‘This happened, this happened so long ago — Oh, as long ago as I have known myself be. Ever since being has known itself as being I have Known It. It is the gift that Yagnyavalkya made to Maiteryi, it is the gift Govinda made to Sri Sankara. It is the gift He made to me, my Lord. May I be worthy of the Lord. Lord, my Master! O thou abode of Truth.’
~
I go sometimes to see Catherine and Georges. While Georges corrects my manuscript, and puts it into the acuity, the brilliance of the French language, I often sit by little Vera, and speak to her my truth. For Vera, with her seven months, can understand more of it than I could ever make Georges accept. Truth is to be recognized when told — as the beauty of a flower is recognized. Truth has such a perfume too. When I go into Vera’s room she smiles, and her little eyes know who I am. She sees beyond me.
I am so happy with Vera that even when the maid is there I tell her, ‘Go to a cinema, enjoy yourself. I will look after the baby.’ And sometimes I sent Georges and Catherine away to see a play or go and hear music. They see that I am really happy, and they let me be with their daughter. And when I am alone I sing to Vera — I sing her Sankara and Bhartrhari, and tell her one day she shall know there is somewhere to go. For now I know the name of Him to whom I have to go, though I have always known Him without knowing His name. So to Travancore I will go, I tell Vera, ‘I will go there Vera, and think of you.’
Sometimes so deep is my joy that I dance about the room and sing of the Truth. I show His picture to Vera, for I have a picture now — and have bought his books too — and say, ‘Look, look, Vera, this is He! Can you see Him? It is He, the guru, my Lord.’
It was Georges, good Georges, who had originally taken me to the Rue de Boulainvilliers. ‘There are some Vedantins in Paris, too,’ he said. Would you like to meet them?’ I was happy. I met an Indian who knew me, and knew my family; he talked too much. But the Frenchmen and the Frenchwomen— and one or two English people as well, and an American — they all made a deep impression on me. That had been long before I went down south, soon after leaving London. I had carried His books to the Alps and had read them again and again. They convinced me, but I had to know.
Now, I think I know, but I must go, I must go to Travancore. I have no Benares now, no Ganga, no Jumna; Travancore is my country, Travancore my name. Lord, accept me, vouch that I be where I should. How can I ever, ever tell Georges? Will he understand? Would Madeleine, with her vajras and her chakras understand this simple, this ever-lit Truth? Truth indeed is He, the guru. No, He is beyond definition. He is, and you are not.
Now, when I am singing Sankara, how my eyes fill with tears, and I drop them on Vera. ‘Vera, do you see?’ I say, and cover her cheeks with my tears. I sing to her the Kanarese cradle-song I sang often to Sridhara:
The Swan is swinging the cradle, baby,
Saying ‘I am That’, ‘That I am’, quietly.
She swings it beautifully, baby,
Abandoning actions and hours.
Georges and Catherine went this evening to see Oberon.
‘What gorgeous scenery!’ Catherine said. ‘And how rich and appreciative the audience. But what was true a hundred years ago is true no more. Kings and queens have to talk differently, be different. The President of the Republic was there, and so was Prince George of Greece. But Paradise, Rama, the Paradise of Oberon…?’
‘All you need’s a donkey,’ said Georges, tired.
‘Come, I will make you some nice warm chocolate. Chocolate or coffee, my children?’ said Catherine, very happy.
‘The children being very wise,’ said Georges, ‘they will take chocolate.’
‘How was Vera?’ said Catherine. ‘You don’t need to go to India for a job, Rama. You look after Vera. Vera loves you: she is so quiet when you are here. And you can write your abstruse theories. I will give you back your small room. And Georges will drink chocolate and translate your clever ideas.’
‘I promise to stay if you will have a baby before I go,’ I said jokingly.
‘Now, now, Rama, you may have more intuition than you think you have.’ This from Georges.
‘Ah, là là!’ said Catherine, ‘A Brahmin after all.’
‘Do you know what a Brahmin is, Catherine?’
‘No, what is it?’ She came back, having gone halfway to the kitchen.
‘A Brahmin is he who knows Brahman. That is one definition,’ I said. ‘There is another, a roughish definition. A Brahmin is he who loves a good banquet.’
‘You certainly do not belong to the second category, poor dear, Rama, what shall we do when you are gone? You have become so like one of us. We will be lost.’
Georges looked at me. He looked so sad.
‘We must have been brothers in a past life,’ he said, as though to explain everything. Catherine must have heard it, through the kitchen wall. For she came back and said:
‘I must have been your wife. That is why Vera knows you. Marriages are made in Heaven, they say, don’t they? Sometimes they are made on earth.’
Georges and I went back to the kitchen with her. I said, ‘Catherine, I will tell you what: marriages are made in Benares.’
‘Georges, let us go to Benares,’ she said.
‘And what about the dead bodies, and the pyres, and the famous crocodiles that some French author saw with his own four eyes?’ I laughed. She had read about the crocodiles in some book and was convinced Benares had only floating dead bodies, beggars, and many cremation fires. She had also heard, seven miles away was Sarnath. That was where the Buddha had turned the Wheel of Law.
‘No, let us go to Travancore,’ I said.
‘Now, what is this new place?’ protested Catherine.
‘I have been telling you and myself a lie, all these years. My real home is in Travancore. Benares is there, and there you have no crocodiles or pyres.
‘It’s opposite Ceylon,’ said Georges, in geographic explanation; like me he was a born professor.
‘I will make chocolate for two in Travancore. Travancore, Travancore, there’s magic in that name!’ said Catherine.
And we went back to the plush chairs. The chocolate was very good.
Introduction: Notes
1 Raja Rao, The Policeman and the Rose: Stories. Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1978, p. xiv.
2 Raja Rao, The Chessmaster and His Moves. New Delhi: Vision Books, 1988, p. 1.
3 R. Parthasarathy, ‘The Future World Is Being Made in America: An Interview with Raja Rao’, Span (September 1977): 30.
4 Braj B. Kachru, The Indianization of English: The English Language in India. Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1983.
5 Raja Rao, Kanthapura. London: Allen and Unwin, 1938. Reprinted 1963, New York: New Directions. Subsequent citations from the American edition are indicated in the text parenthetically by page number.
6 Raja Rao, The Serpent and the Rope. London: John Murray, 1960. Subsequent citations from this edition are indicated in the text parenthetically by page number.