Impresionist
"The Impressionist" by Hari Kunzru, a debut novel published in 2002, tells the story of Pran Nath Razdan, a boy of hybrid descent – the son of an English father and an Indian mother, raised as the heir of a wealthy Kashmiri Brahmin near the Taj Mahal.
At the age of 15, the discovery of his real father throws the boy onto the streets as an alien in colonial India. Thus begins an epic journey and transformation: he becomes Rukhsana, a brothel girl, used in intrigues between colonialists and local powerful people; then Clive, an "English boy" for a perverse British major; in Bombay, Pretty Bobby, a missionary's servant and a red-light broker.
Political unrest sets him on a journey: he assumes the identity of the deceased Jonathan Bridgeman, arrives in London and Oxford, where he transforms into a charming student. He falls in love with Astarte, the daughter of an anthropologist, exploring the boundaries of race and class. The journey continues in Paris among black Americans, then to Africa in search of a "lost tribe", where colonial myths are crumbling.
Kunzru satirically dissects imperialism: Pran, a chameleon, changes skins to survive, but searches for a true identity in a world where "white" or "Indian" is only a perception. The novel combines humor, exoticism and criticism of race, post-colonial traumas, with rich descriptions from Victorian India to Edwardian London. Winner of the Betty Trask and Somerset Maugham awards, "The Impressionist" is an ode to the fluidity of being in a crumbling empire.
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