a book which needs re-reading every few years, I'd have this on my list. Makes for thoughtful reading. Wouldnt throw this in when you want to head out on a holiday, lest you start researching the context of it.
February 8, 2018
3,5 Sterne
Das Buch stellt die Missstände Indiens und das tägliche (Über)Leben gut dar. Allerdings kann es nicht mit Das Gleichgewicht der Welt mithalten, welches ich vorher gelesen hatte. Daher auch meine etwas schwächere Bewertung. Für sich allein gesehen, hat das Buch durchaus vier oder auch mehr Sterne verdient.
Als Ergänzung oder Einstieg in die indische Literatur eignet sich Eine Handvoll Reis sehr gut. Jedoch würde ich jedem der gerne ausführliche Bücher mit unterschiedlichen Charakteren und Lebenswegen liest Das Gleichgewicht der Welt empfehlen.
Das Buch stellt die Missstände Indiens und das tägliche (Über)Leben gut dar. Allerdings kann es nicht mit Das Gleichgewicht der Welt mithalten, welches ich vorher gelesen hatte. Daher auch meine etwas schwächere Bewertung. Für sich allein gesehen, hat das Buch durchaus vier oder auch mehr Sterne verdient.
Als Ergänzung oder Einstieg in die indische Literatur eignet sich Eine Handvoll Reis sehr gut. Jedoch würde ich jedem der gerne ausführliche Bücher mit unterschiedlichen Charakteren und Lebenswegen liest Das Gleichgewicht der Welt empfehlen.
May 5, 2011
A must read
Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews