824 Naipaul, V. s.
IndIvIduaL and SocIety in A House for
Mr. Biswas
It might be too much to call Mr. Biswas, the hero
of V. S. Naipaul’s novel, an “everyman,” as he is one
of the most unique characters in 20th-century lit-
erature. And yet his story of impotent daydreams,
thwarted chances, and the unflagging desire to buck
the system speaks to the “little man” in every soci-
ety. Mr. Biswas—so called by the narrator even as a
child of seven—does not have a propitious start in
life: The midwife, upon delivering him, announces
that he is “six-fingered, and born in the wrong way,”
prompting the astrologer to pronounce him to be “a
lecher and a spendthrift. Possibly a liar as well.” His
mother is resigned to being disappointed by this ill-
favored offspring, even agreeing that his adolescent
fantasies of suicide “would be the best thing for you.
And for me.” As a child, Biswas shuttles between the
narrow possibilities for a poor Indian in Trinidad: a
pundit (holy man), a laborer, or a shopkeeper. How-
ever, he is too independent to take up a traditional
occupation and too imaginative not to see himself
as the hero of his own romance. As a young man, he
rewrites the rags-to-riches stories of Samuel Smiles
(similar to America’s Horatio Alger) in his head,
imagining his first big fortune—and love—just
around the corner. Of course, living in a postcolonial
society, Biswas is continually struck by the “point
when the resemblance ceased.”
The heroes had rigid ambitions and lived in
countries where ambitions could be pursued
and had a meaning. He had no ambition, and
living in this hot land, apart from opening a
shop or buying a motorbus, what could he
do?”Indeed, what is the fate of the imaginative youth,
raised on foreign ambition, in the “hot land” of nar-
row expectations—and money?
Though not an orthodox Hindu, Biswas remains
bound by its rules and customs. This is most clearly
seen when his attempt at a casual romance—slip-
ping a love note to Shama—is interpreted as an offer
of marriage. For all Biswas’s independence, he is
blown about like a dandelion on the winds of fate,
not only agreeing to the match but finding himself
moving in with his bride’s family (a humorous
reversal of tradition) only days after. At Hanu-
man House, he finds a microcosm of everything he
detests about colonial society: tradition, caste, and
invisibility. Indeed, he is married to Shama largely
because he was the proper caste, and as a man with-
out “money or position,” he is expected to become
a groveling (and rather anonymous) member of the
Tulsi family. Like many young men, the prospect
of his entire life settled by a single alliance terrifies
him; he immediately rebels in the most grotesque
ways imaginable, insulting the family with disparag-
ing nicknames, avoiding his wife and children, and
adopting radical sentiments that rattle the conserva-
tive life of the house. What fuels his rebellion is his
deep-rooted knowledge that he is someone, and that
everything—his marriage, his jobs, and even Hanu-
man House itself—is temporary, a mere prelude to
his grand adventure. A newspaper headline hang-
ing on his wall sums up his dreams and character:
“AMAZING SCENES WERE WITNESSED
YESTERDAY WHEN.” His life is lived in grim
expectation for the “amazing scenes” he will enjoy
when he finds the luck—or pluck—to strike out on
his own.
Ultimately, however, Biswas realizes that he is
not Samuel Smiles, nor is life at Hanuman House
grooming him for such a career. As Naipaul writes:
“Change had come over him without his knowing.
There had been no precise point at which the city
had lost its romance and promise, no point at which
he had begun to consider himself old, his career
closed.” Yet the one dream that never dies—and
perhaps his true career—is that of homeowner.
From his fledgling attempts to build a house in
Green Vale to his final, hasty purchase of a home
in Port of Spain, home ownership becomes his final
bid for independence. He no longer wants to escape
Trinidad, but to claim a small piece of it, enough to
escape the sun, the rain, and the inevitable train of
Tulsi relatives. As he ruminates at the very end of
his life: “The wonder of being in his own house, the
audacity of it: to walk in through his own front gate,
to hear no noises except those of his own family,
to wander freely from room to room and about his
yard.” The word audacity sticks out, as behind closed
doors, he can indulge in his own private rebellion: