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Funeral Nights
A group of friends from Shillong journey to a remote part of West Khasi Hills to witness Ka Phor Sorat, the feast of the dead, a unique six-day-long funeral ceremony of the Lyngngams, a Khasi sub-tribe. It may well be the last time this ancient rite is performed. The ceremony—involving a number of rituals and the sacrifice of as many as fifty bulls—will conclude with the cremation of a beloved elder, a woman whose body has been preserved in a tree house for nine whole months. By mistake, however, the group ends up reaching the secluded hamlet of Nongshyrkon seven days early. Stuck in the jungle for eleven days, they spend their nights around a fire in the middle of a spacious hut built especially for them, sharing stories and debating issues in what turns out to be a journey of discovery for all of them. Funeral Nights is an unconventional novel—a vast collection of stories big and small, not so much about death, but about life, past, present and future, rural and urban, high and low; about admirable men and women, raconteurs and pranksters, lovers and fools, politicians and conmen, drunks and taxi drivers; about culture and history, religion and God, myth and legend. Inspired by the narrative frame of Boccaccio’s The Decameron and The Arabian Nights , but adopting a serio-comic style, this is intimate access to a whole world, spectacular in its documentation of a tribe’s life and culture such as has never been attempted before. ‘A closely-woven sequence of narratives that provides us a profound insight into the working of the tribal psyche where the borders of the real and the surreal get blurred ... Here is a book of rare scholarship that Mircea Eliade or Claude L vi-Strauss would have read with admiration and yet remains as accessible as fiction to the lay reader.’ K . SATCHIDANANDAN ‘This is the Moby Dick of Meghalaya, a novel of huge ambition and tremendous appetite. Or is it a novel at all?’ JERRY PINTO author of Em and the Big Hoom and Murder in Mahim
1000 pages, Kindle Edition
Published July 30, 2021
39 people are currently reading
728 people want to read
About the author
Kynpham Sing Nongkynrih
17 books34 followersKynpham Sing Nongkynrih is the winner of the Shakti Bhatt Prize 2024. He was born and brought up in Sohra, Meghalaya, and writes poetry, drama and fiction in Khasi and English. His latest works are "The Distaste of the Earth" (Penguin India, longlisted for the JCB Prize 2024 and shortlisted for the Kerala Literature Festival Book of the Year Award 2024) and the 1024-page debut novel, "Funeral Nights" (Context/Westland Amazon for India; And Other Stories for the UK-US). He is the author of "The Yearning of Seeds" (HarperCollins), "Time’s Barter: Haiku and Senryu" (HarperCollins), "Around the Hearth: Khasi Legends" (Penguin) and the co-editor of "Late-Blooming Cherries: Haiku Poetry from India" (HarperCollins), Lapbah: Stories from the Northeast (Penguin) and "Dancing Earth: An Anthology of Poetry from Northeast India" (Penguin).
He has published poems and stories in Planet: The Welsh Internationalist, Wasafiri, The New Welsh Review, PEN International, The Literary Review, Karavan, The Sentinel Literary Quarterly, Cordite Poetry Review, Poetry International Web, The Indian Quarterly, Down to Earth, The Hindu Business Line, Indian Literature, The Oxford Anthology of Writings from North-East India, Pilgrim’s India, Day’s End Stories and others.
His other awards include the first North-East Poetry Award (Tripura, 2004), the first Veer Shankar Shah-Raghunath Shah National Award for tribal literature (Madhya Pradesh, 2008), a Tagore Fellowship (IIAS, Shimla, 2018), the Bangalore Review June Jazz Award (2021) and the Sparrow Literary Award (2022). He teaches literature at North-Eastern Hill University, Shillong.
From http://keralaliteraturefestival.com/s...
He has published poems and stories in Planet: The Welsh Internationalist, Wasafiri, The New Welsh Review, PEN International, The Literary Review, Karavan, The Sentinel Literary Quarterly, Cordite Poetry Review, Poetry International Web, The Indian Quarterly, Down to Earth, The Hindu Business Line, Indian Literature, The Oxford Anthology of Writings from North-East India, Pilgrim’s India, Day’s End Stories and others.
His other awards include the first North-East Poetry Award (Tripura, 2004), the first Veer Shankar Shah-Raghunath Shah National Award for tribal literature (Madhya Pradesh, 2008), a Tagore Fellowship (IIAS, Shimla, 2018), the Bangalore Review June Jazz Award (2021) and the Sparrow Literary Award (2022). He teaches literature at North-Eastern Hill University, Shillong.
From http://keralaliteraturefestival.com/s...
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Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews
September 6, 2021
Kynpham Sing Nongkynrih’s Funeral Nights is that rare book that defies the lines that the publishing world has been toeing for sometime, where books are slotted into genres and pegged on this thing or that. So is the 1007 page tome, fiction or non-fiction? Is it a collection of stories stitched together into a narrative? Is it a fictionalized autobiographical book, given the author’s published poems are referenced in the narrative and the many similarities between author and narrator?
The author takes readers into the world of the Khasis of Meghalaya through a deep dive into the socio political history and journey as a community over the years and across generations. The literary device used here is that of the narrator telling us about the many stories told through the course of a community vigil leading to a unique six day funeral ceremony of an old woman involving rites and rituals that are rarely practiced in contemporary times.
There are stories around rites of passage, of courtship, of the core of the Khasi philosophy of life, as are stories of community gatherings that is being practiced for years, of food and drinking, of the mad rush for betting and its many reincarnations over the years, of traditional poetic takedowns in public where opposing teams not just rhyme their words but use them to hilarious effect,of the culture of betel chewing (dental after effects are included) and the central place it occupies in the Khasi way of life: distance being measured in terms of how many pieces of betel have been consumed on the way and how the deceased are blessed with a ‘May he/she eat betel in the House of God’.
The story telling device is a nod towards the oral literary culture of the Khasis and other indigenous groups elsewhere, a practice that brings community members together in shared camaraderie and social and cultural transaction. Does the story-telling format make Funeral Nights a Khasi retelling (isn’t that the approved word in publishing circles?) of The ArabianNights? Wrong question. The right one is: Is it necessary to file literary works into neat genres and what have you?
Full review here: https://scroll.in/article/1004598/fun...
The author takes readers into the world of the Khasis of Meghalaya through a deep dive into the socio political history and journey as a community over the years and across generations. The literary device used here is that of the narrator telling us about the many stories told through the course of a community vigil leading to a unique six day funeral ceremony of an old woman involving rites and rituals that are rarely practiced in contemporary times.
There are stories around rites of passage, of courtship, of the core of the Khasi philosophy of life, as are stories of community gatherings that is being practiced for years, of food and drinking, of the mad rush for betting and its many reincarnations over the years, of traditional poetic takedowns in public where opposing teams not just rhyme their words but use them to hilarious effect,of the culture of betel chewing (dental after effects are included) and the central place it occupies in the Khasi way of life: distance being measured in terms of how many pieces of betel have been consumed on the way and how the deceased are blessed with a ‘May he/she eat betel in the House of God’.
The story telling device is a nod towards the oral literary culture of the Khasis and other indigenous groups elsewhere, a practice that brings community members together in shared camaraderie and social and cultural transaction. Does the story-telling format make Funeral Nights a Khasi retelling (isn’t that the approved word in publishing circles?) of The ArabianNights? Wrong question. The right one is: Is it necessary to file literary works into neat genres and what have you?
Full review here: https://scroll.in/article/1004598/fun...
February 21, 2024
It irks me to like this book! Reading on and off, took 10 months to finish. Had DNF thoughts a few times, but I'm glad to persist.
Highlight: Magnum Opus
What i loved:
1. Ton loads of research and information. Anyone writing anything on Khasi life can consider this as the bible.
2. The enthusiasm in the beginning about hometown Sohra (common name Cherrapunji) - the 25 odd types of rain!
3. The legends, origin stories about the tribes and hills, deeper dissection on current affairs, stories about Khasi and non Khasi people, kissaas and kahaniyaas! Never ending stories within stories!
4. The bantering, leg pulling and at times ferocious fights among the group of friends traveling to the funeral site.
5. A dedicated chapter on facsimile English names - Hilarious! Can be read as a standalone.
6. The main ceremony - no trace of it till 500 odd pages had me frustrated in anticipation. But it was worth when it finally presented itself.
What i didn't like:
1. Pathetic editing. Conversations are written verbatim. Lot of it was mindless, unnecessary, and took the focus away damaging the narrative structure.
2. Why not tag it as non-fiction? Travelogue? Memoir? It was disheartening to see it presented as mere "Fiction"
3. No references!! Instead of that small bibliography para in the end, proper accurate references would have worked wonders. Because of this, it still feels like a work in progress!
4. Missing subheadings leading to potpourri of stories. It's difficult to look up (lest you use ebook and search for that legend!) - it was difficult to determine where one story ended and the next began.
Overall:
Good research covering a lot of ground. Presentation was drastically amiss. Kudos for this work of a lifetime, helping preserve exotic customs.
Highlight: Magnum Opus
What i loved:
1. Ton loads of research and information. Anyone writing anything on Khasi life can consider this as the bible.
2. The enthusiasm in the beginning about hometown Sohra (common name Cherrapunji) - the 25 odd types of rain!
3. The legends, origin stories about the tribes and hills, deeper dissection on current affairs, stories about Khasi and non Khasi people, kissaas and kahaniyaas! Never ending stories within stories!
4. The bantering, leg pulling and at times ferocious fights among the group of friends traveling to the funeral site.
5. A dedicated chapter on facsimile English names - Hilarious! Can be read as a standalone.
6. The main ceremony - no trace of it till 500 odd pages had me frustrated in anticipation. But it was worth when it finally presented itself.
What i didn't like:
1. Pathetic editing. Conversations are written verbatim. Lot of it was mindless, unnecessary, and took the focus away damaging the narrative structure.
2. Why not tag it as non-fiction? Travelogue? Memoir? It was disheartening to see it presented as mere "Fiction"
3. No references!! Instead of that small bibliography para in the end, proper accurate references would have worked wonders. Because of this, it still feels like a work in progress!
4. Missing subheadings leading to potpourri of stories. It's difficult to look up (lest you use ebook and search for that legend!) - it was difficult to determine where one story ended and the next began.
Overall:
Good research covering a lot of ground. Presentation was drastically amiss. Kudos for this work of a lifetime, helping preserve exotic customs.
October 24, 2021
Between February 2 and 7, 1992, the funeral of a certain Ka De Nongsiang was ritually performed in the village of Nonshyrkon, in West Khasi Hills, Meghalaya. Known as Ka Phor Sorat, this particular funeral ceremony was possibly the last of its kind to be performed: the conversion of many Khasis to Christianity, with the accompanying drifting away from the indigenous Niam Khasi religion, meant that even back then, nearly 30 years ago, the highly ritualistic, complex, and expensive Ka Phor Sorat was seen as being no longer feasible.
If something as deeply imbued with meaning as last rites could die out, what hope might there be for the other, less spiritual aspects of culture? If the folklore that ties us to the land, and the myths that live, even in our language and in the names of our villages, waterfalls, rivers and hills, should disappear, would we even realize what we had lost? Would our dances, our songs, the games and sports we play, not suffer as well?
Kynpham Sing Nongkynrih uses a funeral, similar to that Ka Phor Sorat of 1992, as the fictional basis of his thousand-page novel, Funeral Nights. The narrator of this work is a forty-year old man, a writer and academician, aptly named Ap Jutang (‘keeper of the covenant’). When Ap Jutang and some of his friends hear of a Ka Phor Sorat due to be held in Nongshyrkon, the last there ever will be, they decide to travel there to see it. Eleven people, ten men and one woman, nearly all of them well-educated and urban, travel the long, dusty way deep into the forests, only to realize that they have arrived a few days too early.
Ap Jutang and his friends stay on in Nongshyrkon for the few days before the funeral will begin: they are well looked-after, in a comfortable shelter built specially for them, their meals provided for, and rice beer aplenty. Naturally, they start conversations: about deforestation, corruption, politics, the influx of non-Khasis into Meghalaya. They soon settle into a routine, coming together every evening to talk. Ap and Bah Kynsai, one of the senior members of the group, are among the most articulate and knowledgeable when it comes to explaining the history, the origin myths, the legends and stories of the Khasis; but each of them, from the hot-headed Eveningstar ‘Ning’ to the often inebriated but eager Raji, have their own stories to offer. There are anecdotes of pranksters and alcoholics; of shamans, archers, politicians. There are chilling stories of bizarre deaths and equally bizarre lives. There is magic, myth, humour, despair. The insecurity of a people losing touch with their land and their roots.
Funeral Nights, while ostensibly a novel, is not a book so easily classified. Very little actually happens in this book; the overwhelming bulk of it consists of the conversations, the stories, legends, and more. The depth and breadth of Kynpham Sing Nongkynrih’s research come through brilliantly, making this not just a poignant and sensitively written book about the Khasis, but a very informative one as well. And yet, Nongkynrih’s primary characters do not glorify Khasis: there is a rootedness, an acceptance of idiosyncrasies (as in the penchant for English-sounding names), a humour that takes the good with the bad.
I began this book with trepidation: a thousand pages seemed daunting. But the way this book reads, it did not feel weighty and tedious. It was more like sitting down with old friends and listening to conversations. Amusing, enlightening, witty conversations that opened my eyes, made me think.
In an India where insularity and the othering of people not perceived as ‘mainstream’ is rife, Funeral Nights is the sort of book that should be made required reading. We need many more books like this, insightful and well-written, opening a window on the often-ignored corners of India.
(From my review for The New Indian Express, https://www.newindianexpress.com/life...)
If something as deeply imbued with meaning as last rites could die out, what hope might there be for the other, less spiritual aspects of culture? If the folklore that ties us to the land, and the myths that live, even in our language and in the names of our villages, waterfalls, rivers and hills, should disappear, would we even realize what we had lost? Would our dances, our songs, the games and sports we play, not suffer as well?
Kynpham Sing Nongkynrih uses a funeral, similar to that Ka Phor Sorat of 1992, as the fictional basis of his thousand-page novel, Funeral Nights. The narrator of this work is a forty-year old man, a writer and academician, aptly named Ap Jutang (‘keeper of the covenant’). When Ap Jutang and some of his friends hear of a Ka Phor Sorat due to be held in Nongshyrkon, the last there ever will be, they decide to travel there to see it. Eleven people, ten men and one woman, nearly all of them well-educated and urban, travel the long, dusty way deep into the forests, only to realize that they have arrived a few days too early.
Ap Jutang and his friends stay on in Nongshyrkon for the few days before the funeral will begin: they are well looked-after, in a comfortable shelter built specially for them, their meals provided for, and rice beer aplenty. Naturally, they start conversations: about deforestation, corruption, politics, the influx of non-Khasis into Meghalaya. They soon settle into a routine, coming together every evening to talk. Ap and Bah Kynsai, one of the senior members of the group, are among the most articulate and knowledgeable when it comes to explaining the history, the origin myths, the legends and stories of the Khasis; but each of them, from the hot-headed Eveningstar ‘Ning’ to the often inebriated but eager Raji, have their own stories to offer. There are anecdotes of pranksters and alcoholics; of shamans, archers, politicians. There are chilling stories of bizarre deaths and equally bizarre lives. There is magic, myth, humour, despair. The insecurity of a people losing touch with their land and their roots.
Funeral Nights, while ostensibly a novel, is not a book so easily classified. Very little actually happens in this book; the overwhelming bulk of it consists of the conversations, the stories, legends, and more. The depth and breadth of Kynpham Sing Nongkynrih’s research come through brilliantly, making this not just a poignant and sensitively written book about the Khasis, but a very informative one as well. And yet, Nongkynrih’s primary characters do not glorify Khasis: there is a rootedness, an acceptance of idiosyncrasies (as in the penchant for English-sounding names), a humour that takes the good with the bad.
I began this book with trepidation: a thousand pages seemed daunting. But the way this book reads, it did not feel weighty and tedious. It was more like sitting down with old friends and listening to conversations. Amusing, enlightening, witty conversations that opened my eyes, made me think.
In an India where insularity and the othering of people not perceived as ‘mainstream’ is rife, Funeral Nights is the sort of book that should be made required reading. We need many more books like this, insightful and well-written, opening a window on the often-ignored corners of India.
(From my review for The New Indian Express, https://www.newindianexpress.com/life...)
September 12, 2021
Morose to reach the end of the book – feels like a vacuum inside. I will miss the cantankerous characters of the book, Raji, the irascible Bah Kynsai, Bah Su, Bah Kit, the sceptical Donald (spoiler alert: who finds love with the only female of the group), the nay-saying Evening and Ap the omniscient narrator – the alter ego of the author. Their squabbles, and occasional fisticuffs aside, the narration is immensely readable without becoming dry and scholarly.
Five-star rating for the colossal effort of compiling this magnum opus. It smartly encapsulates the Khasi (known colloquially as Ri Hynniew Trep) ethos – if a tome of 1000+ pages can be called encapsulation. This includes various facets of culture, religion, social set-up (matrilineal amongst the tribals but fading away amongst the converts to Christianity), politics, folk-lore, history, culinary practices (pork, beef, mutton – all is kosher only dogs are taboo) geography of Meghalaya, conflicts. Almost encyclopaedic in scope, it details their linguistic quirks in naming, their foibles, the effects of British invasion, Christianity and non-tribal immigration leading to a loss of their cultural heritage, including their extant grassroots political system with the king as a titular head without executive powers being replaced by the corrupt Indian Panchayati Raj.
Indigenous people feel strongly about the name of their state imposed on them
I really loved the description of the Khasi religion - a beautiful message of spirituality for living in harmony with nature and fellow humans with the blessings of God - U Blei Nong-thaw. No prophet, no jihad, no prosetylization, no caste, no exploitative priests. Who knows? This form of worship may have existed during the Vedic times in our hoary past before it was hijacked by Hindutva votaries and turned into a combative religion.
Khublei! Bah Kynpham!! Following the quaint practice of naming offspring after celestial objects, you could name your child FiveStar. Just joking…
A question: Where can one see the film Ka Phor Sorat by Raphael Warjri?
Five-star rating for the colossal effort of compiling this magnum opus. It smartly encapsulates the Khasi (known colloquially as Ri Hynniew Trep) ethos – if a tome of 1000+ pages can be called encapsulation. This includes various facets of culture, religion, social set-up (matrilineal amongst the tribals but fading away amongst the converts to Christianity), politics, folk-lore, history, culinary practices (pork, beef, mutton – all is kosher only dogs are taboo) geography of Meghalaya, conflicts. Almost encyclopaedic in scope, it details their linguistic quirks in naming, their foibles, the effects of British invasion, Christianity and non-tribal immigration leading to a loss of their cultural heritage, including their extant grassroots political system with the king as a titular head without executive powers being replaced by the corrupt Indian Panchayati Raj.
Indigenous people feel strongly about the name of their state imposed on them
What has this stupid name - Meghalaya, Abode of the Clouds, given by some academic thug from nowhere - got to do with us? Are you a cloud, Hamkom? Does the name connect you with the land, as Nagaland or Mizoram does? Are we a people with no roots in the land? Were they so dim-witted, your heroes, that they couldn't think of a name for their state?I learnt about Extispicy (also Splanchomancy, Haruspicy, Aruspicy, Hieroscopia, and Hieroscopy) - the practice of using anomalies in animal entrails to predict or divine future events; the difference between Matriarchy - a postulated gynocentric form of society, in which power is with the women and especially with the mothers of a community and Matrilineality - a system in which one belongs to one's mother's lineage, where children are identified in terms of their mother rather than their father, and extended families and tribal alliances form along female blood-lines; cromlechs, ossuaries and other funeral practices. Various aspects of their traditional sport of archery was covered comprehensively.
I really loved the description of the Khasi religion - a beautiful message of spirituality for living in harmony with nature and fellow humans with the blessings of God - U Blei Nong-thaw. No prophet, no jihad, no prosetylization, no caste, no exploitative priests. Who knows? This form of worship may have existed during the Vedic times in our hoary past before it was hijacked by Hindutva votaries and turned into a combative religion.
Khublei! Bah Kynpham!! Following the quaint practice of naming offspring after celestial objects, you could name your child FiveStar. Just joking…
A question: Where can one see the film Ka Phor Sorat by Raphael Warjri?
October 19, 2021
https://thewire.in/books/book-review-...
Book Review: Kynpham’s 'Funeral Nights' Is an Unconventional Novel About the Khasis
It is indeed ‘intimate access to a whole world, spectacular in its documentation of a tribe’s life and culture such as has never been attempted before’.
Book Review: Kynpham’s 'Funeral Nights' Is an Unconventional Novel About the Khasis
Khasi woman and standing-stones, near Laitlyngkot, Meghalaya, India. Photo: Bogman/CC BY-SA 4.0/ Wikimedia Commons
Kanchan Verma
Kanchan Verma
Listen to this article:
Play00:0008:21
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BOOKSCULTURE
13/AUG/2021
The blurb on Kynpham Sing Nongkynrih’s Funeral Nights tantalises me. It reads, ‘This is the Moby Dick of Meghalaya …’ Why did the novelist Jerry Pinto describe the novel thus? Intrigued, I tried reading the book from Pinto’s point of view.
Readers have usually identified some difficulties in reading Moby Dick. These include the book’s length, at 822 pages; its format, considered odd; its allusions to western classics, and its many symbols and metaphors that don’t easily explain themselves. The timeframe and the fact that Moby Dick is ‘not only an adventure story’, add up to make the book a very dense one indeed.
Kynpham Sing Nongkynrih
Funeral Nights
Context (August 2021)
Kynpham’s debut novel is of epic length at 1,024 pages and its format is quite unlike that of a conventional novel.
As the blurb reveals, its narrative frame was inspired by Boccaccio’s The Decameron and The Arabian Nights: a group of academics and writers from Shillong journey to a remote part of West Khasi Hills to witness ‘Ka Phor Sohrat’, the feast of the dead, a unique six-day-long funeral ceremony of the Lyngngams, a Khasi sub-tribe.
By mistake, however, the group ends up reaching the secluded hamlet of Nongshyrkon seven days early. ‘Stuck in the jungle for eleven days, they spend their nights around a fire in the middle of a spacious hut built especially for them, sharing stories and debating issues in what turns out to be a journey of discovery for all of them.’
The novel begins with the narrator introducing himself, ‘My name is Ap Jutang…’ (‘Call me Ishmael,’ in Moby Dick). But what an introduction it turns out to be! Ap Jutang weaves into the narrative about himself and his birthplace, Sohra, so many exciting accounts about his people and the land steeped in stories, legends and folk memories, that a whole new world is immediately opened to me.
The book has 12 fat chapters, each with a title. Most of the chapters are divided into ‘Root Stories’ and ‘Little Stories’, depending upon what the characters share on a particular night. In the first chapter, the narrator explains why he wants to write a book about his people, the Khasis — to clear their wounded name. But he would not do it in a manner that would make him sound ‘like one of those wearying pedants’ whom he dislikes so much and from whom he ‘ran away in such a hurry?’ He would tell us the story of his people through an account of his journey to the jungle village of Nongshyrkon. He would tell us of the grave and funny things he and his friends talked about, and of the light-hearted self-examination they indulged in, the illumination they sought, and most of all, the stories they exchanged.
Also read: Book Review: Ian Patel Essays a Relentless Timeline of Britain’s Struggle To Keep Itself White
And nothing is as simple as it seems. In the second chapter entitled ‘The Journey’, for instance, we not only get a vivid and reflective description of the difficult journey from Shillong into the deep jungles of West Khasi Hills but much, much more. We come across the Torajans of Indonesia and their fascinating death rituals; we listen to the equally fascinating funeral rites of the Lyngngams; we hear about Khasi name stories, colonial and pre-colonial histories, the English and their mini-Englands, Rabindranath Tagore and the local philistines, Nobel laureates and their reminiscences, politicians and political shenanigans, tales of corruption and government neglect, the Supreme Court and the strange narratives wrapped around its twin bans on coal and timber, rat-hole mining and dead rivers, pristine forests and their frightful decimation, deprivation and tales of woe, coal barons and criminals, militants and extortionists, the police and the protection racket, philanderers and gangsters, Christian missionaries and earthquakes, seismic history and Khasi uncharity, and hundreds of anecdotes and stories, songs and poetry, parables and fairy tales.
And all this, in just one chapter. As we journey along with the characters — on a road that is no road, but a twisting dirt track cut into a steep hillside, disfigured by craters and deep ruts and obstructed by stones the size of tables and watermelons — we can never predict what is coming next.
This dizzying diversity is replicated everywhere in the novel. We encounter in it ‘stories big and small, not so much about death, but about life, past, present and future, rural and urban, high and low; about admirable men and women, raconteurs and pranksters, lovers and fools, politicians and conmen, drunks and taxi drivers; about culture and history, religion and God, myth and legend.’
Besides the stories and anecdotes in prose and poetry, there are memoirs, travelogues, history — oral, colonial and postcolonial — true-life incidents, monographs and treatises. All of them are woven into a sequence of narratives that provide us a profound insight into a world where ‘the real and the surreal get blurred, spirits and deities become part of what is human and the imaginary is ever in conversation with the everyday.’
And these do not merely suggest dilettantism and variety, but immense depth and complexity. If Moby Dick can be seen as ‘more than just a novel of adventure, more than an encyclopedia of whaling lore and legend,’ and as a book that is ‘part of its author’s lifelong meditation on America,’ then the same thing can be said about Funeral Nights. It is indeed ‘intimate access to a whole world, spectacular in its documentation of a tribe’s life and culture such as has never been attempted before’. But more than that, it is essentially about what it means to be human in a world increasingly precarious.
There are indeed strange resemblances between the two massive books. The language of Melville is said to mirror ‘the discursive tics of Ahab and Ishmael’s modes of thought — nautical, theological, political, sociological, mythic, historic, naturalist, symbolist’. Kynpham’s prose is lucid and engaging and often lyrical and poetic, even though he has adapted the language of experience in telling his stories. There is a kind of tongue-in-cheek and boisterous humour in it, which is a joy to read. But it is also amazingly similar to the language of Moby Dick. And this similarity is specifically in those sections which discuss Khasi religious philosophy, traditional political and social systems and present-day psychological, sociological and environmental realities with illustrations from myths, history and symbols drawn not only from Khasi culture but from the greatest ‘classics of western civilisation.’
Also read: Book Review: Discovering Indigenous Modernity in the Words of Kabir
If it is ‘nearly impossible to place, to categorise, to hold without feeling the vertiginous swell’ of Moby Dick’s creation, the same difficulty is experienced with Funeral Nights. That is why Pinto’s blurb says ‘This is the Moby Dick of Meghalaya, a novel of huge ambition and tremendous appetite. Or is it a novel at all?’
D.H. Lawrence said that Moby Dick ‘is one of the strangest … books in the world.’ Funeral Nights is, without doubt, the strangest book I have read in recent times. Its stories, long and short, ‘about diverting incidents and characters,’ fascinate me. Its rich variety and nebulous depths fill me with awe.
Its serious conversation on race, ethnic identity, culture and religious philosophy has prompted Satchidanandan to describe it as ‘Here is a book of rare scholarship that Mircea Eliade or Claude Levi Strauss would have read with admiration.’ But since everything is presented in the form of Socratic dialogues and illustrated at every turn with illuminating examples and stories, the novel very much ‘remains as accessible as fiction to the lay reader.’ Despite its length and its strangeness, Funeral Nights is a voyage worth taking.
Kanchan Verma is a writer and translator. She translates fiction from English to Hindi and vice versa. She currently teaches at Lady Shri Ram College for Women, Delhi University.
Book Review: Kynpham’s 'Funeral Nights' Is an Unconventional Novel About the Khasis
It is indeed ‘intimate access to a whole world, spectacular in its documentation of a tribe’s life and culture such as has never been attempted before’.
Book Review: Kynpham’s 'Funeral Nights' Is an Unconventional Novel About the Khasis
Khasi woman and standing-stones, near Laitlyngkot, Meghalaya, India. Photo: Bogman/CC BY-SA 4.0/ Wikimedia Commons
Kanchan Verma
Kanchan Verma
Listen to this article:
Play00:0008:21
Volume
BOOKSCULTURE
13/AUG/2021
The blurb on Kynpham Sing Nongkynrih’s Funeral Nights tantalises me. It reads, ‘This is the Moby Dick of Meghalaya …’ Why did the novelist Jerry Pinto describe the novel thus? Intrigued, I tried reading the book from Pinto’s point of view.
Readers have usually identified some difficulties in reading Moby Dick. These include the book’s length, at 822 pages; its format, considered odd; its allusions to western classics, and its many symbols and metaphors that don’t easily explain themselves. The timeframe and the fact that Moby Dick is ‘not only an adventure story’, add up to make the book a very dense one indeed.
Kynpham Sing Nongkynrih
Funeral Nights
Context (August 2021)
Kynpham’s debut novel is of epic length at 1,024 pages and its format is quite unlike that of a conventional novel.
As the blurb reveals, its narrative frame was inspired by Boccaccio’s The Decameron and The Arabian Nights: a group of academics and writers from Shillong journey to a remote part of West Khasi Hills to witness ‘Ka Phor Sohrat’, the feast of the dead, a unique six-day-long funeral ceremony of the Lyngngams, a Khasi sub-tribe.
By mistake, however, the group ends up reaching the secluded hamlet of Nongshyrkon seven days early. ‘Stuck in the jungle for eleven days, they spend their nights around a fire in the middle of a spacious hut built especially for them, sharing stories and debating issues in what turns out to be a journey of discovery for all of them.’
The novel begins with the narrator introducing himself, ‘My name is Ap Jutang…’ (‘Call me Ishmael,’ in Moby Dick). But what an introduction it turns out to be! Ap Jutang weaves into the narrative about himself and his birthplace, Sohra, so many exciting accounts about his people and the land steeped in stories, legends and folk memories, that a whole new world is immediately opened to me.
The book has 12 fat chapters, each with a title. Most of the chapters are divided into ‘Root Stories’ and ‘Little Stories’, depending upon what the characters share on a particular night. In the first chapter, the narrator explains why he wants to write a book about his people, the Khasis — to clear their wounded name. But he would not do it in a manner that would make him sound ‘like one of those wearying pedants’ whom he dislikes so much and from whom he ‘ran away in such a hurry?’ He would tell us the story of his people through an account of his journey to the jungle village of Nongshyrkon. He would tell us of the grave and funny things he and his friends talked about, and of the light-hearted self-examination they indulged in, the illumination they sought, and most of all, the stories they exchanged.
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And nothing is as simple as it seems. In the second chapter entitled ‘The Journey’, for instance, we not only get a vivid and reflective description of the difficult journey from Shillong into the deep jungles of West Khasi Hills but much, much more. We come across the Torajans of Indonesia and their fascinating death rituals; we listen to the equally fascinating funeral rites of the Lyngngams; we hear about Khasi name stories, colonial and pre-colonial histories, the English and their mini-Englands, Rabindranath Tagore and the local philistines, Nobel laureates and their reminiscences, politicians and political shenanigans, tales of corruption and government neglect, the Supreme Court and the strange narratives wrapped around its twin bans on coal and timber, rat-hole mining and dead rivers, pristine forests and their frightful decimation, deprivation and tales of woe, coal barons and criminals, militants and extortionists, the police and the protection racket, philanderers and gangsters, Christian missionaries and earthquakes, seismic history and Khasi uncharity, and hundreds of anecdotes and stories, songs and poetry, parables and fairy tales.
And all this, in just one chapter. As we journey along with the characters — on a road that is no road, but a twisting dirt track cut into a steep hillside, disfigured by craters and deep ruts and obstructed by stones the size of tables and watermelons — we can never predict what is coming next.
This dizzying diversity is replicated everywhere in the novel. We encounter in it ‘stories big and small, not so much about death, but about life, past, present and future, rural and urban, high and low; about admirable men and women, raconteurs and pranksters, lovers and fools, politicians and conmen, drunks and taxi drivers; about culture and history, religion and God, myth and legend.’
Besides the stories and anecdotes in prose and poetry, there are memoirs, travelogues, history — oral, colonial and postcolonial — true-life incidents, monographs and treatises. All of them are woven into a sequence of narratives that provide us a profound insight into a world where ‘the real and the surreal get blurred, spirits and deities become part of what is human and the imaginary is ever in conversation with the everyday.’
And these do not merely suggest dilettantism and variety, but immense depth and complexity. If Moby Dick can be seen as ‘more than just a novel of adventure, more than an encyclopedia of whaling lore and legend,’ and as a book that is ‘part of its author’s lifelong meditation on America,’ then the same thing can be said about Funeral Nights. It is indeed ‘intimate access to a whole world, spectacular in its documentation of a tribe’s life and culture such as has never been attempted before’. But more than that, it is essentially about what it means to be human in a world increasingly precarious.
There are indeed strange resemblances between the two massive books. The language of Melville is said to mirror ‘the discursive tics of Ahab and Ishmael’s modes of thought — nautical, theological, political, sociological, mythic, historic, naturalist, symbolist’. Kynpham’s prose is lucid and engaging and often lyrical and poetic, even though he has adapted the language of experience in telling his stories. There is a kind of tongue-in-cheek and boisterous humour in it, which is a joy to read. But it is also amazingly similar to the language of Moby Dick. And this similarity is specifically in those sections which discuss Khasi religious philosophy, traditional political and social systems and present-day psychological, sociological and environmental realities with illustrations from myths, history and symbols drawn not only from Khasi culture but from the greatest ‘classics of western civilisation.’
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If it is ‘nearly impossible to place, to categorise, to hold without feeling the vertiginous swell’ of Moby Dick’s creation, the same difficulty is experienced with Funeral Nights. That is why Pinto’s blurb says ‘This is the Moby Dick of Meghalaya, a novel of huge ambition and tremendous appetite. Or is it a novel at all?’
D.H. Lawrence said that Moby Dick ‘is one of the strangest … books in the world.’ Funeral Nights is, without doubt, the strangest book I have read in recent times. Its stories, long and short, ‘about diverting incidents and characters,’ fascinate me. Its rich variety and nebulous depths fill me with awe.
Its serious conversation on race, ethnic identity, culture and religious philosophy has prompted Satchidanandan to describe it as ‘Here is a book of rare scholarship that Mircea Eliade or Claude Levi Strauss would have read with admiration.’ But since everything is presented in the form of Socratic dialogues and illustrated at every turn with illuminating examples and stories, the novel very much ‘remains as accessible as fiction to the lay reader.’ Despite its length and its strangeness, Funeral Nights is a voyage worth taking.
Kanchan Verma is a writer and translator. She translates fiction from English to Hindi and vice versa. She currently teaches at Lady Shri Ram College for Women, Delhi University.
December 31, 2022
This was my Meghalaya read for my #ReadingIndia challenge.
If I am honest with myself, this book is really a DNF. Because by the last 3-400 pages I was speed reading, barely registering what I was reading any longer, because I just wanted to be done with it.
There were so many wonderful details here that it felt like a museum or a tapestry of all things Khasi. But it was also a little too unwieldy for me, literally (my wrist hurt if I spent too long with this tome) and figuratively. The basic plot―friends planning to attend a rare funeral ceremony arrive early and spend the nights they have to wait in long conversations―is a great device, but I did find the structure like a trellis against which a banyan was planted.
Some of the stories that are narrated felt repetitive and I think if this was more closely edited, I would have enjoyed it more. However, I cannot deny that in its scale and scope this is a remarkable feat; it covers history, mythology, current affairs, architecture, culture, so much about the land of the Khasis that I am awed by it.
I think the ambition and the execution of this book is a fascinating accomplishment, but I think in the process some of the sheer pleasure that a book can bring was sacrificed. There was a point where I was almost hoping the book would end and by the time I got to the end, my initial joy and excitement were drained entirely.
Maybe this just wasn’t for me. It took me nearly five months to finish this and then too, I only managed to finish it so I could meet a self-imposed goal.
If I am honest with myself, this book is really a DNF. Because by the last 3-400 pages I was speed reading, barely registering what I was reading any longer, because I just wanted to be done with it.
There were so many wonderful details here that it felt like a museum or a tapestry of all things Khasi. But it was also a little too unwieldy for me, literally (my wrist hurt if I spent too long with this tome) and figuratively. The basic plot―friends planning to attend a rare funeral ceremony arrive early and spend the nights they have to wait in long conversations―is a great device, but I did find the structure like a trellis against which a banyan was planted.
Some of the stories that are narrated felt repetitive and I think if this was more closely edited, I would have enjoyed it more. However, I cannot deny that in its scale and scope this is a remarkable feat; it covers history, mythology, current affairs, architecture, culture, so much about the land of the Khasis that I am awed by it.
I think the ambition and the execution of this book is a fascinating accomplishment, but I think in the process some of the sheer pleasure that a book can bring was sacrificed. There was a point where I was almost hoping the book would end and by the time I got to the end, my initial joy and excitement were drained entirely.
Maybe this just wasn’t for me. It took me nearly five months to finish this and then too, I only managed to finish it so I could meet a self-imposed goal.
December 4, 2025
A gargantuan tour de force of a novel with the clear mission of introducing to or deepening the understanding of the history and mythical lore of Khasi culture for its own young people. It`s a forceful attempt at teaching or re-awakening an understanding and appreciation for their own unique cultural identity, which over the last century has been increasingly diluted by external influxes, both cultural and religious. It also tries to make the reader aware of the undercurrent of social issues present in modern Khasi culture that result from those external influences.
The novel does very little in the sense of handholding for certain Khasi specific terms and concepts, so not being a Khasi myself and not having grown up with the terminology I sometimes did get lost a little, but I do understand I`m not the primary audience for the novel and it still opened up a cultural world to me which I knew literally nothing about before reading it. I have to say I`m very grateful for getting a chance to learn about a culture most people outside the region know nothing about.
This novel, hopefully, will not only help to teach its readers about Khasi culture, it undoubtedly is also an important work for its very preservation.
The novel does very little in the sense of handholding for certain Khasi specific terms and concepts, so not being a Khasi myself and not having grown up with the terminology I sometimes did get lost a little, but I do understand I`m not the primary audience for the novel and it still opened up a cultural world to me which I knew literally nothing about before reading it. I have to say I`m very grateful for getting a chance to learn about a culture most people outside the region know nothing about.
This novel, hopefully, will not only help to teach its readers about Khasi culture, it undoubtedly is also an important work for its very preservation.
May 2, 2022
It's huge. 1000 pages render an encyclopedia like undeniable depth to Funeral Nights. To put it 'simply', it is an assortment of anecdotes, facts, folklore, history, geography, civics, culture, etymology, sociology and linguistics of Khasi culture, and of course, a lot about "Kyiad" (Alcohol), "Khalai" (Gambling) & "Kynthei" (Women), the three vices of the Khasis, narrated with an uncomfortable amount of scatological humor. Woven together with a contemporary storyline where a group of friends visit an elaborate traditional funeral ceremony 'Ka Phor Sorat' spanning 10 days (inspired by one such ceremony that was recorded in Feb 1992 at Nongshyrkon). They stay up late all 10 nights narrating everything there is to know about the Khasi culture. One would imagine a 1000 page tome to lose focus at times and talk about irrelevant topics, but not here. Kynpham ensures all 1000 pages of the book are singularly focused on Meghalaya, never going beyond Kamrup in the north and Sylhet in the south. I think I would have to write a small book of my own just to list the subjects in this book.
An engrossing novel since the entire book is mostly story telling so in a conversation format. Highly recommended for anyone who wants to know everything there is know about the people of Meghalaya.
An engrossing novel since the entire book is mostly story telling so in a conversation format. Highly recommended for anyone who wants to know everything there is know about the people of Meghalaya.
August 17, 2022
Kynpham Sing Nongkynrih has written a fantastic book. I have always loved the North-Eastern part of India, and I believe most Indians often mistreat our fellow citizens from this part of the country.
However, I cannot claim to be an expert on the culture of this part of India. It is varied - there is no one North-Eastern culture. When Kynpham Sing Nongkynrih wrote this book, he brought us one step closer to an appreciation of Khasi culture. The plot is simple: a group of friends traveled to a remote part of the state to witness a cremation ceremony. During their ten days there, they shared stories. The narrator, Ap, has the most stories to tell, and these stories educate his fellow Khasis.
It's a simple plot, but in narrating the tales, he also lets us in on the issues facing Khasis today.
Stories make us, and when we forget the stories of our ancestors, we forget who we are.
Is it the Moby Dick of Meghalaya? I don't know. I aver, however, this book will leave an indelible influence on you. When you read the book - and savor the tales - you will find yourself transported to a magical place.
This book is beautiful.
However, I cannot claim to be an expert on the culture of this part of India. It is varied - there is no one North-Eastern culture. When Kynpham Sing Nongkynrih wrote this book, he brought us one step closer to an appreciation of Khasi culture. The plot is simple: a group of friends traveled to a remote part of the state to witness a cremation ceremony. During their ten days there, they shared stories. The narrator, Ap, has the most stories to tell, and these stories educate his fellow Khasis.
It's a simple plot, but in narrating the tales, he also lets us in on the issues facing Khasis today.
Stories make us, and when we forget the stories of our ancestors, we forget who we are.
Is it the Moby Dick of Meghalaya? I don't know. I aver, however, this book will leave an indelible influence on you. When you read the book - and savor the tales - you will find yourself transported to a magical place.
This book is beautiful.
June 5, 2022
The book is not a novel in the truest sense. Going deep into the art of folklore and history of what we can say the khasi society, this book can be termed as tome on everything one can know about the Khasis.a group of people, a very eclectic mix of people indeed, goes to place to attend what can be said one of it's kind of funeral ceremony and through them writer has questions and answers too about various facets of Khasi. The sheer number of tales or anecdotes may put one down and find it difficult to grasp all, but the attempt to read it through is so rewarding and one will come with a sense of knowing the Khasi society well after reading the whole book. A brilliant book indeed.
January 6, 2025
Amazing novel, absolutely worth reading! Nongkynrih leads you into the world and culture of the Khasi in a way nothing else could do.
Occasionally, the book becomes a bit dull, the entirety is amazing, and it can definitely be argued that the final chapter is one of the best fragments of literature ever written.
Would absolutely recommend everyone who is interested in the world outside of themselves to read this novel.
Occasionally, the book becomes a bit dull, the entirety is amazing, and it can definitely be argued that the final chapter is one of the best fragments of literature ever written.
Would absolutely recommend everyone who is interested in the world outside of themselves to read this novel.
March 3, 2022
An evocative book that takes you into the heart of Meghalaya, and introduces you to the Khasi culture, their traditions, myths, folklore, politics, society. It is an ambitious undertaking by the author and he succeeds in it. The narrative style is unique as the stories and anecdotes about the Khasis are shared during conversations among friends.
It felt like I was there sitting around a bonfire, listening to their banter.
For a detailed review:
https://tsbookclub.wordpress.com/2022...
It felt like I was there sitting around a bonfire, listening to their banter.
For a detailed review:
https://tsbookclub.wordpress.com/2022...
October 4, 2021
Full review on https://www.thehindubusinessline.com/...
The sheer range and the number of stories that are covered during the 10 nights does tend to overwhelm the reader. There is a morbid story about the origin of why betel nut or kwai is integral to Khasi hospitality and a slightly off-putting story about why the pork in Sohra is more delicious than anywhere else. There are stories about tribes who fought against the imposition of Hinduism, another about families that fell under the spell of a Christian fundamentalist Doomsday Cult, and the story of why the buffalo and rooster are sacred to the Khasis. And then there are also long discussions on deforestation, how coal mining has continued illegally even after the NGT ban, the pros and cons of nuclear energy and opening up the mountains of Meghalaya for the uranium deposits. It is impossible to bound the stories to a genre.
Though the book is divided into chapters with the theme of the night such as Root Stories, Little Stories, Name Stories and others, the reader sometimes ends up confused and loses track of the narration since the stories merge into more stories. It could start with the members of the group talking to each other, discussing Khasi culture and the influx of outsiders, and the narration moves on to history where it is the reader who is now being addressed in long passages. A conversation that starts with someone narrating a Khasi folk tale could end in political commentary or even in a rant about corrupt politicians. Also, sitting in a remote village with erratic electricity and no mobile signals, it did seem a bit contrived when many a time, someone in the group, usually the tad boring but very knowledgeable Ap Jutang, pulls out his tablet or mobile phone on which a relevant article or poem has been very conveniently saved and goes on to read it aloud to the group.
The sheer range and the number of stories that are covered during the 10 nights does tend to overwhelm the reader. There is a morbid story about the origin of why betel nut or kwai is integral to Khasi hospitality and a slightly off-putting story about why the pork in Sohra is more delicious than anywhere else. There are stories about tribes who fought against the imposition of Hinduism, another about families that fell under the spell of a Christian fundamentalist Doomsday Cult, and the story of why the buffalo and rooster are sacred to the Khasis. And then there are also long discussions on deforestation, how coal mining has continued illegally even after the NGT ban, the pros and cons of nuclear energy and opening up the mountains of Meghalaya for the uranium deposits. It is impossible to bound the stories to a genre.
Though the book is divided into chapters with the theme of the night such as Root Stories, Little Stories, Name Stories and others, the reader sometimes ends up confused and loses track of the narration since the stories merge into more stories. It could start with the members of the group talking to each other, discussing Khasi culture and the influx of outsiders, and the narration moves on to history where it is the reader who is now being addressed in long passages. A conversation that starts with someone narrating a Khasi folk tale could end in political commentary or even in a rant about corrupt politicians. Also, sitting in a remote village with erratic electricity and no mobile signals, it did seem a bit contrived when many a time, someone in the group, usually the tad boring but very knowledgeable Ap Jutang, pulls out his tablet or mobile phone on which a relevant article or poem has been very conveniently saved and goes on to read it aloud to the group.
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