Writers, novels and banyan trees: notes on Vikram Seth's A Suitable Boy

Abstract

Vikram Seth's first prose novel A Suitable Boy (1993) has been considered by critics and reviewers as a return to traditional ways of writing, particularly after the eighties, a decade of experimentation in the novel. However, a close reading of the book may reveal connections in the narrative with a contemporary mood also found in other recent novels. The aim of this article is to show that Seth's work is deeply embedded in the ideological issues of its time, despite Seth's anti-intellectual statements in a conversation with the author which is also recorded here.