Having left Patna in his teens, US-based author Amitava Kumar has again rejuvenated links with his hometown with a "whimsical" and "rat-infested" account of the city, once the 'ancient capital' of India.
Fifty-year-old Kumar through a short non-fiction narrative attempts to encapsulate the "character" of the city, balancing memoirs, reportage, humour and an "honest storytelling" with a hint of nostalgia.
Aptly titled 'A Matter of Rats: A Short Biography of Patna', the book recently launched in India, introduces readers to "many kinds of rats" who inhabit the "multi-layered city" as seen by the author.
"I realised I was losing my touch with my city until David Davidar asked me to write about my hometown which is when I began to connect back to my roots, my hometown with a strong sense of guilt of having left my parents behind like rats escaping a sinking ship, not to mean that Patna is sinking," Kumar told PTI in an interview.
The "Bombay London New York" author, who is currently a professor of English at the Vassar College in New York says he chose the "rat metaphor", as it fitted the description of his city, as he "saw it" or "remembered it".
"There are people continuously moving out of city, boarding the next train to the big cities, abandoning their hometowns behind, just like I did many years ago and hence I also am a rat. But, there are many other types of rats too," he said.
Divided into six chapters, the book opens with a prologue amusingly called "The Rat's Guide" where the author talks of rats, both four-legged and the two-legged ones, who are slowly revealed as the pages turn.
He then ventures into the ancient splendour of the city, then known as Pataliputra, contrasting it unapologetically with the malaise like caste system that characterises its somewhat "not-so-glorious present".
A sense of loss is palpable but the author said "being and insider and an outsider" to the city gave him a "unique vantage point" to see his "own city" and also saved him from falling into the trap of "too much nostalgia" and "glorified pride".
"I think having both an inside and an outside view of Patna gave me a unique perspective to the city. And, anyway the idea of writing it was not to produce a text book history but to paint a picture, tell a story honestly based on my experiences and those who ever drifted into its orbit," he said.
