“The modern thing,” as Alec informs a skeptical café proprietor in a bid to get a young Mr. Biswas hired as a sign writer, “is to have lots of words.”Footnote ¹ This shameless campaign for verbiage might well resonate with some students’ initial assessment of V. S. Naipaul’s A House for Mr. Biswas. Instead, as part of an undergraduate postcolonial literature course in a university in Ghana, I aim for the novel to stimulate the kind of discussions that will dispel that impression.Footnote ² My students and I will review the life of a man inauspiciously born “the wrong way” as he and his wider society are portrayed humorously and mercilessly, with tenderness but also objectivity. Given Naipaul’s descriptive style and the prominence the novel accords the practice of reading, Biswas is especially useful for the underlying objectives of our discussions. These include exercising textual analytic skills and developing a more articulate writing style, while becoming more cognizant of one’s own reading practices. Ultimately, I hope to help my students come to trust in their ability to interrogate a literary text and evaluate it in their own words. This should help them build a solid foundation upon which they may later develop an arsenal of literary theories.

The novel opens by announcing the upcoming death of Mr. Biswas; the first line declares a ten-week countdown. Despite the anticipation that a death foretold could provoke, the details that follow—his currently placid interactions with his family, the much-vaunted house, the languid and seemingly forgetful solicitor’s clerk, and even the title of the next chapter (“Pastoral”)—are early indications that, relative to other novels the class has treated, less priority will be given to action and suspense. Indeed, even though there is something undoubtedly heroic about the protagonist’s relentless and greatly detailed battle to “lay claim to [his] portion of the earth” (11), his life perpetually evokes stasis and redundancy. We will note that it is often starkness, grubbiness, desolation, and ennui, as well as everyday absurdities, which are brought to life through vivid narration. We will stop to appreciate the finesse and ever-present humor with which the narrator chronicles otherwise commonplace activities, for example Mr. Biswas trying to impress his new neighbors: “Looking stern, preoccupied and, as he hoped, dangerous, Mr. Biswas became very busy, helping the carter to unload” (137). In addition to the narrator’s style, there are other things to hold our attention. These include points of contact between the protagonist and the reader. Indeed, reading is one of the practices that come to influence the directions Mr. Biswas’s life takes, and as readers we will pause on this for a while.

As part of being recognized “officially,” Mr. Biswas is admitted to Lai’s school, and “the new world” is opened to him with its “chanting” and note-taking. We discover his notes, “which he never seriously believed, about geysers, rift valleys, watersheds, currents, the Gulf Stream, and a number of deserts” (45). At this stage, he is still learning to evoke the images behind the words he only recently learned to read. This provides a window for my students to consider how reading influences their own perceptions, especially about places they may have not yet visited. What images might they already be painting of Trinidad, filtered through this narration? Later, Mr. Biswas habitually reads out loud to Ajodha, titillating him with articles from the syndicated column That Body of Yours. As he enters young adulthood, he loses himself in stories by Samuel Smiles and quickly realizes that Smiles’s heroes are diametrically opposed to him in terms of romanticism and ambition. We will point out that Mr. Biswas’s circumstances lie outside the borders of the “magic land” of Smiles’s heroes, where “ambitions could be pursued and had a meaning” (75). My readers, poised as they are to enter the workforce and take their life in hand, may need to reconsider the amount of agency they accord the protagonist, and thus, the extent to which they hold him responsible for all the letdowns and the compromises he has to make. Samuel Smiles stays with Mr. Biswas into adulthood, along with Bell’s Standard Elocutionist and Marcus Aurelius, whom he sometimes evokes as a symbol of his own intelligence. We will remark that young Mr. Biswas’s reading seems to be underlined by his removal from the referents he reads about.

Nevertheless, Mr. Biswas is not exclusively a passive receiver of written material; he develops a different form of agency as he becomes a dealer in words and, in his own way, a creator of romance. His storytelling, which also comprises his failed attempts at fiction, is tied to the malaise that haunts him for most of his life. We will discuss the slight ridiculousness of his extravagant signs, which among other things welcome potential clients into shops with stern warnings not to loiter, showcase snowy Santa Clauses who “blister in the blazing sun” (74), and advertise goods and services that shopkeepers do not have on offer. The sign over his own dour, stuffy little shop is in keeping with this ill-fitting optimism because it declares that customers have come to the “Bonne Esperance Grocery.” Additionally, after he is hired as a journalist, Mr. Biswas channels his creativity into crafting stories instead of reporting them. He is far less concerned with the accuracy normally expected of a journalist than with a profound desire to create something. Years before, when reading That Body of Yours, it had “puzzled” him to see the effect the words had on Ajodha, who reacted with “gravity, concern and alarm” (48). But by the time he is writing his own columns, his fiery catchphrases, “Amazing scenes were witnessed yesterday when . . .” and “Passers-by stopped and stared yesterday when . . . ,” show that he has grasped the mechanism by which words may be used to seize a reader’s attention.

For us, approaching the novel as a simple linear narrative may lead some to dismiss it as a life of resounding failures and accidents, dappled with unremarkable successes. Rather, the narrator adroitly presents various series of hope, mobility, failure, and anticipation within a bigger narrative structure where the end of the novel echoes its opening lines. We might see these as a reflection of the Hindu belief that life is a cycle. In any case, I will have divided the students into groups and assigned them various sections of the novel from which to extract themes, motifs, and symbols. Symbols will include the house, the typewriter, the furniture, the newspaper, and others. Also, I will invite them to point out the incidents that they find striking—they will offer a list of deaths, meetings, births, fights, reconciliations, and so on.Footnote ³ The resulting discussions will be a way to share impressions and establish a timeline for the plot.

Beyond constituting a chronology from Mr. Biswas’s birth to his burial, however, we will also concentrate on how some of the events, though they may have sprung from lofty aspirations, quickly deflate and get incorporated into a cycle of a tedious, pedestrian life. They will initially point out the most obvious of these—the houses. Though they feature prominently throughout the novel and in its title, the acquisition of Mr. Biswas’s various homes is marred with myriad defects. Besides the houses, Mr. Biswas entertains high hopes about love; this is also warped in its realization. For a wistful yet anticipatory period, it seems that the romance that he makes his watchword shall come to fruition in Shama. From the prologue, we are already aware that she is to become his wife. Then, like a romantic, main event, her entrance is neatly announced at the end of a chapter: “He no longer simply lived. He had begun to wait, not only for love, but for the world to yield its sweetness and romance. He deferred all his pleasure in life until that day. And it was in this mood of expectation that he went to Hanuman House at Arwacas, and saw Shama” (76). Shama thus personifies the confused profusion of sentiment young Mr. Biswas develops and concretizes in his love letter. Yet, there is a sharp comedown when their first interaction shows that she does not have the shoulders for these sorts of impractical expectations. Worse, Mr. Biswas, far from being an unwavering and amorous hero, is railroaded into marrying a girl he has already become disenchanted with. There is little romance left after that. What becomes the real focus in their life together after the court wedding is what the narrator seems to be telling us many marriages are about – stomach upsets, spectacular fights, trivial fights, sulking, unappetizing food, and illogical behavior.

By focusing on how Mr. Biswas reads, as well as some of the possible ways we can read his story, we are starting to uncover patterns implicit throughout the book. We note that the narrator constantly plays with highs and lows, and likes to contrast elements. Among many others, Samuel Smiles’s romantic heroes, as we have seen, provide a foil to Mr. Biswas. His dreams do sometimes materialize, but in ways that mark the disparity between the sublime nature of what he wants and what he actually gets. As we shall see in our close readings, there are similar contrasts even on the scale of sentence structure.

Another useful consideration for students, this time as writers, is how the narrator uses words to stimulate the reader’s imagination. He details events and sentiments that one may not always think to put into words and yet resonate with readers for their universality. To illustrate is Mr. Biswas’s bewilderment at the workings of the market system:

I will ask my students to pay attention to the simple but ingenious manner in which these observations about social contexts are brought to life. This will help them better visualize and express ideas in their own writings.

By the time we tackle A House for Mr. Biswas, the class will have read Ato Quayson’s introductory chapter to The Cambridge Companion to the Postcolonial Novel.Footnote ⁴ Among other things, this will help to broaden their perspective on the diverse geographical spaces that colonialism and postcolonialism have been situated in. On a surface, cultural level, A House for Mr. Biswas is different from other postcolonial texts they are sure to have studied (including by Achebe, Armah, and Ngugi). Given this, it would be beneficial to briefly evoke Trinidad—particularly its history as a British colony and its East Indian population. This is to help to better contextualize the novel; it is not an inducement to interpret it as a textbook or a guidebook. I note this because, although it is often rightly stated that Western readers of African literatures risk approaching these as referential and thus, essentializing them,Footnote ⁵ this can hold true for African readers of Caribbean literature as well. In this case, there is the danger of interpreting references to dhotis, lentils, a “wife-beating culture,” and so on as making incontrovertible statements about Trinidadian societies. I will remind them that the cultural elements encountered in this work of fiction are no more an irrefutable, anthropological snapshot of its author’s country of origin than obis and egwugwu are fully representative of the space that eventually came to be known as Nigeria.Footnote ⁶

Speaking of the author, I may ask the students to research him independently, given time constraints. Even if I do not, the instinct of many will be to search for “Naipaul” (or “Biswas summary”) online. Undoubtedly, they will encounter very helpful material. They may also discover websites advertising “V. S. Naipaul quotes.” There, scattered among nonpolemical citations like “fiction never lies,” they may find such pearls as “Africa has no future” or “I read a piece of writing and within a paragraph or two I know whether it is by a woman or not. I think [it is] unequal to me.” They could then bring these quotations up for discussion in class. In case we end up here, this would in fact be a good occasion to share extracts from Roland Barthes and debate the extent to which we can practically consign the author to the role of scriptor, as he calls for in “The Death of the Author.” Ideally, according to this theory, we should judge the work more by literary than ideological criteria.Footnote ⁷ I will also use the opportunity to ask my students to further interrogate their reading practices: How many give a pass to writers they might otherwise find mediocre because the writers’ worldviews and principles match their own? Could Naipaul’s uncharitable yet unpitying stance be seen as a refreshing take on paternalistic views? And really, does it even matter either way? I will make it clear that I do not have answers to these questions. In any case, we will not carry Naipaul the man far. His origins and opinions most certainly mean something, but for the purpose of this class, our primary focus is his storytelling.

After we have determined elements such as motifs and themes, I will offer a selection of passages for in-depth textual analysis. To reduce the impression that there is a single way to go about the process, and to further demystify it, I will invite students to propose a few passages for the exercise. This part will mirror other classes I have taught, though I will of course be open to their suggestions. I will provide a standard chart for parsing the text, which they can also modify. The first part, the global analysis, situates the extract and asks what it is saying: What kind of text is it (narrative, argumentative, etc.)? What of the genre? We will also examine the narrative voice—in this novel, the narrator often makes observations about ridiculous things, then leaves readers to provide their own commentary. We will note that the point of view is often Mr. Biswas’s and that this allows us to have a better understanding of him. It is not, however, always uncomplicated to separate points of view, such as when we read that “Pratap and Prasad were already married, Pratap to a tall, handsome woman who was bearing a child every eighteen months, Prasad to a woman of appalling ugliness who was mercifully barren,” and Bipti says that Mr. Biswas “mustn’t say things like that” out loud (75−75). Moving on, the detailed analysis demands a hunt after words so as to unearth patterns—in terms of recurrent lexical fields, syntax and rhythm, sonority, and figures of speech, which they might have otherwise glossed over because some do not think to look for them in prose. I will emphasize that beyond uncovering these textual elements, we want to scrutinize what effect they produce.

As an illustration, here is a brief look at one of many possible passages. I happen to choose this one because it is rich in rhythm and humor. Additionally, it is Mr. Biswas’s career as a sign-writer which sends him to Hanuman House and changes the course of his life. We should find a satisfying number of things to say about his first meeting with Seth, a sign of things to come:

Among many other observations, the students will articulate the ways in which this descriptive and narrative text is opposing two mismatched characters and positions of power. They will detail how it establishes the characters’ identities as well as their behaviors, what is implied by their words and their silence, and why the title of “Mr.” comes across as quite ironic. They will identify contrast, repetition, juxtaposition, the rhythm in the conversation, and the effect these have on the text. Lexical fields include power and size. Someone will note the anticipation that Seth builds by making it seem that Mr. Biswas is “lucky” to enter the store, only for the latter’s disillusionment to destroy Seth’s arguments in a single line. This sort of exercise demands that students read an extract more than once and with a critical eye, that they trust their impressions, but more importantly, that they be ready to justify them with “evidence” from the passage. It reaffirms the reason some choose a literature class to begin with—the liberating idea that a text can say so many things.

Moreover, over the course of these exercises, I hope the students will come to the conclusion that, in fact, the novel is quite funny. There is something absurd in the fact that our protagonist’s house has a doorway but no door; its owner defies Seth but not to his face; he claims to despise the Tulsis but keeps gravitating to them; he is in charge of disbursing the Deserving Destitutes Fund but frequently would qualify for those funds himself. We can laugh at his snide bickering with Shama, as well as his astonishment at discovering how a wife sulks. We could utilize our exercises in analysis to determine what makes some parts funny. The class can thus look more closely at sentence structure, for example in the understated contrasts between the longer passages and the pithier sentences that often follow (such as “Mr. Biswas had sneezed” or “The Tulsi Store was disappointing”). Other questions will be raised: How is it that some will laugh at a passage that will leave others cold? How does humor fit into a discussion of the postcolonial novel? And could we ever fully explain what is so comical about the narrator’s deadpan manner of addressing a newborn from a modest home as “Mister”? During these conversations, we can also have a very brief recourse to humor theory. I will point out that the lack of consensus in this field can be freeing: Just as there are as many analyses as readers, there will be as many senses or appreciations of humor. I will momentarily cite Henri Bergson: For him, a comic character is often one with stars in his eyes who has one fixed objective and constantly trips over reality. Furthermore, I will note that A House for Mr. Biswas serves to illustrate the oft-cited observation that the comic must usually be approached via its link to the tragic.Footnote ⁸ Naipaul confirms that this is true for him in terms of his production: “One always writes comedy at the moment of deepest hysteria.”Footnote ⁹

Mr. Biswas is not a very sympathetic character, and though events are often presented through his eyes, readers will not always wish to identify with him. When he is described, physically or otherwise, it is frequently in unappealing terms. Many of his actions are off-putting, and he can himself be stuffy, confused, irrational, and petty, for example in the competitions over milk and prunes, or furniture. He is often disconcertingly helpless. It is true that Mr. Biswas is important in part because he is inspired by Naipaul’s father. Nevertheless, his life induces a general indifference from the time he outgrows baby massages up to his funeral, which does not provoke excessive emotion. For this class, the novel provides a counterpoint to other protagonists like Okonkwo, heroes of both the colonial encounter and the independence struggle, who are created to “do” symbolic things. When Mr. Biswas does something, it is often an end in itself.

But the class will hopefully come away with the conclusion that Mr. Biswas still retains his own form of dignity. This is worth remarking by readers who nowadays take decolonization for granted or, do not think about it beyond bold, heroic resistance. In addition, Neil ten Kortenaar notes that it is difficult for some postcolonial writers to draw inspiration from their fathers’ “transitional generation of colonized”; the colonized status can be, above all, a source of unease.Footnote ¹⁰ A House for Mr. Biswas grants humanity to the colonized, even those with modest aspirations who did not imagine seeing an end to the British Empire. It prompts readers to consider that this other generation, which fathered the anticolonial hero, managed respectable achievements despite their restrictive circumstances. Indeed, there is something inherently noble about Mr. Biswas’s search for identity and his desire for emancipation from the Tulsis. It therefore makes sense that his own quest for independence has even been read as reflective of the decolonization process.Footnote ¹¹

Mr. Biswas, preoccupied as he is with living, could never be aware of inspiring such evaluations. He is a man who, more surefooted in disappointment than success, barely understands how to enjoy what he has wished for, whether that is a day free of the bully Bhandat, a holiday away at the sea, or a house. Indeed Mr. Biswas, or “Man” as Shama sometimes calls him, is in surprising ways more like his readers than they may first assume, with his dreams and feverish desire to make something of his life. He shows that being an everyman is actually nuanced, complex business. Hopefully, taking the time to read the novel in the way I have proposed will help my students arrive at a similar conclusion.