Coolie

“The blood of little Munoo ran to the tune of all this lavish beauty. And he would rather have had all the machines come here than tear himself away from the sandy margins of the still backwaters where he played.”

Early on, Anand establishes Munoo as a child contented and blessed in nature. Nature gives the novel vitality and energy that Munoo will lose once he moves away. Here, he roams amid the streams and mango trees and water buffalo without worries in the richness of his mountain home. His response to the sweeping scenery of Kangra is intuitive and immediate. It stirs him like music. Knowing he is only hours away from leaving his home makes this moment especially poignant.

“And, in his heart, there was a lonely song, a melancholy wail asking, not pointedly, but in a vague, uncertain rhythm, what life in this woman’s house would be like.”

Young Munoo arrives at the home of the accountant Nathoo Ram in Sham Nagar without expectations of anything other than kind treatment. In meeting Ram’s wife, Bibiji, and trying to figure out why she is so angry at the coolies and why she treats them with such hostility and disgust, Munoo learns his first lessons in the hardhearted and compassionless world of the caste system. For the first time since his departure from his mountain home, Munoo feels alone. He feels melancholy, a sadness that is sharp and as sweeping as joy was in the hills.