Fledgling Booker Prize Winner: Alvind Adiga

 　　Since its inception in 1969, the Booker Prize has become the most important literary award in the Commonwealth of Nations, and its influence is growing day by day. In 2008, on the 40th anniversary of the Booker Prize, the 34-year-old Indian writer Aravind Adiga won the first prize with his novel "White Tiger", which broke out a big upset. Competitors in the final round include Man Booker regular Irish writer Sebastian Barry and fellow Indian English-language writer Amitwa Goth. With his debut novel, he can "pass five levels and six generals" and become the second-youngest winner in the history of the Booker Prize, and Adiga is indeed worth celebrating.

　　

　　1. From a journalist to a new favorite in the literary world

　　

　　On October 23, 1974, Adiga was born in Chennai, the capital of Tamil Nadu, India, the famous Madras during the colonial period; he was born in Mangalore, Karnataka. City grew up. Later, his family relocated to Australia, where he completed his secondary education in Sydney. He then studied English Literature at Columbia University, New York, and Magdalen College, Oxford, UK.

　　After graduation, Adiga has been working in journalism. In 2000, he interned at the Washington branch of the Financial Times. After officially graduating, he worked in New York for two and a half years as a correspondent for financial media, and interviewed many successful people, including real estate tycoon Donald Trump, and the host of the famous American reality show "Falling Up". In 2003, Adiga returned to India and continued to work as a correspondent for Time magazine. He has conducted interviews with the prime ministers of South Asian countries and conducted field trips in South Asian countries, covering India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal and Sri Lanka. Adiga's thinking is broad, politics, business and art are all his fields, and he has worked for the "Financial Times", "Wall Street Journal", "Time" magazine and ABC at the same time. Adiga now lives in Mumbai and is a freelance writer.

　　"White Tiger" was originally written in 2005 and revised in early January 2007. The novel takes the form of a letter, written by the protagonist Balram Halwai to the Chinese Prime Minister who is about to visit Bangalore. Through the story of a murderer, "White Tiger" vividly summarizes the darkness of contemporary Indian society, and exposes and criticizes the tragic misfortune of the people at the bottom in the process of India's economic development. After the economic reform in the 1980s, India's economy has made great progress and has appeared on the international stage with an extremely active attitude. The competition and cooperation between India and China is one of the most important topics in the world today. "White Tiger" was born in such an era, the protagonist of the novel confidently said to the novel's narrative recipient: "20 years from now, it will be the century of our yellow and brown people at the top of the pyramid, we Will rule the whole world." However, under the bright future, this Bangalore's darling of the times has obtained the "first pot of gold" for commercial development by killing; his career cannot be run without the blessing of bribed officials . Balram's self-confidence represents a thriving India, but there are many hidden secrets behind the self-confidence.

　　The artistic attention of "White Tiger" mainly focuses on the shaping of the protagonist Balram Halwai. Balram is a poor descendant from a lower caste. When he first dropped out of school to work, he was obedient, loyal and hard-working to his master. In the process of moving from the countryside to the city, from a tea shop boy to a private driver, he was gradually driven by money. , The mercenary world has corrupted the soul, and he took the risk and embarked on the road of no return; fortunately, after he succeeded, he retreated completely, and joined the business in Bangalore and achieved success. became a celebrity. Barram's life course is absurd and complicated: from the perspective of social roots, his crime is the instinctual struggle of the bottom people against cruel caste discrimination and hierarchical oppression; from the perspective of India's modernization process, this bloodthirsty and cruel transformation seems to be It is also inevitable, and even the moral price that economic development must bear. The novel adopts a first-person subjective narration, and Barram constantly argues to the reader that his actions are both helpless and the only one in a desperate situation; while the narrator behind the scenes is noncommittal to Barram's narration, which is another reason for this story from the first. The postmodern works of the Three Worlds are covered with a veil of complexity.

　　

　　2. Contemporary India in "White Tiger"

　　

　　Balram Halwai, a culturally meaningful name. The process of Balram's life development is marked by the name: Muna Boy → Balram (White Tiger) → Ashok Sharma, which is a symbolic clue.

　　On the first day of school, the teacher asked him his name, and his answer was Mu Na (boy) - like the Chinese, the child's name entrusted the parents' expectations, but his father was exhausted for life, and his mother was seriously ill in bed - poor What can your children expect? So, the teacher casually called him "Ballam". From nameless to famous, Balram's life took the first turn for the better. Once, a school inspector came, and the teacher asked him to answer questions on behalf of all the students. Barram's on-the-spot performance was praised by the inspector, who praised him as a "white tiger" and sent him to a real school for further study. Although none of those promises were fulfilled, and although only his family jokingly called him "The White Tiger," the nickname gave Barram a meaning deep inside, a distinctive aura. The "white tiger" in the novel is an important metaphor. Balram and his nephew traveled to the zoo to watch the white tiger. The white tiger in the cage suddenly disappeared. When Balram fled to Bangalore, he changed his name to Ashok Sharma, and seemed to be better suited to this rising age than his dead master, and more qualified to be "Ashok". The creation of names and the fading of caste history together mark the era represented by Balram.

　　Barram's hometown is Lexmanga, a village near Bodh Gaya, where the Buddha Sakyamuni attained enlightenment and the poorest northern region in modern India. His family is a typical traditional big family, with dozens of young and old. In order to make a living, their relatives could only rely on laboring for the landlords, enduring extremely high taxes, and even begging for a living when they had no choice. Father Vikram Halwai, unwilling to be exploited by the landlord, but pulling a rickshaw could not change his fate, he told his son bitterly: "I have been treated as a donkey all my life. All my hope is to have a son of my own - at least one of my own sons. One - can live like a human being." His father suffered from tuberculosis, and eventually died of a cough in a public hospital without any medicine or medicine. Balram watched helplessly but was helpless, which was the first blow in his life. He realized that there was no way out for living in the countryside, and he secretly vowed to escape from his homeland forever.

　　So, Balram went to work in a tea shop in the city, but he had little education and no skills, and discrimination against lower castes was common in urban and rural areas. He used to "squat on the street" looking for job opportunities, but was often rejected outright. The hardships of urban life made him taste the hardships of life, and this was the second blow he suffered.

　　With cleverness and luck, he learned to drive and became a driver for the local landlord "Lao Stork", who has real estate in both urban and rural areas. The "Stork" family has two cars: the Honda "City" and the Suzuki. "No. 2 driver" Balram drives a small Suzuki, and the Honda is exclusively owned by "No. 1 driver" Ram Posad. Posad is a good driver and plays badminton to accompany the hostess. The relationship between him and Balram was like the room they shared. Balram has always been jealous of Posad to death, "Is there any kind of hatred in the world comparable to the hatred of the second servant to the first servant?" For self-interest, Balram used a whistle-blowing method to expose Posad to his master. Muslim identity, became the only driver of the "Old Stork" family.

　　The novel truly and profoundly reveals the dark side of Indian society, paying particular attention to the bottom people in the dark realm. There is a special section describing Old Delhi, where the slums are dilapidated, the streets are congested and chaotic, and the people's living conditions are very difficult, which is in stark contrast to the modern atmosphere of New Delhi. Despite economic development, enslavement and discrimination against lower castes by landlords and rich people can still be seen everywhere. Barram is not only a driver, but also cooks for the owner, washes the dog, cleans the yard, and even washes and massages the feet of the landlord, the old stork. Every time he tried to wash his hands with soap, "After massaging someone's feet, no matter how you wash your hands, the smell from old and dead dander will stay all day." While driving, Barram also learned a kind of The ability is to control the steering wheel with one hand and pour wine for the owner of the back seat with the other, and not a drop! "This technology is only available to Indian drivers." This is a perfect irony! Although he entered the city and received a "high salary" that his family envied, his fundamental social status of being enslaved did not change in any way. This was the third blow to Balram.

　　If physical fatigue can still be tolerated, what Balram can't tolerate the most is the mental discrimination and oppression. Barram, who is new to the city, often experiences sexual distress. The city's feasting, the seduction and teasing of pornographic magazines and the rich people's search for flowers and willows kept stimulating his turbulent heart. What he most desires is to find a blond beauty like Ashok introduced by Assistant Minister Mukshan, and his cultural vision at this time is completely from others. He saved a few months' salary to go to a brothel to buy sex, but he didn't expect that the prostitute's blonde hair was dyed, which made him very angry and asked the boss to refund the money. This was his fourth blow. Barram finally realized that just selling his labor and raising his income could not change the essence of life, and he wanted to completely change his destiny.

　　Balram is indeed different. He is good at drawing social experience from all aspects, he is very good at the wind and the rudder, and pleases his master. The most important thing is that he can clearly identify the essence of society and take action quickly. His "success" Start here. The writer raised a question through his fortune, that is, a young man of ability and ambition who wants to get ahead in society, can only use a bloody way?

　　"White Tiger" attempts to answer this question through the protagonist's narrative. In the countryside, the oppression of the caste system has made it impossible for the lower castes to turn over, and the exorbitant taxes of the landlords have overwhelmed the lives of the poor, but the government has turned a deaf ear. Lexmanga has four landlords: "Buffalo", "Stork", "Wild Boar" and "Crow". These guys are evil, fish and meat villages, they do everything possible to exploit the common people, or insult any woman they want. In cities, politicians live a corrupt life by playing political tricks and robbing them. Landlords and politicians collude with each other, and the upper classes of urban and rural society gang up together to enslave the people at the bottom. In the so-called modern cities, behind the development of a new technology economy is still the The dirty model of power-for-money underpins the healthy functioning of society on the surface. The "Old Stork" family bribed high-ranking officials, cheated on local elections, and operated coal mines to control the lifeline of the local economy. When dealing with high-ranking officials, they do their best to flatter and flatter, pay bribes with huge sums of money, and accompany the officials to have fun in pornographic places; "Mongoose", the son of "Stork", once offered a bribe of 500,000 rupees to the central minister, but because he couldn't find the 1 rupee in his wallet, he was furious with Barram and complained that he had stolen the money. In the end, Barram had to pretend that the coin had been lost. On the ground and use your own money to pass the test. These rich people are ruthless and extremely cruel. The son of the "Buffalo" family was kidnapped. The "Buffalo" suspected that the servant who looked after the child colluded with the Naxalites, so he shot the servant, set the house on fire, and wiped out the servant's family. Mrs. Pinzi, the American wife of Barram's owner Ashok, hit a person with a drunken driving, and "Mongoose" thought that Barram should be vindicated!

　　

　　3. The White Tiger from a Post-colonial Perspective

　　

　　Adiga frankly told reporters that the novel was directly influenced by African-American literary writers Ralph Ellison, James Baldwin and Richard Wright. However, contrary to the tragic fate of the protagonist of black literature, the murderer Barram in "The White Tiger" not only managed to escape, but also used the "first pot of gold" obtained from the murder to make a fortune in Bangalore. His personal property reached 15 times the 700,000 rubles of Ashok when he robbed him, and he became a multi-millionaire! This image is the continuation of the critical realism theme in the post-colonial era, and the "anti-hero" image created by the novel has rich post-modern significance.

　　Undoubtedly, Balram is a villain, but his conscience remains intact. After the murder, he risked arrest to pick up his nephew, who was working in the city together. While enjoying the glory and wealth, he did not forget his relatives in his hometown—he knew that because of his actions, his relatives would either be killed in revenge, or be driven out of the village, and life would be better than death. In Bangalore, Barram tries to forge a new self. "But, I have to do it differently; can't you see? I can't live like 'wild boar', 'buffalo' and 'raven'..." When his employee, Mohammad Asf, hit and killed a man, Without blaming him, he personally bribed the police and made the case go unresolved. Then, he took out a large sum of money to go to the deceased's home to offer condolences, and promised to let the deceased's brother come to his company as a driver. These descriptions reflect Balram's complexity. On the one hand, he still has a conscience. He never regards his employees as "a member of the family" (as he is called by the "Old Stork" family), and can treat the poor and lower classes around him equally. "Let animals live according to the nature of animals, and let humans live according to the nature of human beings." To some extent, it is the embodiment of Ashok's thought that he killed with his own hands. On the other hand, the irony is that Balram struggled to break free from the darkness, but he just changed himself, he couldn't save more people, not even the relatives who raised him. He became an entrepreneur, but the way he kept the business afloat was still buying bribes and taking lives, just as the "storks" did. His efforts have not touched the operating mechanism of Indian society in the slightest, but continued to strengthen the original unfair social system.

　　Thus, Barram's dilemma lies in the contradiction between unjust means and just ends. Although the novel uses seven chapters to write about his experience and psychological changes before the murder, and only one chapter about his life in Bangalore after his escape, we can still divide his life into these two stages. The former is in order to escape the darkness, and the latter is to establish a fairer attitude towards life, but no matter what the purpose is, Balram adopts unjust means. Harmony between ends and means is difficult to achieve, a problem that plagued his way of thinking.

　　Regarding killing, Balram has always admitted his mistakes, although he always stressed that there is no way to do it; he is quite hopeful about his actions in Bangalore. In his letter to the Chinese premier, he also claimed to be a successful person and a veteran. Balram is in the car rental business, which is not only symbolic, that is, symbolizing his transformation from "driver's driver" to "driver's master", but also a very real reflection of Bengaluru's economic situation. This southern city is known as the "Silicon Valley of India", and the world's major IT companies gather in the city. His taxi company's service targets are white-collar workers who work at night in these companies. Why do they have to go to work in the middle of the night? Because company owners are far across the ocean, they have to adapt to their time. This forms a chain, with local staff serving foreign bosses and Barram serving local staff. Economic development is a historical choice, and developing countries should pay particular attention to economic development. Inspired by this kind of history, the poor country boy who used to serve the landlord in the countryside was called into the city and continued to work for the upper-class rich, like the nameless boy who fell under the wheel and died silently.

　　Economic development will inevitably bring about a rapidly growing middle class and an ever-expanding elite of the wealthy. During this historical change, Barram has rapidly expanded his assets, transforming himself from a poor boy to a trendsetter of the times. However, the impact on traditional culture and the erosion of ethics and morality brought about by economic development is something that Balram is unwilling to face and dare not face. Just like he was worried that his nephew would blame him for not telling his family to escape, but soon discovered that his nephew was actually more realistic than him, and could not help but sigh: "...the new generation is becoming immoral. .” As pointed out earlier, in order to maintain the development of his career, he can only adopt immoral methods, and can only copy the methods of the rich people who he deeply hates. Although he is also guilty, his reason tells him that this is the only one. The way, just like the reason told him that he must kill. Here, the author uses the artistic method of image modeling to profoundly question the huge impact on people's thinking brought by the economic development of India in the post-colonial era, as well as the division and disintegration of values ​​in the process. To some extent, whether it is Ashok who died at his hands, or the boy who died under the wheel, and even Barram himself, are the victims of India's economic development.

　　Through his works, the writer Adiga explores different ways of asking the same question - "What will the future of India look like - that is one of the most difficult questions in the world to answer." Facing the development of the post-colonial era Opportunities and potential crises, the young Adiga showed invaluable sophistication and prudence, which may be the reason why he won the Booker Award.