PUBLISHER: Penguin Random House India
Translated by Pooja Priyamvada
“I don’t live in my home. I roam everywhere with it within me.”
‘Rooh’ by Manav Kaul is a journey, a travelogue, a part memoir of a person trying desperately to search his roots and rest his case with his memories, with his personal history.
Haunting and Lyrical. The book is like peeping into someone’s private space. Are we intruding? Is the author’s narration permission granted to us to invade his space?
Manav Kaul travels to Kashmir to search for his home. White walls. Blue door. Khwaja Bagh. The book narrates the incompleteness of Kashmiri Pandits who fled their homeland. But there is no ‘us’, and there is no ‘them’. No blame games. No politics. No vilification.
It is just a quiet turmoil, a restless soul searching for his roots. The author’s memories of white walls and the blue door in Khwaja Bagh continuously glare out of the pages in his desperation to come to a closure. To search himself.
The book is poignant, raw and nostalgic. Flitting between the past and the present, the book also has an incompleteness to it. There are a lot of random encounters the author has had while travelling in Kashmir, and he has used them sensitively.
Page 83-when he writes about the Chopan men who seemingly had taken a pair of shoes from their tent, Manav Kaul reflecting on their tough life writes, “Who is the thief, this old Chopan man or us?”
Rooh is a character in the book inextricably mixed with his past visits to his lost homeland. There is a mystery about the character- fact or fiction? On being questioned about it, Manav Kaul has said, “If I answer this, I will reduce the reader’s imagination, the reader’s belief in the book.” https://www.indiatoday.in/lifestyle/books/story/manav-kaul-on-his-novel-rooh-kashmir-and-favourite-books-exclusive-interview-2404986-2023-07-11
Pooja Priyamvada, has translated/transcreated the author’s work beautifully with the right emotions and right words.
However, there are certain words whose meanings are not clear :‘wazwan’ on page 50… one has to read ahead to understand. Also, ‘noon chai’.
The poems are stirring. It would have been interesting to read the poems if they were kept in the original language of Hindi too for those who can read Hindi, though not a book, and thus have bought the translation.
This is a book that seeps into you. The tide and ebb of its emotions become yours. Its placid narrations wash over you.
‘Rooh’ by Manav Kaul is a homage to Kashmir. It is a book best read when you are in a mood to just let feelings take over.
Preeta Chag 