The Vendor of Sweets

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Jagan, thevendor of sweets, finds himself confronted by his estranged son Mali, who has returned to Malgudi with Grace, his American wife, and a grand plan for selling story-writing machines. What follows is a classic cross-generational battle between father and son. A man of Gandhian principles, Jagan cannot reconcile himself to Mali’s modern ways, but develops a fondness for Grace. Unable to find a place in the new world, Jagan decides to retire, only to learn that Mali has been arrested by the police and has deserted his wife. Insightful and moving, The Vendor of Sweets is R.K. Narayan’s story of an India trying to find its own identity.

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R. K. Narayan was born in Madras in 1906 and educated there and at Maharaja College of Mysore. His first novel Swami and Friends (1935) was set in the enchanting fictional territory of Malgudi. Narayan’s other novels are The Bachelor of Arts , The Dark Room, The English Teacher , Mr Sampath, The Financial Expert, Waiting for the Mahatma, the Sahitya Akademi award-winning The Guide, The Man-eater of Malgudi, The Vendor of Sweets, The Painter of Signs, A Tiger for Malgudi, Talkative Man and The World of Nagaraj. Besides six collections of short stories, Narayan published two travel books, five collections of essays, translations of Indian epics and myths, and a memoir, My Days, A Town Called Malgudi, The World of Malgudi, The Magic of Malgudi and Memories of Malgudi, collections of Narayan’s fiction, and Malgudi Landscapes, a selection of his best writings, are available in Penguin Books. The Writerly Life, a volume of his selected non-fiction, is available in Viking. In 1980 R.K. Narayan was awarded the A. C. Benson medal by the Royal Society of Literature and was made an Honorary Member of the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters. In 1989 he was made a member of the Rajya Sabha. In 2000 the Government of India conferred on him the Padma Vibhushan. R. K. Narayan died in May2001.