is also popular in India, where readers revel in
seeing the India they know so brilliantly evoked
in his deceptively simple prose.
There is always a breezy, easy quality to Nara-
yan’s work. It is not fraught with high philosophy
or complex themes, but rather blessed with an
accessibility that takes great skill to produce.
His extraordinary productivity included many
short stories and articles as well as his novels. On
request, Narayan wrote popular versions of both
the Ramayana and the Mahabharata.
In the late 1980s R. K. Narayan was elected
to India’s upper house of parliament, the Rajya
Sabha. He was also honored with many literary
awards, including India’s Sahitya Akademi Award
(for The Guide), the Royal Society of Literature’s
Christopher Benson Award, and Indian’s second
highest literary award, the Padma Vibhushan, in
- He also made the short list for the Nobel
Prize in literature.
He died in 2001 after his own daughter’s sad
early demise, still working on another novel.
Narayan was a great figure in world literature,
whose own personal humility and desire to avoid
pretense may have made him less widely known
than he deserved.
Further reading: A. L. McLeod, ed., R. K. Narayan:
Critical Perspectives (New Delhi: Sterling, 1994); R. K.
Narayan, An Astrologer’s Day, and Other Stories (Mysore:
Indian Thought, 1968); ———, The Bachelor of Arts
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1980); ———,
Gods, Demons and Others (New York: Viking Press,
1964); ———, The Guide (London: Bodley Head,
1970); ———, The Mahabharata: A Shortened Modern
Prose Version of the Indian Epic (London: Heinemann,
1978); ———, Malgudi Days (London: Heinemann,
1982); ———, My Days: A Memoir (Hopewell, N.J.:
Ecco Press, 1999); ———, A Story-Teller’s World (New
Delhi: Penguin Books, 1990).
Narayana See VISHNU.
Narayanananda, Swami (1902–1968)
pioneer Hindu teacher in Scandinavia
Swami Narayanananda established VEDANTA cen-
ters throughout Europe and North America.
He was born in Coorg, a village in the state of
Karnataka, in southern India. A bright boy, from
an early age he showed a marked tendency to
spiritual matters. He never married and at the age
of 27 took the vows of the renounced life (san-
nyas) and began searching for a GURU. His pilgrim-
age around India eventually took him to the Belur
Math of the VEDANTA/RAMAKRISHNA MAT H AND
MISSION, where he met Swami Shivananda, who
became his teacher. Several years later, he was
instructed by his guru to spend time alone in the
Himalayas to strengthen his spiritual practice. In
February 1933 he had a deep spiritual experience,
which he described as merging into the formless
aspect of God, that is, nirvikalpa samadhi.
He remained in seclusion until the partition
of India in 1947. The violence of the period con-
vinced him to dedicate his life to helping people;
he left his retreat and began to accept disciples. In
1955, as a step toward building a more formal fol-
lowing, his devotees established a printing press
and began to publish Narayananda’s writings. It
would be another 12 years, however, before the
swami would consent to incorporating an organi-
zation, the Narayanananda Universal Yoga Trust.
The first ASHRAM was opened in Denmark in 1967.
The first ashram in the United States was opened
in Chicago in the early 1970s.
Initially, the leaders of the rapidly expanding
movement were all monks who had trained with
Narayanananda in India, but in the course of the
1970s a number of Westerners took vows of san-
nyas and took on leadership roles. As in India, the
monks live a life of celibacy and follow a spiritual
discipline that includes twice-daily MEDITATION
sessions with the community and the practice of
HATHA YOGA.
Narayanananda died in 1988. His movement
continues from its international headquarters in
Gylling, Denmark, and the ashram in Chicago.K 306 Narayana