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Willie Chandran #2
Magic Seeds
Willie Chandran is a man who has allowed one identity after another to be thrust upon him. In his early forties, after a peripatetic life, he succumbs to the encouragement of his sister – and his own listlessness – and joins an underground movement in India. But years of revolutionary campaigns and then prison convince him that the revolution ‘had nothing to do with what we were fighting for’, and he feels himself further than ever ‘from his own history’.
When he returns to Britain where, thirty years before, his wanderings began, Willie encounters a country that has turned its back on its past and, like him, has become detached from its own history. He endures the indignities of a culture dissipated by reform and compromise until, in a moment of grotesque revelation – a tour de force of parodic savagery from our most visionary of writers – Willie comes to an understanding that might finally allow him to release his true self.
This book is the second volume of Half A Life, but can be read alone.
When he returns to Britain where, thirty years before, his wanderings began, Willie encounters a country that has turned its back on its past and, like him, has become detached from its own history. He endures the indignities of a culture dissipated by reform and compromise until, in a moment of grotesque revelation – a tour de force of parodic savagery from our most visionary of writers – Willie comes to an understanding that might finally allow him to release his true self.
This book is the second volume of Half A Life, but can be read alone.
288 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2004
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930 people want to read
About the author
V.S. Naipaul
190 books1,787 followersV. S. Naipaul was a British writer of Indo-Trinidadian descent known for his sharp, often controversial explorations of postcolonial societies, identity, and displacement. His works, which include both fiction and nonfiction, often depict themes of exile, cultural alienation, and the lingering effects of colonialism.
He gained early recognition with A House for Mr Biswas, a novel inspired by his father’s struggles in Trinidad. His later works, such as The Mimic Men, In a Free State, and A Bend in the River, cemented his reputation as a masterful and incisive writer. Beyond fiction, his travelogues and essays, including Among the Believers and India: A Million Mutinies Now, reflected his critical perspective on societies in transition.
Naipaul received numerous accolades throughout his career, including the Nobel Prize in Literature, awarded for his ability to blend deep observation with literary artistry. While praised for his prose, his often unsparing portrayals of postcolonial nations and controversial statements sparked both admiration and criticism.
He gained early recognition with A House for Mr Biswas, a novel inspired by his father’s struggles in Trinidad. His later works, such as The Mimic Men, In a Free State, and A Bend in the River, cemented his reputation as a masterful and incisive writer. Beyond fiction, his travelogues and essays, including Among the Believers and India: A Million Mutinies Now, reflected his critical perspective on societies in transition.
Naipaul received numerous accolades throughout his career, including the Nobel Prize in Literature, awarded for his ability to blend deep observation with literary artistry. While praised for his prose, his often unsparing portrayals of postcolonial nations and controversial statements sparked both admiration and criticism.
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May 4, 2025
“It is wrong to have an ideal view of the world.
That's where the mischief starts.”
- V S Naipaul, November 2005
************
Willie Chandron, now living in Berlin with his sister Sarojini and her German husband for six months, is confronted once again with what to do with himself after 18 years in Africa. Sarojini is politically active, and compares the worlds of order and desperation that are represented by West and East Germany. Born of an outcaste mother and a Brahmin father, Naipaul portrays her as intelligent and worldly, although given to a 1970’s retro regard for Lenin and Mao. Back in Mozambique, where he abandoned his life, the insurgency wipes out colonial towns and homes. He left Africa, not to escape the threat of war but out of boredom with his wife and her colonial friends, reaching Europe just in time.
Inspired by her conviction Willie goes back to India to search for Kondapalli, a revolutionary in Andhra Pradesh, who took part in the Telegana Rebellion in the late 40’s as Secretary of the Communist Party of India. After weeks in a provincial town with filthy hotels, bad food and slow moving trains, he is led through the forest to an insurgent camp. After his basic training he is sent on a mission with another man but given no instructions. They await money and plans and finally have to work to survive. It turns out Willie is with the wrong guerrilla group, a band of bloody killers, and begins to question the point of even being there. Once again he has put himself in the hands of others, but is learning self reliance.
A recruit betrays the movement and is summarily executed as the police close in. Willie’s letters with Sarojini have been read and his partner is arrested at the post office; he is next on the list. Naipaul creates a suspense that is often found in thrillers, but seldom in his books. Inexplicably Willie takes a train back to the guerrilla base, instead of to his home in Europe, as he contemplates the futility of the revolution. It seems he is trying to prove something to himself. The base is a village held by guerrillas in fatigues wearing a red star on their caps and guns slung over their backs. Ironically the landlords are replaced by paramilitary freeloaders living off their labor and indoctrinated with Maoist mumbo jumbo.
The villagers want the Marxist squad to kill people for them, while the squad wants the villagers to kill landlords. Some think shooting the villagers would solve both problems and desertion is widespread. Naipaul presents this in a satirical light but it’s not far from reality. Kondapalli, now a mental invalid, is arrested and a kidnapping of a Minister planned to even the score. Predictably the keystone comrades plans go awry. Willie allows himself to be ordered to kill a peasant in cold blood, duly facing a mental anguish, and resolves to escape the maniacs. He and the squad leader sneak away, surrender to the police and are promptly thrown in jail. Naipaul turns the book into a morality play and a warning.
Willie, by dint of his sister’s efforts and his previous book, escapes a ten year jail sentence and is sent to England on a special amnesty. Certain themes are reoccuring in Naipaul’s writing such as radical politics leading to extreme violence. His reporting on the Black Power movement and Michael X which led to murders in 1972 was fictionalized in his 1975 novel ‘Guerrillas’. Landing in London Willie is now over fifty with no prospects and having learned nothing. He is required to stay in the UK under the terms of his release. Staying with Roger, who had helped get him out of prison, he begins an affair with his wife, who is currently seeing a third man. This might as well be a page torn from Naipaul’s own life.
Late 1980’s London has changed since Willie left in the late 1950’s but class consciousness is still there, the streets crowded with immigrants from all over the former Empire. He gets a job writing for an architectural magazine owned by one of Roger’s rich friends. Attending architecture classes Willie feels he missed his calling; Naipaul had an interest in architecture. The friend Peter is a banker whose wife enjoys trysts with other men and Roger has a side romance too. Willie is glad that work extricates him from these sexual obligations and finds futility all around him. Predictably Naipaul’s writes pages of criticism for Muslim and Hindu faiths and a paen to the practical achievements of the West.
Roger is caught in a property acquisition scheme as Peter’s lawyer and may lose his house, blaming it on socialism, high taxes and loss of family values. He also talks about a friend from the Carribean who tried to breed the black out of his grandchildren’s skin with six different white women and varying success. Not speaking of politics before, Roger now goes on a Tory rant. I haven’t seen Naipaul in this light before and it’s not a good look. The last third of the book descends into a tawdry soap opera. He begins to date a friend of his father’s housekeeper. Rancor towards public housing and illegitimate children are deemed to be the collapse of civilization. The story ends with an interracial wedding and without any resolution to the futures of Roger or Willie.
This is an unusual example of Naipaul abandoning the fictionalized world he knew for a story probably gleaned from newspapers and politics, unless of course he led a secret life as a revolutionary. The closest example could be ‘Killings in Trinidad’, but that was a work of non-fiction. It’s not difficult to discern where Naipaul stands in his thoughts on socialism but Willie is more of a mysterious character, intelligent, sensitive and yet struggles in his life. Like Naipaul he is a Brahmin and also a published English university man. One wonders what he is doing in the forest with an AK-47. On the whole it’s not a bad book but Naipaul has done much better over the course of his 50 year career.
That's where the mischief starts.”
- V S Naipaul, November 2005
************
Willie Chandron, now living in Berlin with his sister Sarojini and her German husband for six months, is confronted once again with what to do with himself after 18 years in Africa. Sarojini is politically active, and compares the worlds of order and desperation that are represented by West and East Germany. Born of an outcaste mother and a Brahmin father, Naipaul portrays her as intelligent and worldly, although given to a 1970’s retro regard for Lenin and Mao. Back in Mozambique, where he abandoned his life, the insurgency wipes out colonial towns and homes. He left Africa, not to escape the threat of war but out of boredom with his wife and her colonial friends, reaching Europe just in time.
Inspired by her conviction Willie goes back to India to search for Kondapalli, a revolutionary in Andhra Pradesh, who took part in the Telegana Rebellion in the late 40’s as Secretary of the Communist Party of India. After weeks in a provincial town with filthy hotels, bad food and slow moving trains, he is led through the forest to an insurgent camp. After his basic training he is sent on a mission with another man but given no instructions. They await money and plans and finally have to work to survive. It turns out Willie is with the wrong guerrilla group, a band of bloody killers, and begins to question the point of even being there. Once again he has put himself in the hands of others, but is learning self reliance.
A recruit betrays the movement and is summarily executed as the police close in. Willie’s letters with Sarojini have been read and his partner is arrested at the post office; he is next on the list. Naipaul creates a suspense that is often found in thrillers, but seldom in his books. Inexplicably Willie takes a train back to the guerrilla base, instead of to his home in Europe, as he contemplates the futility of the revolution. It seems he is trying to prove something to himself. The base is a village held by guerrillas in fatigues wearing a red star on their caps and guns slung over their backs. Ironically the landlords are replaced by paramilitary freeloaders living off their labor and indoctrinated with Maoist mumbo jumbo.
The villagers want the Marxist squad to kill people for them, while the squad wants the villagers to kill landlords. Some think shooting the villagers would solve both problems and desertion is widespread. Naipaul presents this in a satirical light but it’s not far from reality. Kondapalli, now a mental invalid, is arrested and a kidnapping of a Minister planned to even the score. Predictably the keystone comrades plans go awry. Willie allows himself to be ordered to kill a peasant in cold blood, duly facing a mental anguish, and resolves to escape the maniacs. He and the squad leader sneak away, surrender to the police and are promptly thrown in jail. Naipaul turns the book into a morality play and a warning.
Willie, by dint of his sister’s efforts and his previous book, escapes a ten year jail sentence and is sent to England on a special amnesty. Certain themes are reoccuring in Naipaul’s writing such as radical politics leading to extreme violence. His reporting on the Black Power movement and Michael X which led to murders in 1972 was fictionalized in his 1975 novel ‘Guerrillas’. Landing in London Willie is now over fifty with no prospects and having learned nothing. He is required to stay in the UK under the terms of his release. Staying with Roger, who had helped get him out of prison, he begins an affair with his wife, who is currently seeing a third man. This might as well be a page torn from Naipaul’s own life.
Late 1980’s London has changed since Willie left in the late 1950’s but class consciousness is still there, the streets crowded with immigrants from all over the former Empire. He gets a job writing for an architectural magazine owned by one of Roger’s rich friends. Attending architecture classes Willie feels he missed his calling; Naipaul had an interest in architecture. The friend Peter is a banker whose wife enjoys trysts with other men and Roger has a side romance too. Willie is glad that work extricates him from these sexual obligations and finds futility all around him. Predictably Naipaul’s writes pages of criticism for Muslim and Hindu faiths and a paen to the practical achievements of the West.
Roger is caught in a property acquisition scheme as Peter’s lawyer and may lose his house, blaming it on socialism, high taxes and loss of family values. He also talks about a friend from the Carribean who tried to breed the black out of his grandchildren’s skin with six different white women and varying success. Not speaking of politics before, Roger now goes on a Tory rant. I haven’t seen Naipaul in this light before and it’s not a good look. The last third of the book descends into a tawdry soap opera. He begins to date a friend of his father’s housekeeper. Rancor towards public housing and illegitimate children are deemed to be the collapse of civilization. The story ends with an interracial wedding and without any resolution to the futures of Roger or Willie.
This is an unusual example of Naipaul abandoning the fictionalized world he knew for a story probably gleaned from newspapers and politics, unless of course he led a secret life as a revolutionary. The closest example could be ‘Killings in Trinidad’, but that was a work of non-fiction. It’s not difficult to discern where Naipaul stands in his thoughts on socialism but Willie is more of a mysterious character, intelligent, sensitive and yet struggles in his life. Like Naipaul he is a Brahmin and also a published English university man. One wonders what he is doing in the forest with an AK-47. On the whole it’s not a bad book but Naipaul has done much better over the course of his 50 year career.
June 30, 2024
مرة أخرى رحلة البحث عن الذات مع ويلي تشاندران؛ وأدب ما بعد الاستعمار وهو تخصص نايپول صاحب نوبل 2001، ومثير الجدل على الدوام من آراء وأسلوبه الأدبي ذو المرارة والحنق وهل هو أدبي أم صحافي؟
كنت قد قرأت الجزء الأول من هذه الرواية "نصف حياة" منذ ستة أشهر؛ وتدور في بريطانيا وأفريقيا، وهأنذا أكمل الجزء الثاني "بذور سحرية" وهو جزء مكمل لرحلة ويلي تشاندران مع عودته للهند. من اسمه الشخصي نفسه؛ نستطيع أن نرى الانقسام والازدواجية اسم أول إنجليزي وإسم عائلي هندي.
"كان لدي أسباب كثيرة للشعور بالخزي، سواء في الهند أو لندن أو أفريقيا؛ وهي ما تزال حية حتى بعد عشرين عامًا. لا أظن أنها ستموت أبدًا؛ لن تزول إلا بزوالي أنا".
وهنا بالطبع نرى النموذج الهندي لأدب ما بعد الاستعمار؛ وذلك لأن نايپول بريطاني من أصول هندية وجاء من ترينيداد في البحر الكاريبي؛ حيث كان الاستعمار البريطاني ودوره في تشويه الشعوب المستعمرة وتحويلها لمسوخ بشرية تحاول تقليد المستعمر؛ ولكن تفشل بصورة فجة لأنها بعيدة كل البعد عن طبيعة بلادهم الأصلية.
نشعر ونحن نقرأ أدب نايپول إحساسه الدائم بالمرارة والكوميديا السوداء في سرده في معظم أعماله؛ وكنت قد قرأت له عدة أعمال أخرى وأعجبني أسلوبه الشبيه بصنع الله إبراهيم الصحفي أكثر منه أدبي؛ الملئ بالمرارة والقسوة والحقد ونقد المجتمع المحيط.
ويلي تشاندران هنا الهندي المنبهر بالمستعمر، وشعوره المستمر بالنقص والانبهار وهو ما يميز السرد العام هنا، وانطباع نفسي من الكاتب ومادته الكتابية في معظم أعماله.
"في هذا العالم الخالي من الحرب والخطر الحقيقي أصبح البشر بسطاء، يراقبون التلفزيون فيجدونه صورة عن مجتمعاتهم؛ يأكلون ويشربون أطعمة صادقت عليها الحكومة؛ وهم يحصون أموالهم. أما في ذلك العالم الآخر فالبشر أكثر إحباطًا؛ فاقدًا الأمل في دخولهم إلى العالم المرتب والمبسط".
تتفق أم تختلف مع الكاتب، ولكن أسلوبه وكتابته باذخة، استخدامه للكلمات رائعة، متمكن من عمله بطريقة فذة وخبرة حياتية فائقة.
نرى هنا ويلي تشاندران بعد قضاء سنوات في انجلترا ومستعمرة برتغالية في أفريقيا، يرجع مرة أخرى للهند وينضم لرجال حرب العصابات في زمن تحرير الشعوب، ليس حبًا منه في الثورة، ولكن كنوع من دفن ذاته الاستعمارية مع فقراء الهند.
نلاحظ هنا في كتابة نايپول أنه انجليزي أكثر من الإنجليز أنفسهم، من قسوة على شعوب العالم الثالث، ويضع بطل الرواية وأبناء المستعمرات في مشاهد وأوصاف تصف فشلهم وحركاتهم التحررية الفاشلة.
وفي النهاية نرى ويلي تشاندران يقول لوصف شعوره العام "إنه الأمر الوحيد الذي عملت عليه طوال حياتي، ليس لأن أكون في دياري حيثما وجدت، بل لأبدو وكأنني في دياري".
كنت قد قرأت الجزء الأول من هذه الرواية "نصف حياة" منذ ستة أشهر؛ وتدور في بريطانيا وأفريقيا، وهأنذا أكمل الجزء الثاني "بذور سحرية" وهو جزء مكمل لرحلة ويلي تشاندران مع عودته للهند. من اسمه الشخصي نفسه؛ نستطيع أن نرى الانقسام والازدواجية اسم أول إنجليزي وإسم عائلي هندي.
"كان لدي أسباب كثيرة للشعور بالخزي، سواء في الهند أو لندن أو أفريقيا؛ وهي ما تزال حية حتى بعد عشرين عامًا. لا أظن أنها ستموت أبدًا؛ لن تزول إلا بزوالي أنا".
وهنا بالطبع نرى النموذج الهندي لأدب ما بعد الاستعمار؛ وذلك لأن نايپول بريطاني من أصول هندية وجاء من ترينيداد في البحر الكاريبي؛ حيث كان الاستعمار البريطاني ودوره في تشويه الشعوب المستعمرة وتحويلها لمسوخ بشرية تحاول تقليد المستعمر؛ ولكن تفشل بصورة فجة لأنها بعيدة كل البعد عن طبيعة بلادهم الأصلية.
نشعر ونحن نقرأ أدب نايپول إحساسه الدائم بالمرارة والكوميديا السوداء في سرده في معظم أعماله؛ وكنت قد قرأت له عدة أعمال أخرى وأعجبني أسلوبه الشبيه بصنع الله إبراهيم الصحفي أكثر منه أدبي؛ الملئ بالمرارة والقسوة والحقد ونقد المجتمع المحيط.
ويلي تشاندران هنا الهندي المنبهر بالمستعمر، وشعوره المستمر بالنقص والانبهار وهو ما يميز السرد العام هنا، وانطباع نفسي من الكاتب ومادته الكتابية في معظم أعماله.
"في هذا العالم الخالي من الحرب والخطر الحقيقي أصبح البشر بسطاء، يراقبون التلفزيون فيجدونه صورة عن مجتمعاتهم؛ يأكلون ويشربون أطعمة صادقت عليها الحكومة؛ وهم يحصون أموالهم. أما في ذلك العالم الآخر فالبشر أكثر إحباطًا؛ فاقدًا الأمل في دخولهم إلى العالم المرتب والمبسط".
تتفق أم تختلف مع الكاتب، ولكن أسلوبه وكتابته باذخة، استخدامه للكلمات رائعة، متمكن من عمله بطريقة فذة وخبرة حياتية فائقة.
نرى هنا ويلي تشاندران بعد قضاء سنوات في انجلترا ومستعمرة برتغالية في أفريقيا، يرجع مرة أخرى للهند وينضم لرجال حرب العصابات في زمن تحرير الشعوب، ليس حبًا منه في الثورة، ولكن كنوع من دفن ذاته الاستعمارية مع فقراء الهند.
نلاحظ هنا في كتابة نايپول أنه انجليزي أكثر من الإنجليز أنفسهم، من قسوة على شعوب العالم الثالث، ويضع بطل الرواية وأبناء المستعمرات في مشاهد وأوصاف تصف فشلهم وحركاتهم التحررية الفاشلة.
وفي النهاية نرى ويلي تشاندران يقول لوصف شعوره العام "إنه الأمر الوحيد الذي عملت عليه طوال حياتي، ليس لأن أكون في دياري حيثما وجدت، بل لأبدو وكأنني في دياري".
April 13, 2025
Magic Seeds is the second part of Naipaul’s 2001 novel, Half a Life. Published three years after the first novel, Magic Seeds is about the adventures of Willie Chandran as he continues on his journey to achieve masculinity and feel like a complete man. Willie had left his wife Ana in Africa at the end of Half a Life after telling her that he was sick of living somebody else’s life.
Urged on by his sister Sarojini with whom he spends a few months in safe and protected Berlin, Willie is attracted to a peasant uprising, somewhere in Andhra Pradesh. A reading of Gandhi’s autobiography in a library convinces Willie that he must go to India and be a part of the movement. The thought of going back to India, which he had left as a young man in Half A Life, initially fills Willie with a feeling of pride. He feels that he might finally achieve the grace and fulfilment of the secure people he had come across during his time in London and Africa. But this feeling of pride turns into panic when he reaches the airport lounge where Indian passengers are waiting. The ways of the Indian passengers makes Willie feel like he is going back to a life and a country which he thought he was done with. Willie longs to be back in a luxurious Berlin restaurant. Naipaul seems to suggest that like he had done throughout his life, Willie decides to go to India on an impulse. It is Willie’s way of drifting through his life jumping from one accident into another. Salim, the main character in Naipaul’s A Bend in the River, who leaves his family and moves to another part of Africa to become a successful businessman only to be faced by fear and insecurity due to the violence of Africa, came to mind while reading Magic Seeds.
After joining the guerrilla movement, Willie slips into anomie. He realizes that his fellow guerrillas are cold-blooded killers. He makes a deduction that lack of sexual fulfilment could be the driving force behind many of the men joining the movement. During this time, Willie commits a murder and also witnesses the murder of a few policemen. Bewildered and unhappy, Willie desperately tries to contact his sister to inform her that joining the movement was a grave mistake. And a letter from Sarojini informs him that she has left her life in Berlin as a left-wing revolutionary and joined their father’s ashram. Willie feels that the guerrilla movement is something that is imposed upon the peasants and that he has no way of truly knowing what exactly the peasants want from their lives.
Willie is soon arrested by the police but seems to lack any kind of perspective or remorse regarding the violent acts committed by him and his comrades. However, a book he had written during his youth in London, now considered a masterpiece of post colonial literature helps Willie gain asylum in Britain. Willie feels that he might finally live some of the simple peaceful life that he had longed for in Britain. But an unfulfilling affair with his friend Roger’s wife and a changing Britain characterized by aggressive immigrants and a slothful British working class leaves Willie as unhappy as ever.
The idea of people drifting through life by jumping from one accident to another as if there are magic seeds which would give them fulfilment is one of the main themes of this novel. It is one of the bleakest novels Naipaul has ever written. The vicious humour in Willie and Sarojini’s letters as they stumble and waver from one ideology to another is Naipaul at his cynical best. Magic Seeds is a great last novel from the man whom Christopher Hitchens described as “seemingly unassailable”. Here, Naipaul is unassailable in that he is unwilling to offer any kind of respite or consolation to the characters in this searing account of the life of a wounded man from a wounded civilization.
Urged on by his sister Sarojini with whom he spends a few months in safe and protected Berlin, Willie is attracted to a peasant uprising, somewhere in Andhra Pradesh. A reading of Gandhi’s autobiography in a library convinces Willie that he must go to India and be a part of the movement. The thought of going back to India, which he had left as a young man in Half A Life, initially fills Willie with a feeling of pride. He feels that he might finally achieve the grace and fulfilment of the secure people he had come across during his time in London and Africa. But this feeling of pride turns into panic when he reaches the airport lounge where Indian passengers are waiting. The ways of the Indian passengers makes Willie feel like he is going back to a life and a country which he thought he was done with. Willie longs to be back in a luxurious Berlin restaurant. Naipaul seems to suggest that like he had done throughout his life, Willie decides to go to India on an impulse. It is Willie’s way of drifting through his life jumping from one accident into another. Salim, the main character in Naipaul’s A Bend in the River, who leaves his family and moves to another part of Africa to become a successful businessman only to be faced by fear and insecurity due to the violence of Africa, came to mind while reading Magic Seeds.
After joining the guerrilla movement, Willie slips into anomie. He realizes that his fellow guerrillas are cold-blooded killers. He makes a deduction that lack of sexual fulfilment could be the driving force behind many of the men joining the movement. During this time, Willie commits a murder and also witnesses the murder of a few policemen. Bewildered and unhappy, Willie desperately tries to contact his sister to inform her that joining the movement was a grave mistake. And a letter from Sarojini informs him that she has left her life in Berlin as a left-wing revolutionary and joined their father’s ashram. Willie feels that the guerrilla movement is something that is imposed upon the peasants and that he has no way of truly knowing what exactly the peasants want from their lives.
Willie is soon arrested by the police but seems to lack any kind of perspective or remorse regarding the violent acts committed by him and his comrades. However, a book he had written during his youth in London, now considered a masterpiece of post colonial literature helps Willie gain asylum in Britain. Willie feels that he might finally live some of the simple peaceful life that he had longed for in Britain. But an unfulfilling affair with his friend Roger’s wife and a changing Britain characterized by aggressive immigrants and a slothful British working class leaves Willie as unhappy as ever.
The idea of people drifting through life by jumping from one accident to another as if there are magic seeds which would give them fulfilment is one of the main themes of this novel. It is one of the bleakest novels Naipaul has ever written. The vicious humour in Willie and Sarojini’s letters as they stumble and waver from one ideology to another is Naipaul at his cynical best. Magic Seeds is a great last novel from the man whom Christopher Hitchens described as “seemingly unassailable”. Here, Naipaul is unassailable in that he is unwilling to offer any kind of respite or consolation to the characters in this searing account of the life of a wounded man from a wounded civilization.
November 14, 2007
Dear Magic Seeds, I'm sorry - it's me, not you. Really, you are too good for me. you are sweet and patient but I'm just at a different place in my life. I need something more! Call it a midlife crisis, call it a terminal case of immaturity! but right now I need uproarious laughter or crass sex. I need words so beautiful they make me gasp and drop the pages. I don't have the patience for subtlety of plot or unfulfilled flirtations with characters. I will probably regret it someday but for now, I need to say goodbye to you.
June 8, 2019
Sementes Mágicas é a continuação da demanda (iniciada em Uma Vida Pela Metade) de Willy Chandran por uma vida só sua e não dependente dos outros (como se isso fosse possível). Regressado de Moçambique, vai para a Alemanha de onde parte para a Índia, o seu país natal, para se juntar a um grupo de guerrilheiros que, teoricamente, defende as castas inferiores. Anos depois regressa a Londres para casa de Roger, um amigo também perdido na vida.
Algumas partes com os revolucionários aborrecem um pouco mas tudo o resto é muito bom.
Algumas partes com os revolucionários aborrecem um pouco mas tudo o resto é muito bom.
February 18, 2009
What I learned from this book would take another book to explain. Naipaul is such a prolix writer with chameleon shifts of tone - and did I mention his incredibly drawn characters? Right now, the brain is swimming in his wonderful sea of words, so let me pick one example of each facet of fiction.
Character: Not fair, not fair. Willie would seem the natural candidate: the transplanted Indian whose father funs an ashram and who begins as a young man in London, writes a book, meets and marries a Portuguese woman and lives 18 vapid years in Africa. Next he joins his sister who hectors and badgers him to get a real life. She lives in Berlin and makes movies with a man named Wolf. His middle name is not Amadeus. Sturck by her passion for an Indian guerilla, he leaves for the subconintent and joins an insurgency group. What matter if he mistakenly joins the enemy of his Ideal. Willie philosophizes a great deal and his one-liners are elegant. But how can I ignore Roger and Perdita and Einstein, Willie's comrade in arms in the teak forests and dismal slums? But who wants to read Son of Magic seeds. Onward and upward.
Setting: Again.....don't fence me in! Which 3-D locale was more memorable than the others? London....has to be; the barbed wire writing about Counsel Housing brings on tears of laughter. But then flashbacks to Berlin's noir cafe scene, or the prospect of a clueless Willie in the midst of a brutal Civil War in Angola are close competitors. One thing for sure, the Indian experience....seven years of eating rice gruel and then the prison scenes must have been the most powerful. I could not wait until he escaped that hell for London's posher inferno.
Tone: You want ring tones, read this novel! Funny, bitingly arch, profoundly wise, frightening, repellent. When Roger begins his extra marital affair with Marion, the swimmer, we are treated to a raucous comedy only Chaucer could have conceived.
Theme: It's a few hours since I got to page 280 and I'll be damned if I can figure out what "Magic Seeds" means. There's a tie in to the beanstalk which the naive Jack climbs only to meet the horrid but stupid giant whom he must outwit in order to get the goose that lays the golden eggs. Roger - the rich attorney who was responsible for Willie's release from Political Prison -- tends to repeat himself while sharing with Willie the story of his life. He, for instance does not want to die full of hatred like his father, but peacefully, smoking his pipe like Van Gogh.Oh, Really? But he does come up with a big clue to the theme: He says he wants to take an ax to the beanstalk roots - cutting off any possibility of fairy tale living. Well, writing this last paragraph was therapeutic since it helped me find the overweening message of Naipaul's book. At the end, Willie has a eureka moment: "It is wrong to have an ideal view of the world. That's where the mischief starts." Oh there are twelve more themes wriggling around and up and down the chapters in Magic Seeds. As the book jacket proclaims them: exile, identity, the precariousness of civilization not to mention social justice. These are the seeds Naipaul scatters in the reader's brain and what a delightful and serious headache they create.
Character: Not fair, not fair. Willie would seem the natural candidate: the transplanted Indian whose father funs an ashram and who begins as a young man in London, writes a book, meets and marries a Portuguese woman and lives 18 vapid years in Africa. Next he joins his sister who hectors and badgers him to get a real life. She lives in Berlin and makes movies with a man named Wolf. His middle name is not Amadeus. Sturck by her passion for an Indian guerilla, he leaves for the subconintent and joins an insurgency group. What matter if he mistakenly joins the enemy of his Ideal. Willie philosophizes a great deal and his one-liners are elegant. But how can I ignore Roger and Perdita and Einstein, Willie's comrade in arms in the teak forests and dismal slums? But who wants to read Son of Magic seeds. Onward and upward.
Setting: Again.....don't fence me in! Which 3-D locale was more memorable than the others? London....has to be; the barbed wire writing about Counsel Housing brings on tears of laughter. But then flashbacks to Berlin's noir cafe scene, or the prospect of a clueless Willie in the midst of a brutal Civil War in Angola are close competitors. One thing for sure, the Indian experience....seven years of eating rice gruel and then the prison scenes must have been the most powerful. I could not wait until he escaped that hell for London's posher inferno.
Tone: You want ring tones, read this novel! Funny, bitingly arch, profoundly wise, frightening, repellent. When Roger begins his extra marital affair with Marion, the swimmer, we are treated to a raucous comedy only Chaucer could have conceived.
Theme: It's a few hours since I got to page 280 and I'll be damned if I can figure out what "Magic Seeds" means. There's a tie in to the beanstalk which the naive Jack climbs only to meet the horrid but stupid giant whom he must outwit in order to get the goose that lays the golden eggs. Roger - the rich attorney who was responsible for Willie's release from Political Prison -- tends to repeat himself while sharing with Willie the story of his life. He, for instance does not want to die full of hatred like his father, but peacefully, smoking his pipe like Van Gogh.Oh, Really? But he does come up with a big clue to the theme: He says he wants to take an ax to the beanstalk roots - cutting off any possibility of fairy tale living. Well, writing this last paragraph was therapeutic since it helped me find the overweening message of Naipaul's book. At the end, Willie has a eureka moment: "It is wrong to have an ideal view of the world. That's where the mischief starts." Oh there are twelve more themes wriggling around and up and down the chapters in Magic Seeds. As the book jacket proclaims them: exile, identity, the precariousness of civilization not to mention social justice. These are the seeds Naipaul scatters in the reader's brain and what a delightful and serious headache they create.
August 16, 2021
This is not one of Naipaul's better books. It was very good for about three quarters of the book but fell apart in the last quarter. I was almost half way through before I realized that this is a follow up to "Half a Life". It is a continuation of Willie Chandran's life after his marriage and move to Africa. When his marriage ends he moves in with his sister until she tires of him and he then moves back to India and becomes involved with an underground movement and lives in a jungle. After several years and many misadventures he ends up in prison. Up to this point the book was very entertaining but it slowly began losing its appeal after that. As in "Half a Life" Willie seems to just blunder his way through life and eventually things seem to work out okay for him. Naipaul created a very entertaining character in Willie and took him through an extraordinary variety of adventures and places. I just wish the book would have ended on a better note.
July 20, 2022
Nobody Says It's Easy
V.S. Naipaul's "Magic Seeds" (2004) is a philosophical novel exploring issues of personal identity and meaning in individual and political contexts. The book fails for many reasons, chiefly because its preachy, didactic tone takes away from any kind of story or character development. The characters are wooden and the plot implausible. There is value in what Naipaul has to say, but this novel is not a good medium.
The story is about Willie Chandran, a man in his early 40's when the book begins. In mid-life, Willie is an unconvincing subject for a coming of age story. The book takes the reader from Berlin where Willie is leading an idle life in the company of his sister, to India, where Willie spends seven years with a group of guerilla revolutionaries and is imprisoned, and, in a twist, back to England where Willie had gone to college and written a book of stories. The book is a sequel to Naipaul's novel "Half a Life" which tells of Willie's life up to the age of forty. Although "Magic Seeds" is written to be read independently, I thought it presupposed a great deal of Willie's experiences in the earlier book. I have not read "Half a Life" and found this sequel confusing without going back and reading reviews and summaries of the earlier work.
Willie was born in India to a man who gave up a professional career to found an ashram and his lower caste wife. Willie becomes a rootless, divided individual who lacks purpose in life and what is called an identity. This is apparently the premise of the earlier book and it carries through in "Magic Seeds". Willie lacks a sense of what he wants to do in life and becomes prey to all sorts of causes with minimum provocation. Thus, in the heart of this book, he joins a revolutionary movement aimed to free Indian's poor farmers from exploitation. The book explores his motivations and that of his confreres. Naipaul shows just and broad-based skepticism about these and other forms of revolutionary social movements.
The portion of the book that takes place in India is the part of the novel that is most nearly successful but is marred by its preaching. The last third of the book, which deals with Willie's renewed life in Britain after release from prison is nearly intolerable in the disjointedness of the writing, its harsh tone, and its didactic character. I felt I was being beaten over the head with Willie's lack of identity and the importance of being oneself. The focus in the final pages of the book shifts from Willie to the sexual past of one of his friends. It seems to me out of place with the rest of the book.
Themes of identity and activism are pervasive in modern literature, whether from the third world or from the United States or Britain. This book does not explore these issues well because the polemic is not well merged with the form of the novel. For what it says, the book in my view is top heavy with questions of identity. I read this book in a book group and in reading and thinking about it, thought of two other books our group has read out of many that explore issues of identity. First, I was reminded of Saul Bellow, another Nobel Prize winner, and the novel "Ravelstein" written in his old age. The main character of "Ravelstein" stresses the opportunity to study and learn for those fortunate to have the opportunity to do so, to avoid being imprisoned by the narrow concepts of identity, religious or social, in which they were born and to find a thoughtful life for themselves. Second, our group recently read "Butcher's Crossing" by the American National Book Award winning writer John Williams, the author of "Stoner". This Western novels tells the story of a young Harvard student who, under the influence of Emerson, travels West to find his identity in nature. Williams tells a dark, and cohesive story about youthful quests such as this in search of the "unalterable self". Both Bellow's novel and William's novel explore questions of identity but integrate these questions well with the form of the novel. I found them both literarily and philosophically more effective than Naipaul's "Magic Seeds."
Robin Friedman
V.S. Naipaul's "Magic Seeds" (2004) is a philosophical novel exploring issues of personal identity and meaning in individual and political contexts. The book fails for many reasons, chiefly because its preachy, didactic tone takes away from any kind of story or character development. The characters are wooden and the plot implausible. There is value in what Naipaul has to say, but this novel is not a good medium.
The story is about Willie Chandran, a man in his early 40's when the book begins. In mid-life, Willie is an unconvincing subject for a coming of age story. The book takes the reader from Berlin where Willie is leading an idle life in the company of his sister, to India, where Willie spends seven years with a group of guerilla revolutionaries and is imprisoned, and, in a twist, back to England where Willie had gone to college and written a book of stories. The book is a sequel to Naipaul's novel "Half a Life" which tells of Willie's life up to the age of forty. Although "Magic Seeds" is written to be read independently, I thought it presupposed a great deal of Willie's experiences in the earlier book. I have not read "Half a Life" and found this sequel confusing without going back and reading reviews and summaries of the earlier work.
Willie was born in India to a man who gave up a professional career to found an ashram and his lower caste wife. Willie becomes a rootless, divided individual who lacks purpose in life and what is called an identity. This is apparently the premise of the earlier book and it carries through in "Magic Seeds". Willie lacks a sense of what he wants to do in life and becomes prey to all sorts of causes with minimum provocation. Thus, in the heart of this book, he joins a revolutionary movement aimed to free Indian's poor farmers from exploitation. The book explores his motivations and that of his confreres. Naipaul shows just and broad-based skepticism about these and other forms of revolutionary social movements.
The portion of the book that takes place in India is the part of the novel that is most nearly successful but is marred by its preaching. The last third of the book, which deals with Willie's renewed life in Britain after release from prison is nearly intolerable in the disjointedness of the writing, its harsh tone, and its didactic character. I felt I was being beaten over the head with Willie's lack of identity and the importance of being oneself. The focus in the final pages of the book shifts from Willie to the sexual past of one of his friends. It seems to me out of place with the rest of the book.
Themes of identity and activism are pervasive in modern literature, whether from the third world or from the United States or Britain. This book does not explore these issues well because the polemic is not well merged with the form of the novel. For what it says, the book in my view is top heavy with questions of identity. I read this book in a book group and in reading and thinking about it, thought of two other books our group has read out of many that explore issues of identity. First, I was reminded of Saul Bellow, another Nobel Prize winner, and the novel "Ravelstein" written in his old age. The main character of "Ravelstein" stresses the opportunity to study and learn for those fortunate to have the opportunity to do so, to avoid being imprisoned by the narrow concepts of identity, religious or social, in which they were born and to find a thoughtful life for themselves. Second, our group recently read "Butcher's Crossing" by the American National Book Award winning writer John Williams, the author of "Stoner". This Western novels tells the story of a young Harvard student who, under the influence of Emerson, travels West to find his identity in nature. Williams tells a dark, and cohesive story about youthful quests such as this in search of the "unalterable self". Both Bellow's novel and William's novel explore questions of identity but integrate these questions well with the form of the novel. I found them both literarily and philosophically more effective than Naipaul's "Magic Seeds."
Robin Friedman
June 24, 2015
They say that really super rich guys (Donald Trump. Mitt Romney) often say the most stupid things because no-one wants to correct them. I think that winning the Nobel Prize may have had a similar effect on Sir VS Naipaul. His editors may now be less critical or maybe Naipaul has the power to be totally self-indulgent. It was def a struggle for me to complete this short novel. The only reason I think that I managed to finish it was my memory of David French`s excellent biography (the world is what it is) which assists in the reader`s understanding of Naipaul`s characters. Willie shares DNA with Naipaul and for me this was very interesting.
April 20, 2014
A grim little novel of a man not in control of his life, beautifully and poignantly written in Naipaul's controlled, lucid prose. The observations of Indian revolutionaries, London council estate life and the middle classes, and race are acute and painful, sometimes combined with a black comedy. It's a good book, but be prepared to feel sombre.
Read
January 16, 2021Prémio Nobel da literatura, 2001
RESUMO:
Apesar de não ser um dos melhores livros do Nobel da literatura, este livro é mais uma peça que contribui para a construção de uma obra singular. Willie, o protagonista, é um homem que, apesar de querer deixar a sua marca no mundo, não passa de um homem vulgar. Deixou a Índia ainda jovem, foi para Inglaterra e depois para África. Regressa à Europa depois da separação da mulher e a irmã convence-o a regressar à Índia para se juntar à guerrilha.
[Resumo da responsabilidade do Plano Nacional de Leitura 2027]
ISBN: 978-989-722-584-0
CDU: 821.111-31
Livro recomendado PNL2027 - Literatura - maiores 18 anos
RESUMO:
Apesar de não ser um dos melhores livros do Nobel da literatura, este livro é mais uma peça que contribui para a construção de uma obra singular. Willie, o protagonista, é um homem que, apesar de querer deixar a sua marca no mundo, não passa de um homem vulgar. Deixou a Índia ainda jovem, foi para Inglaterra e depois para África. Regressa à Europa depois da separação da mulher e a irmã convence-o a regressar à Índia para se juntar à guerrilha.
[Resumo da responsabilidade do Plano Nacional de Leitura 2027]
ISBN: 978-989-722-584-0
CDU: 821.111-31
Livro recomendado PNL2027 - Literatura - maiores 18 anos
February 22, 2012
\
...ذكر في مقدمة الكتاب أن هذه الرواية من نوع الأدب ما بعد الإستعمار وهي المرحلة التي ظهرت فيها الحركات السياسية لتحرير الشعوب والعمل على البنية الداخلية لتلك البلاد التي خضعت تحت نير الإستعمار , تنقسم هذه الرواية إلى شطرين بطلها ويلي شابران الجزء الأول منه يقضي فيه جزء من حياته منضما إلى إحدى حركات التحرير بعد نصيحة أخته حتى يجد ذاته حيث تبدو هذه الشخصية أعني ويلي شخصية قلقة دون هوية قضى شطرا كبيرا من حياته في أفريقيا بعد أن تعرف على فتاة تزوج منها وأصبح يعيش حياتها لكنه اكتشف ذلك متأخرا هو لم يعش حياته
لذلك توجه لأخته التي نصحته بأن يلتحق بأحدى حركات التحرير في الهند
يتوجه ويلي لتنفيذ النصيحة دون وازع حقيقي وبالفعل ينضم لحركة يكتشف فيما بعد أنها حركة مختلفة عن الحركة التي وجهتها له أخته ولكنه على الرغم من ذلك ينساق في المغامرة
ويقضي عشرة سنوات في الأحراش في حياة بعيدة عن كل متطلبات الإنسانية يسودها التوتر والقتل ورفاق التحرير الغامضين والذين لاتجمعهم سوى الرغبة في الحياة لا أكثر
يبدو أن نايبول أراد من خلال هذا الجزء في الكتاب أن يعري الحركات الثورية التي نشأت في تلك الفترة وأن يكشف إنحرافاتها وتمزقها وأهدافها الغير معلنة ضمنيا
الجزء الآخر من الرواية يأتي بعد استسلام ويلي للشرطة وقضاءه فترة سنة وأكثر في السجن حتى يتم ترحيله إلى لندن ويتلقفه أحد الأصدقاء القدامى الذي نشر له قديما كتاب من قصص قصيرة هذا الجزء في الرواية يتطرق الراوي لبنية المجتمعات الغربية ويطرح طبيعة العلاقات الجنسية والإجتماعية المتفككة من خلال روجر صديق ويلي وبيرديتا عشيقة الأثنين
نايبول من أصل هندي عاش في بريطانيا
الرواية ذات سرد ممتع في جزءها الأول
في الجزء الثاني خبا ضوءها
اكتشفت مؤخرا إنني أتملل من القراءة في ذكريات الغربة والمغتربين وخلافه
...ذكر في مقدمة الكتاب أن هذه الرواية من نوع الأدب ما بعد الإستعمار وهي المرحلة التي ظهرت فيها الحركات السياسية لتحرير الشعوب والعمل على البنية الداخلية لتلك البلاد التي خضعت تحت نير الإستعمار , تنقسم هذه الرواية إلى شطرين بطلها ويلي شابران الجزء الأول منه يقضي فيه جزء من حياته منضما إلى إحدى حركات التحرير بعد نصيحة أخته حتى يجد ذاته حيث تبدو هذه الشخصية أعني ويلي شخصية قلقة دون هوية قضى شطرا كبيرا من حياته في أفريقيا بعد أن تعرف على فتاة تزوج منها وأصبح يعيش حياتها لكنه اكتشف ذلك متأخرا هو لم يعش حياته
لذلك توجه لأخته التي نصحته بأن يلتحق بأحدى حركات التحرير في الهند
يتوجه ويلي لتنفيذ النصيحة دون وازع حقيقي وبالفعل ينضم لحركة يكتشف فيما بعد أنها حركة مختلفة عن الحركة التي وجهتها له أخته ولكنه على الرغم من ذلك ينساق في المغامرة
ويقضي عشرة سنوات في الأحراش في حياة بعيدة عن كل متطلبات الإنسانية يسودها التوتر والقتل ورفاق التحرير الغامضين والذين لاتجمعهم سوى الرغبة في الحياة لا أكثر
يبدو أن نايبول أراد من خلال هذا الجزء في الكتاب أن يعري الحركات الثورية التي نشأت في تلك الفترة وأن يكشف إنحرافاتها وتمزقها وأهدافها الغير معلنة ضمنيا
الجزء الآخر من الرواية يأتي بعد استسلام ويلي للشرطة وقضاءه فترة سنة وأكثر في السجن حتى يتم ترحيله إلى لندن ويتلقفه أحد الأصدقاء القدامى الذي نشر له قديما كتاب من قصص قصيرة هذا الجزء في الرواية يتطرق الراوي لبنية المجتمعات الغربية ويطرح طبيعة العلاقات الجنسية والإجتماعية المتفككة من خلال روجر صديق ويلي وبيرديتا عشيقة الأثنين
نايبول من أصل هندي عاش في بريطانيا
الرواية ذات سرد ممتع في جزءها الأول
في الجزء الثاني خبا ضوءها
اكتشفت مؤخرا إنني أتملل من القراءة في ذكريات الغربة والمغتربين وخلافه
November 9, 2014
This is not Naipaul at his best. That said, he's still head and shoulders above most of people writing.
A continuation of his previous novel "Half a Life", we follow the protagonist Willie as he drifts through the next couple of decades in his life, from his sister's house in Berlin to the guerrilla camps and then jails of India, and then finally back to post-modern cosmopolitan London, feeling nothing but his passivity and anomie all along the way.
In typical Naipaul fashion, the prose is lush and gorgeous, with descriptive passages that captivate like no other can. Yet, the characters and situations are emotionally flat and lifeless, and retreads of themes he's been working with for decades, often done better in past novels.
In some ways, you can feel age working its way into Naipaul in this story. The transmutation of rage and creative fire slowly simmering down to something like bitter acceptance of a flawed world, and brutal misanthropy becoming just aged crankiness.
If Naipaul has just one more novel in him (which is hard to believe being he's in his 80s now), I'd love for him to explore the themes of an old man, instead of creating two novels in which a preternaturally aged young man lives his life almost like an old man going over his memories in tired contemplation.
That said, I still think it's worth a read, as all his novels are. When he is gone, the world will be a far lesser place, and literature will be left to the childish fantasists and bourgeois college lecture hall revolutionaries who will no doubt dance on his grave.
A continuation of his previous novel "Half a Life", we follow the protagonist Willie as he drifts through the next couple of decades in his life, from his sister's house in Berlin to the guerrilla camps and then jails of India, and then finally back to post-modern cosmopolitan London, feeling nothing but his passivity and anomie all along the way.
In typical Naipaul fashion, the prose is lush and gorgeous, with descriptive passages that captivate like no other can. Yet, the characters and situations are emotionally flat and lifeless, and retreads of themes he's been working with for decades, often done better in past novels.
In some ways, you can feel age working its way into Naipaul in this story. The transmutation of rage and creative fire slowly simmering down to something like bitter acceptance of a flawed world, and brutal misanthropy becoming just aged crankiness.
If Naipaul has just one more novel in him (which is hard to believe being he's in his 80s now), I'd love for him to explore the themes of an old man, instead of creating two novels in which a preternaturally aged young man lives his life almost like an old man going over his memories in tired contemplation.
That said, I still think it's worth a read, as all his novels are. When he is gone, the world will be a far lesser place, and literature will be left to the childish fantasists and bourgeois college lecture hall revolutionaries who will no doubt dance on his grave.
October 27, 2016
قال ويلي " الأمر الوحيد الذي عملت عليه طوال حياتي ، ليس لأن أكون في دياري حيثما وجدت . ولكن لأبدو وكأنني في دياري
"
ويلي شاندران هو بالقطع شخصية من شخصيات العالم الثالث ، وإن كان قد إستطاع أن يٌضيع ذاته في رواية "نصف حياة " فهو هنا قد دمرها تماما . ينضم لحركة سرية لتحرير الطبقات الدنيا ثم يكتشف أن " تلك الحرب لم تكن حربي ولا حربك ولا علاقة لها بالقروين الذين إدعينا أننا نقاتل في سبيلهم " يسلم نفسه ويقضي في السجن بضع سنين ثم يعود للندن لتبتلعه العزلة و الإغتراب ليكتشف في النهاية أنه " يقضي في الحياة حكما مؤبدا بالسجن " إنه سجين رغبته في التحرر وعدم إستطاعته تحقيق تلك الرغبة .
هذه رواية حوارات مطولة. وللأسف ليس فيها من رواية نصف حياة غير أنها تكلمة لها . لكن عظمة هذه الرواية تتجلى ــ في رأيي ــ في قصة الأب وعلاقته بابنه . إن الأب ، والتي كانت سيرة حياته في النصف الأول من رواية نصف حياة قصة رائعة وفكهة ، عظيمة وأصلية . نجد أن وجوده هنا هو مجرد حدث جانبي يذكر في رسائل متبادلة بين الأخ وأخته . إنه يحتضر ويموت دونما أي إهتمام حقيقي من الإبن
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ولذلك أشعر بالأسف لأنني أحببت والد ويلي شاندران أكثر مما أحببت أبي .
August 15, 2025
Story about an Indian guy who can't find meaning -- he lives in Africa with a rich wife (this happens before the book starts), prodded by his sister he confusedly joins a small revolution in India and things go comically wrong there. The bad part is that there are zero funny parts to this book. The only thing interesting is the main character's unique viewpoint of life. Decent writing, but the book ends trying to be meaningful by saying that the thing that shouldn't be done is to try to map your life to one, single ideal -- duh.
November 13, 2019
I enjoyed Naipaul's insightful and often clever observations about the global struggles of the economically downtrodden--the "churning of the castes." But his prose is often dense and sometimes repetitive. For me, the narrative bogged down amid the protagonist's phase as a forest-dwelling revolutionary in India. It recovered in the final third of book, with his keen look at the lives of the poor of North London's housing projects juxtaposed against the absurd lives of wealthy show-offs.
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May 13, 2019comments made in first book of series: Half a Life
May 27, 2018
Such a well written book. Takes some time to get through it but totally worth it. My favourite line is "So many calamities, big and small, are: the failure or inability to work out the day-to-day consequences, over a period, of our actions"
September 22, 2013
Firstly I feel that it is only fair to admit that I read this book not realising that it is the sequal to another,'Half a Life', which I've not read so that will almost certainly have a bearing on my opinion of this book.
The story, such as it is, revolves around Willie Chadran, an Indian who grew up in India, went to university in London before moving to Africa and marrying a Portuguese woman. After 18 years of marriage he leaves his wife and move to Berlin and his sister, whom he has had little contact with for 20 years. In Berlin he finds his sister has been radicalised into being a supporter of some Indian revolutionaries. She cajoles Willie into returing to India, a country he has not visited since his childhood and does not understand to join the rebelion. Willie soon becomes disallusioned with the rebels but is too fearful and complacent to leave them. Eventually he is captured, imprisoned and eventually released and returned to London. The magic seeds of the title refer to the crazy notion of climbing a giant beanstalk and there slaying a giant.
That all said I'm afraid that I wasn't overly impressed this book. On the whole I rather liked Naipaul's writing style and that the story, such as it is, is many layered however after a while the frequent repetitions became somewhat grating. However, my main problems was with the chracters.In particular the fact that I just could not relate or empathise with any of them. Willie himself just seems to drift from one situation to the next like a feather on the wind and then does nothing but moan about where he has landed rather than actually trying to make a life for himself. Mainly I felt that they all became merely vehicles for Naipaul's own prejudices. The predominant ones being power and class.
Now I rather enjoyed his critique of revolutionaries and how they are more interested in personal power than they are in the needs and interests of the people that they are supposedly fighting for, not just in India but all over the world. However, once Willi returned to London and the 'civilized' world the story then centres predominantly on his friend and benefactor Roger and Roger's wife Perdita and their marriage problems. This, although comical at times, became too banal for my taste. In the end I felt that all the characters were merely whingers and as such annoying.
I did reach the end of the book so it can't be all bad but if you do want to read this book make sure that you read the prequal first.
The story, such as it is, revolves around Willie Chadran, an Indian who grew up in India, went to university in London before moving to Africa and marrying a Portuguese woman. After 18 years of marriage he leaves his wife and move to Berlin and his sister, whom he has had little contact with for 20 years. In Berlin he finds his sister has been radicalised into being a supporter of some Indian revolutionaries. She cajoles Willie into returing to India, a country he has not visited since his childhood and does not understand to join the rebelion. Willie soon becomes disallusioned with the rebels but is too fearful and complacent to leave them. Eventually he is captured, imprisoned and eventually released and returned to London. The magic seeds of the title refer to the crazy notion of climbing a giant beanstalk and there slaying a giant.
That all said I'm afraid that I wasn't overly impressed this book. On the whole I rather liked Naipaul's writing style and that the story, such as it is, is many layered however after a while the frequent repetitions became somewhat grating. However, my main problems was with the chracters.In particular the fact that I just could not relate or empathise with any of them. Willie himself just seems to drift from one situation to the next like a feather on the wind and then does nothing but moan about where he has landed rather than actually trying to make a life for himself. Mainly I felt that they all became merely vehicles for Naipaul's own prejudices. The predominant ones being power and class.
Now I rather enjoyed his critique of revolutionaries and how they are more interested in personal power than they are in the needs and interests of the people that they are supposedly fighting for, not just in India but all over the world. However, once Willi returned to London and the 'civilized' world the story then centres predominantly on his friend and benefactor Roger and Roger's wife Perdita and their marriage problems. This, although comical at times, became too banal for my taste. In the end I felt that all the characters were merely whingers and as such annoying.
I did reach the end of the book so it can't be all bad but if you do want to read this book make sure that you read the prequal first.
October 14, 2018
A strange book: not just bleak, as the mature Naipaul almost invariably is, but sour, even misanthropic. It patches together the odyssey of a now middle-aged Indian man: study in 1960s London; an 18-year marriage in Mozambique as it drifts to civil war; a 6 month stay with a radical leftist sister in Berlin; 8 years in India as a rapidly disillusioned and eventually captured guerrilla insurgent (Anwar Pradesh?); exile to 1990s England. This feels disjointed—perhaps deliberately, for the man´s character itself seems a ragbag of disparate fragments, with no unifying force of its own. Fragmentation is a recurrent theme. Along with futility, stupidity and betrayal everywhere. (“a child’s vision of the world spinning in darkness, with everyone on it lost.” [p. 238]).
Written in 2002-2003, this calls for comparison with the mature Ian McEwan’s post-9-11 novel,
Saturday. McEwan offers a quite explicit parable of liberal decency: when attacked, we keep calm and carry on being decent, to the extent even of helping to mend our broken assailants. Naipaul, by contrast, has a secondary character voice the thought that “the nicer sides of our civilization, the compassion, the law, may have been used to overthrow that civilization” [p. 276]. This comes from a once-progressive English lawyer, whose life has progressed only to the disillusion of unsatisfactory marriage, toadying to a wealthy patron and dodgy corporate land deals. He is not talking about jihadists but railing against welfare claimants and assorted scum living in public housing: people, he suggests, who once constituted the old servant classes, but have now acquired a new sense of entitlement. This is of course a voice of Naipaul´s creation, not his own, but the offers no counterpoint other than the central character´s closing thought “It is wrong to have an ideal view of the world. That’s where the mischief starts.” [p. 294]. Everyone is tainted, no-one redeemed.
McEwan’s vision feels too cosily reassuring to be true; Naipaul’s too angrily nihilistic.
Written in 2002-2003, this calls for comparison with the mature Ian McEwan’s post-9-11 novel,
Saturday. McEwan offers a quite explicit parable of liberal decency: when attacked, we keep calm and carry on being decent, to the extent even of helping to mend our broken assailants. Naipaul, by contrast, has a secondary character voice the thought that “the nicer sides of our civilization, the compassion, the law, may have been used to overthrow that civilization” [p. 276]. This comes from a once-progressive English lawyer, whose life has progressed only to the disillusion of unsatisfactory marriage, toadying to a wealthy patron and dodgy corporate land deals. He is not talking about jihadists but railing against welfare claimants and assorted scum living in public housing: people, he suggests, who once constituted the old servant classes, but have now acquired a new sense of entitlement. This is of course a voice of Naipaul´s creation, not his own, but the offers no counterpoint other than the central character´s closing thought “It is wrong to have an ideal view of the world. That’s where the mischief starts.” [p. 294]. Everyone is tainted, no-one redeemed.
McEwan’s vision feels too cosily reassuring to be true; Naipaul’s too angrily nihilistic.
June 6, 2024
Even better than "Half A Life," for my money. The story of Willie Chandran continues and while he can be a maddening character - he is constantly looking for some ineffable quality in his life; forever unable or unwilling to accept where he is and prosper instead of constantly considering himself rootless - but an awful lot happens to a guy who thinks nothing is happening. In what amounts to a 2-volume fictional biography, we see Willie go from India to London to Africa to Germany, then back to India and then back to London where the action, so to speak, just sort of ends.
The section Willie spends with the guerrillas in India's teak forest and smaller towns is terrific. Willie's passive approach allows Naipaul to spin a tale laced with scenes of beauty and philosophical heft. At one point, "the movement" is losing: ground, stature, purpose. Willie quickly sees through the madness of these guerrillas and the personal bloodlust that motivates so many of them.
When he returns to London, the story stalls, very briefly, and then the last section switches to his oldest, most decent friend, Roger. Here Naipaul gets to riff on London's historical development and creeping decay.
Above all, both "Magic Seeds" and "Half A Life" have the remarkable quality of offering high art - beautiful scenes and writing; characters you come to know and care about; a penetrating look at the modern situation - while reading easily. Naipaul has what only the greats do: the ability to entertain and enlighten at once. Highly recommended.
The section Willie spends with the guerrillas in India's teak forest and smaller towns is terrific. Willie's passive approach allows Naipaul to spin a tale laced with scenes of beauty and philosophical heft. At one point, "the movement" is losing: ground, stature, purpose. Willie quickly sees through the madness of these guerrillas and the personal bloodlust that motivates so many of them.
When he returns to London, the story stalls, very briefly, and then the last section switches to his oldest, most decent friend, Roger. Here Naipaul gets to riff on London's historical development and creeping decay.
Above all, both "Magic Seeds" and "Half A Life" have the remarkable quality of offering high art - beautiful scenes and writing; characters you come to know and care about; a penetrating look at the modern situation - while reading easily. Naipaul has what only the greats do: the ability to entertain and enlighten at once. Highly recommended.
October 12, 2013
The story is in continuation of V.S Naipual's first book titled Half a life. The book is interesting primarily because of the author's excellent prose writing skills. Even when the story goes dull, the author keeps the ball rolling with his detailed explanation of each character and the setting is described so beautifully that it seems almost like one is living through the words. The vital nerve of the story is how the protagonist goes from the process of just looking to seeing. How, through a series of intricately woven and subtle experinces and observations he comes out to understand the mysteries of life is astonishing.
When one removes out the character description and explanation of thougts and feelings, the basic story-line is uninteresting. At the very end of it, the flow, which is the prime source of interest to keep the book reading. seems to be dying away. There is no particular or a definite ending to the story.
In brief, read this book, if you want to get dazzled by the author's literary skills and to get a taste of what a true prose-writing actually consist of. But if one is looking for a light, engrossing and a firm-storyline kind of a read, this is not the book for you.
When one removes out the character description and explanation of thougts and feelings, the basic story-line is uninteresting. At the very end of it, the flow, which is the prime source of interest to keep the book reading. seems to be dying away. There is no particular or a definite ending to the story.
In brief, read this book, if you want to get dazzled by the author's literary skills and to get a taste of what a true prose-writing actually consist of. But if one is looking for a light, engrossing and a firm-storyline kind of a read, this is not the book for you.
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February 5, 2009Half A Life (2001) might have been better been left without this sequel, which ruffles reviewers' feathers as only a grand old man of literature can. Though his trophy shelf holds a Nobel Prize, his past accomplishments buy him little sympathy. In fact, it's often difficult to tell if critics are more put off by Magic Seeds or their appraisal of Willie Chandran as a mouthpiece for Naipaul's politics. For an author whose greatest works have a heavy dose of autobiography, this reaction is not surprising, though it makes one wonder whether critics are reading the novel or dissecting the author. In the end, one hopes the unlikable characters, implausible plotting, and general fog of pessimism are what doom this book, not critical disappointment in Naipaul.
This is an excerpt from a review published in Bookmarks magazine.
October 10, 2012
I read this for my book club and it was agonizing to read. An utter disappointment. I expected more from a Nobel Prize winning author. Totally boring. I hated this book. The main character was a nothing sort of man.....aimless, with no ideas of his own, no ambition, no motivation. He spent his whole life waiting for someone to tell him what to do. He did not seem to support himself, but lived off others. If there had been some background to his earlier life and the political situation where he had lived, that perhaps had shaped him, it might have been not quite so painful. I kept waiting for some ah-ha moment or astounding message to appear, but NOTHING. I rarely give up on a book, but with my club meeting coming up, I could not make the effort to finish it. I actually quit with only 40 pages to go. The book club members assured me that I had not missed anything.
July 26, 2014
Naipaul, who has made a life and reputation based on the objectivity of his observations, turns his eye to the relationship between commitment to ideals and the reality that could follow. He doesn't judge but he asks and he warns about the dangers involved in giving oneself over to revolutionary ideas. Magic seeds really refers to the story of Jack and the Beanstalk, though it's never mentioned. Jack planted the magic seeds as we all know, and it didn't bring him happiness or success though it did bring him more than his share of adventure. There you might have the irony of what Naipaul cleverly is telling us - it might be safer not to give in to your ideals but doing so might make life much duller. A very nice read which takes us from Africa to London to India and back with some lovely writing and observations.
March 6, 2008
This is the most depressing book I've read since Revolutionary Road, which led me down a 5 year spiral to the bottom... I might not finish it.
Well I did finish it, and it just got worse. I think not reading the prequel (Half Life) left me a bit lacking in insight regarding the main character, but that said, Willie is a cardboard presentation - just a vehicle for Naipaul to push out his angry, cranky politics and disregard for the working class and human struggle. So I probably won't go out looking for more Naipaul, but it is well-written, decently structured book. It had to be for me to get through it. Anyway, it is what it is - two stars.
Well I did finish it, and it just got worse. I think not reading the prequel (Half Life) left me a bit lacking in insight regarding the main character, but that said, Willie is a cardboard presentation - just a vehicle for Naipaul to push out his angry, cranky politics and disregard for the working class and human struggle. So I probably won't go out looking for more Naipaul, but it is well-written, decently structured book. It had to be for me to get through it. Anyway, it is what it is - two stars.
July 14, 2018
Not sure what to make of this novel. It meanders all over the place, starting and ending nowhere in particular. But it flows and reads beautifully and has lots of insights into the human condition; and it frequently made me pause and reflect. A most unusual book, and one I am glad I read. I can relate to the central thesis that if you drift in life and lets life pass you by, then you will probably end up nowhere special and dissatisfied. Very different to the concept of Karma, and perhaps Naipaul is here making an especially acute observation on India and Indian life in general.
A book which I will need to go back to in due course and reread, but more slowly and carefully, savouring the insights and prose for its own sake rather than as part of a somewhat disjointed story.
A book which I will need to go back to in due course and reread, but more slowly and carefully, savouring the insights and prose for its own sake rather than as part of a somewhat disjointed story.
June 26, 2012
I couldn't have enjoyed this book more thoroughly. Naipaul seems to have pondered the events in Ghandi's life, as detailed in the leader's autobiography, and cooked them up into an alternative life. The characters are rich, the themes are interwoven nicely in the plot, and emotional notes are struck with the right balance of intensity and restraint.
May 13, 2012
Never really figured out what the book was about?
March 20, 2023
SUMMARY - The banality of brigandage is well-told, but it was a bit too grim, and a bit too disconnected to fully win me over. (Naipaul's novels read through, over and out.)
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Better than 'Half a Life', to which this is the sequel. I was never wholly convinced that this got fully into the guerrilla mindset, but it was at least possible to suspend belief. I found 1975's 'Guerrilas' more plausible, although in that case the grimness was the problem. The world can be a horrible place and fiction has a duty to explore it, but I prefer Naipaul first at his most elegiac, second in comic mode, and least as gritty gutter-sweeper of the human soul. Give me pop not grime, Mr DJ.
That said, I don't tend to like books that are all surface. There has to be some grit to the pearl. Magic Seeds does deliver on the sense of feeling lost in the moment. It excels in the banality of brigandage.
There is a realism in Naipaul sustained by a momentum of plot (switched between Berlin, India, Africa and London), and tensions in familial and clan relationships that work. Too much of any one place, and I would probably have liked this less (cf my review of 'A House for Mr Biswas', for instance). But the swings between place also fostered dislocation, as well as the story of disassociation it's trying to tell. I just felt the elastic stretched too far that it snapped. I wasn't always sure I really was reading about the same person throughout, and more fatally, nor was I sure I really cared that much anyway.
It was a distraction, and it had more variety and interest that 'Magic Seeds', but it was a ho-hum final one from V.S.
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Better than 'Half a Life', to which this is the sequel. I was never wholly convinced that this got fully into the guerrilla mindset, but it was at least possible to suspend belief. I found 1975's 'Guerrilas' more plausible, although in that case the grimness was the problem. The world can be a horrible place and fiction has a duty to explore it, but I prefer Naipaul first at his most elegiac, second in comic mode, and least as gritty gutter-sweeper of the human soul. Give me pop not grime, Mr DJ.
That said, I don't tend to like books that are all surface. There has to be some grit to the pearl. Magic Seeds does deliver on the sense of feeling lost in the moment. It excels in the banality of brigandage.
There is a realism in Naipaul sustained by a momentum of plot (switched between Berlin, India, Africa and London), and tensions in familial and clan relationships that work. Too much of any one place, and I would probably have liked this less (cf my review of 'A House for Mr Biswas', for instance). But the swings between place also fostered dislocation, as well as the story of disassociation it's trying to tell. I just felt the elastic stretched too far that it snapped. I wasn't always sure I really was reading about the same person throughout, and more fatally, nor was I sure I really cared that much anyway.
It was a distraction, and it had more variety and interest that 'Magic Seeds', but it was a ho-hum final one from V.S.
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