A House for Mr. Biswas - (Vintage International) by V S Naipaul (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

"A marvelous prose epic that matches the best nineteenth-century novels for richness of comic insight and final, tragic power." --Newsweek

In his forty-six short years, Mr. Mohun Biswas has been fighting against destiny to achieve some semblance of independence, only to face a lifetime of calamity. Shuttled from one residence to another after the drowning death of his father, for which he is inadvertently responsible, Mr. Biswas yearns for a place he can call home. But when he marries into the domineering Tulsi family on whom he indignantly becomes dependent, Mr. Biswas embarks on an arduous--and endless--struggle to weaken their hold over him and purchase a house of his own.

A heartrending, dark yet comedic novel, A House for Mr. Biswas masterfully evokes a man's quest for autonomy against an emblematic post-colonial canvas.

Review Quotes

"Naipaul has constructed a marvelous prose epic that matches the best nineteenth-century novels for richness of comic insight and final, tragic power." --Newsweek

About the Author

His novels include A House for Mr Biswas, The Mimic Men, Guerrillas, A Bend in the River, and The Enigma of Arrival. In 1971 he was awarded the Booker Prize for In a Free State. His works of nonfiction, equally acclaimed, include Among the Believers, Beyond Belief, The Masque of Africa, and a trio of books about India: An Area of Darkness, India: A Wounded Civilization and India: A Million Mutinies Now.

In 1990, V.S. Naipaul received a knighthood for services to literature; in 1993, he was the first recipient of the David Cohen British Literature Prize. He received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2001. He died in 2018.