A Passage North: A Novel

Written by Anuk Arudpragasam

Narrated by Neil Shah

SHORTLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZE • A young man journeys into Sri Lanka’s war-torn north in this searing novel of longing, loss, and the legacy of war from the author of The Story of a Brief Marriage.
 
“A novel of tragic power and uncommon beauty.”—Anthony Marra
“One of the most individual minds of their generation.”—Financial Times

SHORTLISTED FOR THE DYLAN THOMAS PRIZE • ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR—Time, NPR

A Passage North begins with a message from out of the blue: a telephone call informing Krishan that his grandmother’s caretaker, Rani, has died under unexpected circumstances—found at the bottom of a well in her village in the north, her neck broken by the fall. The news arrives on the heels of an email from Anjum, an impassioned yet aloof activist Krishnan fell in love with years before while living in Delhi, stirring old memories and desires from a world he left behind. 
 
As Krishan makes the long journey by train from Colombo into the war-torn Northern Province for Rani’s funeral, so begins an astonishing passage into the innermost reaches of a country. At once a powerful meditation on absence and longing, as well as an unsparing account of the legacy of Sri Lanka’s thirty-year civil war, this procession to a pyre “at the end of the earth” lays bare the imprints of an island’s past, the unattainable distances between who we are and what we seek.
 
Written with precision and grace, Anuk Arudpragasam’s masterful novel is an attempt to come to terms with life in the wake of devastation, and a poignant memorial for those lost and those still living.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Penguin Random House Audio Publishing Group
• Release date: Jul 13, 2021
• ISBN: 9780593410530

Reviews for A Passage North

[bodachliath · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Shortlisted for the Booker Prize 2021

When the Booker longlist was announced earlier this week, this book was the one that jumped out at me as the most interesting looking surprise, and on the whole it did not disappoint me. It does rather contradict Rowan Williams' comments about picking readable books - while this is not a very difficult book, it certainly demands concentration, as it is written in fairly long sentences and paragraphs, and is a little short of plot, as much of it is written from a perspective inside the mind of its protagonist Krishan.

Arudprasagam is a Sri Lankan Tamil who has also lived in America and India, so it is perhaps inevitable that the island's long civil war and its aftermath are important themes, but for the most part he is not focused on the details of the war or any of its bloodier incidents.

The foreground story occupies just a few days in the life of Krishan, who lives in Colombo with his mother and grandmother. At the start he receives two messages, a short message from Anjum, a woman who he had an intense affair with as a student in Delhi and who is now involved in radical campaigning in the Indian state of Jharkand. The second is a phone call informing him that the grandmother's former carer Rani, a northern Tamil who has never recovered from the trauma of losing two sons in the latter stages of the war, has died after falling into a well in her village.

The remainder of the book follows Krishan's train journey north to attend Rani's funeral, but this is almost just a peg on which to hang his life story, as he has plenty of time to reminisce and reflect, notably on his relationship with Anjum but also on his political interests. There are also recollections of Hindu legends and epic poems, and what is perhaps most impressive is the way the author can spend so much time inside the head of his protagonist without making the book unreadable.

Overall this made for an interesting start to my longlist reading, but I would be quite surprised if this one wins.

[edieayala · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I simply fell in love with this book. It's so artfully crafted and beautifully written. It's a personal love story, where the fine threads of a young man's memories of lost love weave through myths and questions as he travels through Sri Lanka. All the while he is traveling to the funeral of a loved one, where he presents a tender narrative about life and dying.

I loved this author's long, poetic sentences, his gentle style even as he presented details of a violent and harsh war that ravaged his country.

[castlelass · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This is a beautifully written, introspective book that follows the thoughts of protagonist Krishan. It is set in Sri Lanka and contains only the barest thread of a plot. His grandmother’s caretaker, Rani, has died after traveling back to her home in northern Sri Lanka. Krishan journeys by train from Colombo to attend the funeral. Rani has experienced multiple tragedies in her life, including the violent deaths of two sons in the country’s civil war. As Krishan travels, he remembers people and events that have had a lasting impact on him and the people he loves.

Krishan’s thoughts address many aspects of life, such as love, loss, grief, aging, death, desire, yearning, and memory. He recalls the violence that changed so many lives. His thoughts return regularly to three women: his mother, grandmother, and his first love. He thinks about the war and its lingering impact a decade later. It is a philosophical book that examines the aftermath of the country’s civil war and how we spend our time on this earth.

I am amazed at the author’s ability to capture nuances, subtleties, and interpretations of what is seen, heard, and felt. Krishan’s thoughts flow from one topic to the next, as thoughts tend to do. I felt totally immersed in this story. I stopped several times just to contemplate. It is not one to rush through. I will definitely re-read this novel and can envision it winning literary prizes.

“Waking up each morning we follow by circuitous routes the thread of habit, out of our homes, into the world, and back to our beds at night, move unseeingly through familiar paths, one day giving way to another and one week to the next, so that when in the midst of this daydream something happens and the thread is finally cut, when, in a moment of strong desire or unexpected loss, the rhythms of life are interrupted, we look around and are quietly surprised to see that the world is vaster than we thought.”

The audio book is narrated by Neil Shah. His narration is quiet, almost somber, and fits the content. I listened to it twice and feel audio is a great vehicle for digesting the lengthy, stream-of-consciousness style sentences.

[thewanderingjew_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A Passage North, Anuk Arludpragasam, author; Neil Shah, narrator
This most definitely is Krishan’s story, and although it is utterly exhausting in its description and detail, it is also so beautifully written, in a soft voice that neither raises nor lowers one’s blood pressure, that it rolls out without creating any anxiety . As Krishan’s life is examined, as we look through the window of his feelings and examine his behavior, the strife and destruction of war also quietly enter the picture; still, even when that is told, the stress level does not rise; the prose smoothly rolls out, evenly and thoughtfully as it expresses the temperament of its main character.
Told like one long reminiscence, Krishan and Sri Lanka come to life. As we learn about Krishan, we go from his time as a professor in India to the war torn north of his country, Sri Lanka, where Tamils largely lived. Using his pen, the author has done a yeoman’s job of presenting the picture of his world, with all of its warts and foibles in a country rocked by civil war for decades. Although Krishan is Tamil, he remained outside the country, in India, during the war with the Sinhalese, who are in the majority. He escaped from the horrors with its brutality and destruction, from the awful emotional crises of those subjected to the violence and the fear, from the pain of the loss of loved ones, property and way of life. Not all could recover from such total devastation, but Krishan is determined to move on as he explores and learns more about what took place and how it affected others, as he explores his life and life’s raison d’être.
As Krishan searches for answers, complex ideas are revealed. How do we approach life, death, and aging? What is our purpose? Getting old involves great loss. He had not realized the effect of it on his grandmother, but as her strength, power and mobility diminish, he is forced to face mortality. How does one deal with the shadow of utter loneliness which can be devastating? How do we approach war and peace if we are removed from the actual violence? What do we ultimately want if not freedom and independence? Is that what we are all searching for as we take different paths? In a story about Sri Lanka, the author has managed to also examine human existence everywhere. He includes current themes like the lgbtq lifestyles, politics, the environment, women’s rights and more without causing any conflict or confusion, so light is his nonjudgmental touch
The book is not exciting, quite the contrary, it is slow moving and not uplifting, but is also so alive with important explanations and revelations, one cannot put it down. The reader is moved to learn more about the customs, the culture and the history, as without expending too much energy, the civil war and its aftermath are illuminated.
The juxtaposition of each word in every sentence was so poetic and eloquent that, at times, I lost sight of the story because of the beauty of the expression. Not one word was wasted. Through Appamma and Rani we learn about loneliness and different kinds of loss, about life and death, the life of a plant the decay of the body and mind. Through Anjun and Krishan we learn about what we search for and how we go about it, how we choose our lifestyles and partners. We are all searching for something, for some purpose.
As if the narrator is watching Krishan’s life on a screen, he relates everything without undue emotion, just refers to facts and events as they come up, sometimes moving back and forth in time. Adding to this, the actual reader of the audio book did a masterful job with this novel, never interjecting himself into the narrative, but rather reading it as if he was viewing it all take place with us. As he narrates the story of Krishan’s feelings and memories to the reader, like the peaceful meandering of a river, this story is told, often quoting from legends and poems that reveal the story of others searching for answers, answers that do not always satisfy the seekers. Float on with these stories and be enlightened. I do not think you will be sorry, for in the end, the experience is quite exhilarating.

[brenzi_3 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I thought all the writers who could write long, beautiful, luscious prose were...well, dead. (I'm looking at you, Anita Brookner.) But this book is absolutely beautifully written like nothing I've read from other writers recently. Not much plot but a young man is mulling over his life and the war in Sri Lanka as he walks, and later takes a train across the country. It's heartbreaking learning about how the country was devastated by war but the writing is the star here. Just so beautiful. Booker shortlist.

[ridgewaygirl · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

After the war has ended, a man takes a long walk in Columbo, Sri Lanka, and later he takes a train to attend the funeral of his grandmother's caretaker. Along the way, he remembers other walks and other train journeys he took in India with the woman he fell in love with. Anuk Arudpragasam's novel has a deceptively simple framework from which he explores the aftermath of Sri Lanka's long war on its citizens and the life of those who leave their home countries.

And while all that would be reason enough to make this novel a stand-out, the real reason to read A Passage North is for the writing, which is beautiful. Arudpragasam describes the places Krishan travels through and exists in so as to make the reader feel present in a specific place and time, to see things through the protagonist's eyes and to understand the people he interacts with. This is a remarkable novel and I'm glad that it has been put on the Booker shortlist.