Anita Rau Badami
Author of The Hero's Walk
About the Author
Image credit: Photo by Richard-Max Tremblay
Works by Anita Rau Badami
Associated Works
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Canonical name
- Rau Badami, Anita
- Birthdate
- 1961
- Gender
- female
- Education
- University of Madras (BA, English)
University of Calgary (MA, English), 1995 - Awards and honors
- Marian Engel Award (2000)
- Agent
- The Bukowski Agency
- Short biography
- Anita was born in India in 1961. She grew up in a household, where English was the primary language spoken, and she attended Catholic schools. At age 18, she borrowed money from her father to buy novels, and to pay him back. She took her first writing assignment, an article in a local newspaper, which earned her 75 rupees. She worked as a copywriter for advertising agencies and she wrote stories for children magazines. Anita married in 1984 and she had a son in 1987. Anita moved to Calgary in 1991. In 1995, she graduated from the university of Calgary, with MA degree in English. Anita Rau Badami submitted her first work to Penguin books. Penguin published her work, and soon she was touring North America, reading from her best-selling debut novel "Tamarind Mem".
- Nationality
- India
Canada - Birthplace
- Rourkela, India
- Places of residence
- Rourkela, India (birth)
Bombay, India
Montréal, Québec, Canada
Calgary, Alberta, Canada - Associated Place (for map)
- India
Members
Discussions
Canadian Author Challenge — March: Farley Mowat & Anita Rau Badami in 75 Books Challenge for 2016 (April 2016)
The Hero's Walk in Orange January/July (January 2012)
Reviews
Sripathi Rao is a disappointment to his mother, who runs his life and his home, Big House, where things are falling into disrepair because he cannot afford to maintain them at the level established by his late father, a more "successful", but much less admirable man. The household includes Sripathi's wife Nirmala and their adult son, Arun; his 42-year-old unmarried sister Putti; and his mother, who spends all her time demanding attention, criticizing everyone and ostensibly trying to arrange show more a suitable marriage for Putti. His daughter, Maya, has disgraced the family by breaking an arranged engagement to marry a foreigner she met while at University in Canada. For this, Sripathi has refused to communicate with her or even to read the letters she sends to her mother. The family is almost totally dysfunctional, until the arrival of Sri and Nirmala's 7-year-old Canadian granddaughter, orphaned and muted by her parents' accidental deaths in Vancouver. Things begin to change as this tiny bewildered stranger becomes the center of everyone's existence, and it is a treat to watch.
I loved the story, loved the writing, and found the ending one of the most satisfying I have read in some time. The characters are so real, they evoked a whole range of emotion from me---sympathy, exasperation, disgust, amusement. And with one mighty exception, each of them learned from life's trials and tragedies, and grew to fuller acceptance of themselves and their place in the universe by story's end. Amazingly sensuous prose...sights, sounds, smells (and not all of them pleasant) so vivid I worried they would wake my husband as I read while he slept. I enjoyed this book so much that I intend to do something I rarely do, which is to read two books by the same author back to back. I have already begun Badami's Tamarind Mem. show less
I loved the story, loved the writing, and found the ending one of the most satisfying I have read in some time. The characters are so real, they evoked a whole range of emotion from me---sympathy, exasperation, disgust, amusement. And with one mighty exception, each of them learned from life's trials and tragedies, and grew to fuller acceptance of themselves and their place in the universe by story's end. Amazingly sensuous prose...sights, sounds, smells (and not all of them pleasant) so vivid I worried they would wake my husband as I read while he slept. I enjoyed this book so much that I intend to do something I rarely do, which is to read two books by the same author back to back. I have already begun Badami's Tamarind Mem. show less
“His home was crumbling about his ears, his sister was going crazy and his mother wouldn't shut up. Did it matter? No, not at all. What else were heroes for but to swat troubles away like so many flies?” — Anita Rau Badami, “The Hero's Walk”
Reading Anita Rau Badami's impressive 2000 novel “The Hero's Walk,” one will probably assume the title refers, sooner or later, to Sripathi Rao, the angry, disappointed middle-aged man at the center of the story. Sripathi, who once studied show more medicine, now writes advertising copy, and even that job hangs by a thread. The passion has gone out of his marriage. Both his troublesome mother, Ammayya, and his younger sister, Putti, live with them. Putti wants desperately to get married, but her mother time after time rejects matches proposed by a matchmaker. Sripathi's son, Arun, has dedicated his life to social protest instead of getting a good job.
Yet most of his anger and disappointment stems from the actions of his beloved daughter, Maya, who rejected an arranged marriage into a prominent Brahmin family and instead, while a student in Canada, married a white man and had a daughter. Sripathi refuses to speak with her on the phone or to read her letters.
But now word comes that both Maya and her husband have been killed in an auto accident, and their seven-year-old daughter, Nandana, has been orphaned. Sripathi must travel to Vancouver and bring Nandana back to India to raise. The girl refuses to talk to him or to anyone else and thinks only of escaping and finding her way back to Canada.
Hero imagery pops up here and there throughout Badami's novel. So does Sripathi emerge as a hero? Well, yes, but then so does virtually every other character. The phrase "everyday heroes" is more than a cliche to this author. Simply living one's life, doing one's best, taking care of one's loved ones, fulfilling one's responsibilities, keeping one's promises — all such things can be acts of heroism. Swatting troubles away is something we all must do. show less
Reading Anita Rau Badami's impressive 2000 novel “The Hero's Walk,” one will probably assume the title refers, sooner or later, to Sripathi Rao, the angry, disappointed middle-aged man at the center of the story. Sripathi, who once studied show more medicine, now writes advertising copy, and even that job hangs by a thread. The passion has gone out of his marriage. Both his troublesome mother, Ammayya, and his younger sister, Putti, live with them. Putti wants desperately to get married, but her mother time after time rejects matches proposed by a matchmaker. Sripathi's son, Arun, has dedicated his life to social protest instead of getting a good job.
Yet most of his anger and disappointment stems from the actions of his beloved daughter, Maya, who rejected an arranged marriage into a prominent Brahmin family and instead, while a student in Canada, married a white man and had a daughter. Sripathi refuses to speak with her on the phone or to read her letters.
But now word comes that both Maya and her husband have been killed in an auto accident, and their seven-year-old daughter, Nandana, has been orphaned. Sripathi must travel to Vancouver and bring Nandana back to India to raise. The girl refuses to talk to him or to anyone else and thinks only of escaping and finding her way back to Canada.
Hero imagery pops up here and there throughout Badami's novel. So does Sripathi emerge as a hero? Well, yes, but then so does virtually every other character. The phrase "everyday heroes" is more than a cliche to this author. Simply living one's life, doing one's best, taking care of one's loved ones, fulfilling one's responsibilities, keeping one's promises — all such things can be acts of heroism. Swatting troubles away is something we all must do. show less
Heroes are hard to find – though perhaps because we are always looking in the wrong places. Silently noble folks who daily exhibit the heroic in small things are everywhere – we just rarely recognize or acknowledge them.
Sripathi lives in a small village in India. His house, a large one by the standards of the village, is crowded to bursting with his wife, his adult son, his aging mother, and his spinster sister. He spends mornings writing anonymous letters to the editor of the newspaper show more and stewing his lot in life. His daughter, Maya, left years before to attend college in Canada. Sripathi has refused to speak of her since she shamed the family by refusing to enter into a marriage that her parents had arranged for her. Sripathi’s life changes with a telephone call informing him that Maya and her husband have died in a car accident, leaving behind a daughter, Nadana. Sripathi travels to Canada and brings the child back to India.
The story is a simple one, following the lives of Sripathi and his family as they grieve their loss and try to adjust to Nandana. But the simplicity of the story belies the complexity of emotion in the characters.
The title of the book originates with a traditional Indian dance, which tells the mythological story of Rama and Ravana, two great kings who battle. Sripathi’s wife, Nirmala, teaches dance in the village and explains one day to her students that they must “walk with dignity … walk with courage and humility” during the dance to capture the characters and tell the story. The dance is a symbol of the daily walk of each of the characters as they maneuver the difficult choices in life. Their simple lives, though not the stuff of heroic stories, echo the dance, walking with courage, dignity, and humility. While they each mourn their status in some way, they still conduct themselves nobly and heroically. They are heroes whether they themselves or anyone else recognize them as such.
I’m increasingly a fan of modern Indian literature, as there are several talented and thoughtful writers pushing out unique stories from this culture. Anita Rau Badami deserves more recognition than she has received. She is a lyric wordsmith and a creative storyteller. And this story, while firmly rooted in Indian culture, has much to say about the human condition in any culture.
Bottom Line: A beautifully written story about everyday heroes – firmly rooted in the Indian culture but indicative of the human condition in any culture.
4 bones!!!! show less
Sripathi lives in a small village in India. His house, a large one by the standards of the village, is crowded to bursting with his wife, his adult son, his aging mother, and his spinster sister. He spends mornings writing anonymous letters to the editor of the newspaper show more and stewing his lot in life. His daughter, Maya, left years before to attend college in Canada. Sripathi has refused to speak of her since she shamed the family by refusing to enter into a marriage that her parents had arranged for her. Sripathi’s life changes with a telephone call informing him that Maya and her husband have died in a car accident, leaving behind a daughter, Nadana. Sripathi travels to Canada and brings the child back to India.
The story is a simple one, following the lives of Sripathi and his family as they grieve their loss and try to adjust to Nandana. But the simplicity of the story belies the complexity of emotion in the characters.
The title of the book originates with a traditional Indian dance, which tells the mythological story of Rama and Ravana, two great kings who battle. Sripathi’s wife, Nirmala, teaches dance in the village and explains one day to her students that they must “walk with dignity … walk with courage and humility” during the dance to capture the characters and tell the story. The dance is a symbol of the daily walk of each of the characters as they maneuver the difficult choices in life. Their simple lives, though not the stuff of heroic stories, echo the dance, walking with courage, dignity, and humility. While they each mourn their status in some way, they still conduct themselves nobly and heroically. They are heroes whether they themselves or anyone else recognize them as such.
I’m increasingly a fan of modern Indian literature, as there are several talented and thoughtful writers pushing out unique stories from this culture. Anita Rau Badami deserves more recognition than she has received. She is a lyric wordsmith and a creative storyteller. And this story, while firmly rooted in Indian culture, has much to say about the human condition in any culture.
Bottom Line: A beautifully written story about everyday heroes – firmly rooted in the Indian culture but indicative of the human condition in any culture.
4 bones!!!! show less
Badami's first novel is a remarkable achievement. While not as complex and multi-layered as [The Hero's Walk], it is a fascinating two-part look at life in India first from the perspective of a modern young woman now living in Canada, and then from the perspective of her widowed mother, who has decided to take an indefinite railway journey late in her life to explore the country her railway officer husband would never share with her. As she travels, she tells her life story to strangers on show more the train, and we learn her version of some of the same events earlier narrated by her daughter. Neither woman seems to understand the other very well; they have unresolved conflicts between them, and yet they both have the same basic goal -- to live on their own terms, without being bound by someone else's notions of what is right and proper.
Review written in July, 2009 show less
Review written in July, 2009 show less
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