I haven’t actually read Arundhati Roy’s book. Primarily because a few friends told me that it was too intricate in detailing the nuances of the story. Perhaps the people who told me, got caught in that web of intricacies, finding it impossible to push the story ahead. Or perhaps her descriptions put restrictions on their mind’s ability to paint the visuals that may have been more relatable to them. What if she had only mentioned that the protagonist was beautiful, leaving the rest for our imaginations to conjure up. Things like how the lines of the protagonist’s cheekbones accented the rays of the sun glistening off her skin; or how her tousled hair fell against her face in that gentle autumn breeze. Arundathi’s attention to detail was perhaps her undoing when it came to retaining their excitement about the story she had penned.
All of the above said, I believe Arundathi never wrote her novel to garner an audience. It was perhaps an outlet for creative expression. And God indeed lies in the details. It’s like when you buy a pair of speakers. I’m sure most of the speakers that you buy from the market, sounds “Good”. These mass produced plastic boxes sold for dime a dozen do a “good” job of playing that latest song, but for some of us, “good” isn’t “good” enough. We feel there’s one too many “O’s” in them. We search instead for that “God” hidden in the detail – in that timbre of that cymbal, or the definitive thump from that foot drum; in the raspiness of the singer’s voice and the hush of the air that passes the flute.
Doing a “good” job, barely cuts it for some of us who hope to see and feel the Gods. There is perhaps a deeper meaning in the Bible verse that proclaims that “God created man in his own image”. Perhaps he meant for us to find him in the tiniest of things. Perhaps he meant for us to see the attention he put into the tiniest of his creations instead of taking things for granted. And perhaps when we do, we’ll recognise the Image of God that he created in all of us. Cheers.
