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THE GUIDE FROM WIKIPEDIA:- Railway Raju (nicknamed) is a disarmingly corrupt to

THE GUIDE FROM WIKIPEDIA:- Railway Raju (nicknamed) is a disarmingly corrupt tour guide who is famous among tourists. He falls in love with a beautiful dancer, Rosie, the neglected wife of archaeologist Marco. Marco doesn't approve of Rosie's passion for dancing. Rosie, encouraged by Raju, decides to follow her dreams and start a dancing career. They start living together, but Raju's mother doesn't approve their relationship, and leaves them. Raju becomes Rosie's stage manager and soon, with the help of Raju's marketing tactics, Rosie becomes a successful dancer. Raju, however, develops an inflated sense of self-importance and tries to control her life. He wants to build as much wealth as possible. Raju gets involved in a case of forgery and gets a two-year sentence. After completing the sentence, Raju passes through a village where he is mistaken for a sadhu (a spiritual guide). Since he doesn't want to return in disgrace to Malgudi, he decides to stay in an abandoned temple, close to the village. There is a famine in the village and Raju is expected to keep a fast in order to make it rain. Raju confesses the entire truth about his past to Velan, who had developed a complete faith in Raju like the rest of the villagers. With media publicizing his fast, a huge crowd gathers (much to Raju's resentment) to watch him fast. After fasting for several days, he goes to the riverside one morning as part of his daily ritual, where his legs sag down as he feels that the rain is falling in the hills. The ending of the novel leaves unanswered the question of whether he died, and whether the drought ended. Pages: 220 pp Publisher: Viking Press (US); Methuen (UK) Author: R. K. Narayan Publication date: 1958 SHORT SUMMARY When Raju is released from prison after serving two years for forgery, he goes to the temple located on the Sarayu River in his hometown of Malgudi. He thinks prison is not too bad a place, and he is wondering what to do next with his life. Then a villager named Velan shows up and, taking Raju for a holy wise man or guru, consults with him about his sister, who refuses to marry as the family wishes. Well aware that he is not a guru, Raju is evasive, but Velan brings his sister anyway, and after their meeting she conforms to her family’s wishes. So begins Raju’s life as a holy man. He recalls his boyhood in a poor family; his father, who kept a very small shop; and his mother, who often complained of their life. Meanwhile, Velan returns with others from his village after work. No matter what Raju says, or even if he says nothing at all, they bring him food and beg him for words of wisdom. They feel the need for a spiritual adviser, so they make one out of a very unlikely prospect. Raju then reflects on his father’s small stall at the railroad station and on how he built up the business himself after his father’s death. His memories are interrupted periodically when other villagers come to seek his advice. Almost by accident, Raju finds himself appointing an old man to run a school at the temple for the village children. This increases his fame, and Raju begins to bask in the light of his own glory. Later, Raju recalls, he became known as Railway Raju, and people began to ask for him when their trains stopped at Malgudi. Before long, he had become a guide, even though he knew relatively little about the historic and scenic sites in the area. He simply learned from what he heard others say. He called on old Gaffur, who had a car, to act as chauffeur, and soon he was prospering. One day he met a beautiful traditional dancer named Rosie—an odd name for an Indian—and when he took her to see a cobra and watched her do a snake dance he was charmed himself. Rosie’s husband was a cold, distant art historian named Marco, and it was obvious to Raju that she had married him only for social status and financial security. Marco refused to allow Rosie to dance, and he ignored her for his scholarly research. Raju remembers the day he became romantically involved with her. The Guide is the most popular novel of R.K. Narayan. It was published in 1958, and won the Sahitya Akademy Award for 1960. It has also been filmed and the film has always drawn packed-houses. It recounts the adventures of a railway guide, popularly known as ‘Railway Raju’. As a tourist guide he is widely popular. It is this profession which brings him in contact with Marco and his beautiful wife, Rosie. While the husband is busy with his archaeological studies, Raju seduces his wife and has a good time with her. Ultimately Marco comes to know of her affair with Raju and goes away to Madras leaving Rosie behind. Rosie comes and stays with Raju in his one-room house. His mother tolerates her for some time, but when things become unbearable, she calls her brother and goes away with him, leaving Raju to look after Rosie and the house. Rosie is a born dancer, she practices regularly and soon Raju finds an opening for her. In her very first appearance, she is a grand success. Soon she is very much in demand and their earnings increase enormously. Raju lives lavishly, entertains a large number of friends with whom he drinks and gambles. All goes well till Raju forges Rosie’s signatures to obtain valuable jewellery lying with her husband. The act lands him in jail. Rosie leaves Malgudi and goes away to Madras, her hometown. She goes on with her dancing and does well without the help and management of Raju, of which he was so proud. ADVERTISEMENTS: On release from jail, Raju takes shelter in a deserted temple on the banks of the river Sarayu, a few miles away from Malgudi, and close to the village called Mangla. The simple villagers take him to be a Mahatma, begin to worship him, and bring him a lot of eatables as presents. Raju is quite comfortable and performs the role of a saint to perfection. However, soon there is a severe famine drought, and the villagers expect Raju to perform some miracle to bring them rain. So he has to undertake a fast. The fast attracts much attention and people come to have darshan of the Mahatma from far and wide. On the twelfth day of the fast, Raju falls down exhausted just as there are signs of rain on the distant horizon. It is not certain if he is actually dead or merely fainted. Thus the novel comers to an1 abrupt close on a note of ambiguity. The last pages of Narayan’s best novel, The Guide, find Raju, the chief protagonist, at the end of a lifetime of insincerity and pain. As a professional guide to Malgudi’s environs, he invented whole new historical pasts for bored tourists; he seduced a married woman, drifted away from his old mother and friends, became a flashy cultural promoter, and then tried, absentmindedly, to steal and was caught and spent years in jail, abandoned by everyone. ADVERTISEMENTS: His last few months have been spent in relative comfort as a holy man on the banks of a river: a role imposed on him by reverential village folk. But the river dries up after a drought and his devotees start looking to him to intercede with the gods. Raju resentfully starts a fast, but furtively eats whatever little food he has saved. Then abruptly, out of a moment of self disgust, comes his resolution: for the first time in his life, he will do something with complete sincerity, and he will do it for others: if fasting can bring rain, he’ll fast. He stops eating, and quickly diminishes. News of his efforts goes around; devotees and sightseers, gathering at the riverside, create a religious occasion out of the fast. On the early morning of the eleventh day of fasting, a small crowd watches him quietly as he attempts to pray standing on the river bed and then staggers and dies, mumbling the enigmatic last words of the novel, “It’s raining in the hills. I can feel it coming up under my feet, up my legs….” Characteristically, Narayan doesn’t make it clear whether Raju’s penance does actually lead to rain. He also doesn’t make much of Raju’s decision, the moment of his redemption, which a lesser writer would have attempted to turn into a resonant ending, but which is quickly passed over here in a few lines. What we know, in a moment of great disturbing beauty, is something larger and more affecting than the working-out of an individual destiny in an inhospitable world. It is and the words are of the forgotten English writer William Gerhardie, on Chekhov, but so appropriate for Narayan that sense of uploads/Geographie/ the-guide 7 .pdf