Style in Slumdog Millionaire
Tragicomedy is fictional work that blends aspects of the genres of tragedy and comedy. In English literature, from Shakespeare's time to the nineteenth century, tragicomedy referred to a serious play with a happy ending or a serious play with an unhappy ending, which however may be filled with jokes throughout.
First Person Narrative:
This novel is written in first person:
- How is our understanding of the novel aided through this style?
- How does the first person narrative style help us make a connection with Ram?
- How is our opinion of other characters/events skewed by this style?
Narrative Style:
1. Allusions to Bollywood:
· Throughout the text there are references to Bollywood.
· Ram relates what is happening around him to Bollywood plots, actors, films, as he has no one to explain his own life to him. Instead he has to use his imagination where much of its inspiration comes from Bollywood.
· It is inside the films that Ram and Salim seek comfort and refuge and they have the function of taking him away from his painful reality. On page 371, the author Swarup says, “The potboiler Hindi films have traditionally been considered escapist entertainment, perhaps highlighting their reality to the masses. They almost become an alternate reality for the poor.”
· Ram says "These films are about a fantasy world. A world in which kids have mothers and fathers, and birthdays. We saw this fantasy world but never got carried away with it. The most we could aspire to was to become one of those who held power over us"
· When Ram evaluates periods of his life according to Bollywood, eg “a drama with doses of comedy and action ending eventually in tragedy. In film parlance, this is how I could describe the time I spent with Neelima Kumari.”
· When he meets Nita p298, "In Hindi films, I have seen the prostitute heroine is inevitably a good hearted girl who has been forced into this profession against her will. At the end of the film, the prostitute almost always commits suicide by consuming poison. I wonder whether I have been brought to this whorehouse for a purpose. Whether there is a heroine waiting for me behind this door. Whether I am her hero who is supposed to rescue her. And whether I can change the ending preventing her death."
· “I realised again that real life is very different from reel life” (p396)
· “Till now, my conception of love has been based entirely on Hindi films, where the hero and the heroine make eye contact and whoosh, some strange chemistry starts their hearts beating and their vocal chords tingling and the next you see of them, they are slipping off singing songs in Swiss villages and American shopping malls.”
Much of the story has elements of Bollywood:
1. Ram envisages his mother as a noble, beautiful woman in a white sari who has no choice but to leave her beloved baby at St Mary’s church. His recall is fused with a film version as he describes her in relation to the camera
2. Every woman he connects with reminds him of his idealised mother and is a reason why he acts as their protector.
3. There are coincidences: eg Smita hears of his arrest, recognises him and rescues him to pay back her debt of gratitude when he helped her as Gudiya.
4. Prem Kumar is the abuser of both Neelima and Nita.
5. Ram photographs Maman and then has the opportunity to have him killed.
2. Use of a Conceit
A conceit is like a riddle or pun to cleverly allude to an idea
·
Shankar’s speech is like a conceit in that the consonants seem to mean nothing but following the chapter heading 100,000,000 X GKRZ OPKNU or A Love story, a certain code can be worked out.
· Shankar is thought to be autistic and unable to communicate after the trauma of being rejected by his mother –he “discovered her dirty little secret and that is why she threw you out of the house. And that is when you lost the ability to speak like a normal boy.”
· When Ram says he is going to ask her to pay for the rabies antidote, Shankar replies, “IK IK IL LGZXIZ AKIP CK PK HU HJHHU” –decoded as “No no No, please don’t go to my mummy.”
· Being autistic and speaking like this, he cannot break through and make himself understood.
· Ironically when he is delirious with the rabies and near death, and” when the doctor he would stop speaking completely”, he speaks lucidly “Why did you throw me out Mummy? I am sorry, I should have knocked. How could I know Uncle was inside with you? I love you Mummy. I draw pictures of you. My blue diary is full of pictures. Your pictures. I love you Mummy.”
· There is a sense of pathos here as he speaks as if “regressed to a long-lost time.” (1, pathos, poignancy. a quality that arouses emotions (especially pity or sorrow)
· We as readers are saddened that these last intelligible words are of love towards Swapna Devi who is actually consigning him to death.
3. Use of Motif of a woman in a white sari
· Unifies the story binding together his need for love and connection with the people he gets close to. These people actually make a surrogate family when added together. The negative experiences also give him nightmares when he is really distressed about the cruelty and suffering he sees. Father Timothy a father. Gudiya becomes a sister; Shankar a brother; every experience that Ram goes through alters this motif. It is evident that his mother plays a significant role in his life through which filter he interprets events.
· Ram invents a Bollywood type story about his mother having to abandon her love child in tragic circumstances
- This is how he envisages his abandonment: “…a tall and graceful young woman, wearing a white sari, leaves hospital after midnight with a baby in her arms. The wind is howling, her long black hair blows across her face, obscuring her features. Leaves rustle near her feet. Dust scatters. Lightning flashes. She walks with heavy footsteps to the church, clutching the baby to her bosom. She reaches the door… then she places him in the bin arranging the old clothes to make him comfortable. She takes one final look at her baby, averts her eyes and then, running away from the camera, disappears into the night.”
· Throughout the novel, the dream morphs and changes as he becomes attached to people
· As indicated by the class, a pattern emerges – Gudiya is described as a sister, Father Timothy as a father, Shankar as a brother so that Ram gathers together the wish fulfilment of a family.
· It becomes a nightmare at Maman’s house. “That night I dream of going to a house Jahu Vila Park. I ring the bell and wait. A tall woman opens the door. She is wearing a white sari. A strong wind is howling, making her long black hair fly across her face, obscuring it. I open my mouth to say something, and then discover that she is looking down at me. I look again and discover with a shock that I have no legs.”
· He is deeply affected by the suffering of the children. It affects his subconscious and he feels their pain.
· Relationship with Gudiya changes the dream. They have connected physically through holding hands through the wall, and emotionally. When she is threatened and her cat is killed his dream alters. “Just then another woman arrives. She is also tall and graceful, but her face is swathed in bandages. She plucks the baby from the bin and smothers him. She says “s-i-s-t-e-r” the baby gurgles back “Meeow!” a strangled cry from the cat suddenly pierces the night. I wake up and try to figure whether the cry I heard came from the dream or the room next door.” The love he feels for her has become threatened by her father's violence as he is now in the role of victim.
· Also changes because of Shankar. Ram is horrified by his mother's indifference. "That night I dream of going to a house Jahu Vile Park. I ring the bell and wait. A tall woman opens the door. She wears a white sari. A strong wind is howling, making her long black hair fly across her face, obscuring it. The baby looks into her eyes and gurgles sweetly...Mama. The mother opens her mouth to reply to the baby but the only sound that comes out of her lips is 'Q Gkrz Ukj Hu Wxmu" The baby shrieks and tumbles form her lap. I wake up and check whether I still have a tongue."
· In his darkest hour, being tortured by the police in the prologue, he almost loses consciousness and his last thought is, "I see a tall woman, with flowing black hair. The wind is howling behind her, making her jet-black hair flying across her face, obscuring it. She is wearing a white sari of thin fabric that flutters and vibrates like a kite…She opens her arms and cries, my son...my son...what are they doing to you?"
· In the epilogue, Ram says, "I realised a long time ago that dreams only have power over your mind; but with money you can have power over the minds of others." Perhaps the dreams of his mother reflected the only comfort he could have and when the dream was distorted, we feel his fellow feeling with his victims, his empathy that leads him to help them as he imagines his mother would have helped him?
4. Motif of the jeep with the flashing red light
· The recurring symbol or motif is symbolic of authority, the police and legal consequences of wrong doing.
· It is also an example of synecdoche –a figure of speech in which a part is used for the whole Eg: Jeep (part) = Police (whole).
· It is something Ram fears and points to the powerlessness he feels at times that he can't do anything.
· First occurs in page 11 when Ram describes the passive and inevitable trouble of the "hapless" in the slums who "expect, even wait for, the police. When "they came" there was "no hue or cry" -no concern as "you are conditioned to believe that one day there will be a warrant with your name on it, that eventually a jeep with a flashing red light will come for you."
· At this stage we do not know why the police have come and presume that he has done something wrong. In the eyes of the authorities he had dared to challenge the natural order of things and win a game show. We find out later that it is a matter of financial embarrassment for the producers that he has won, but in the corrupt society in which he lives, at the bottom of the social hierarchy, he is a victim to others' greed.
· When Ram pushes Shantaram through the rail and he falls, Ram envisages the consequences as the officers "arrive in a jeep with flashing red lights." Through this he imagines the scene and thinking that he is guilty of murder, decides that he won't let nature or the inevitable happen. He makes his own choice and determines his own future by fleeing.
· It sets up an expectation or dread that it is inevitable that he will be in trouble with the law. When he leaves Father Timothy's he states with surprise, “They didn't come for me in a van with a flashing red light. They came in a blue van with wire meshed windows" -almost the same heartless, institutional efficiency and power. This time he goes to the Juvenile Home which seems more like a reform place for criminal boys than an orphanage.
· At the Taylor’s a police jeep, its red light flashing and ambassador car come to the house -the state has justly rounded up a criminal this time.
· Later Ram states, "Every day that I stay in the chawl, I fear that a jeep with flashing red light will come..."after he has stolen money from Neelima's place and he leaves her dead.
· "A rainy day ceases to have meaning for a person who has lived in the open under a monsoon cloud for most of his life. I had experienced too many misfortunes and with the constant fear at the back of my mind that a jeep with a flashing red light could come any day to arrest me for the murder of a nameless dacoit or Shantaram or even Neelima Kumari, it felt pointless to make long term plans for the future."
5. Symbol of the lucky coin
· First acquired on a trip to India Gate with Salim and other orphans from Juvenile Home. Ram and Salim have spent their r10 at a fortune teller who tells him he has a remarkable hand but weak line of heart and short time of life and for r200 can give him something to ease his way. Perhaps she feels sorry for having shafted him and gives him the coin.
· When he uses it first and flips it on the ground, it rolls under a bench and there is a r10 note and from then on becomes his lucky coin.
· He uses it to see if he can trust Smita.
· He uses it to convince Salim to run away from Maman because he is going to maim them to become beggars.
· He uses it on the game show after using "half and half lifeboat" to decide whether to choose A or C. Later we find that it is heads on both sides so with it, the writer has created suspense but we realise that Ram knows what is the right thing to do but allows others to seem to be involved in the decision making too.
6. Dramatic Irony
Occurs when the readers know more than the characters.
· We realise the significance of what Ram is confessing that he saw in Father John’s room. He is confessing to seeing things but we know Father John having the pornographic material is the sin.
· Is he “an idiot orphan boy?”
· Ram using the coin to get Salim to escape from Maman – we recognise this from the ending
7. Motif: Dehumanisation
This occurs where characters are compared or compare themselves to animals. To dehumanise something is to deprive it of human qualities. It can be demeaning degrading, and people are made to feel inferior.