Review: A Slight Angle by Ruth Vanita
Set in the 1920s against the backdrop of a nation increasingly intent on getting rid of British rule, A Slight Angle focuses on the desires, ambition and queerness of a group of people who just want to be themselves
In the narration of any historical event, it is mostly the mainstream perspective that is repeatedly presented. Even in the genre of historical fiction, which provides a writer with endless possibilities to tell outrageous stories set in a specific period, more conservative takes are what usually emerge. Ruth Vanita’s approach is entirely different in A Slight Angle.
Set in the 1920s when Indian society is going through a period of transformation and British rule is beginning to face another wave of resistance from the Hindustani population, the reader meets Abhik, Sheela and Sharad, among others, and becomes intimately attached to their lives. While the atmosphere of the era is politically charged with the populace increasingly intent on getting rid of the colonialists, this book focuses on the desires, ambition and queerness of a group of people who just want to be themselves. Apart from the three central characters, there is Kanta, the sister of Sharad, and Robin, Sheela’s brother. As both of them fall in love, they are reminded of the constraints of caste and religion. Meanwhile, Sharad’s growing feelings for Abhik, his teacher at Hindu College, presents another dilemma around the validity of such same sex desires as well as the teacher-student bond they share. Conflicts are not limited to relationships in this book, which intricately narrates how different characters manoeuvre through the situations they encounter and how that leads to a gradual change in their politics. For Sheela, teaching deprived children becomes a way to skip the conversation around marriage as well as use it as her own form of revolution. Staying at Sabarmati ashram, her politics of being a follower of Gandhi isn’t devoid of meaningful criticisms either.
The reader is taken on strolls across not just Delhi and Mumbai but also cities like Allahabad and Varanasi, which makes the canvas of these stories much larger. They become conscious of the glaring differences in the realities that existed in these places, something that still continues. Prominent personalities like Pandey Bechan Sharma ‘Ugra’ and Mahadevi Verma – both of whose works have been translated by Ruth Vanita – along with Subhadra Kumari Chauhan and Sumitranandan Pant have been effortlessly incorporated into the lives of these characters as their contemporaries. This could have encumbered the story. Instead, it roots it deeper in the era and its milieu.
Often, stories set in the pre-independence period, especially in a decade like the 1920s, which was witness to the Non-Cooperation Movement, the Khilafat Movement, and the Chauri Chaura Incident have focused more on the larger picture and the resurgence of nationalism. Ruth Vanita, a scholar of gender studies and queer history, however, uses the same time frame to depict a different form of resistance. In creating an alternative to the mainstream, she presents lives that are real enough to have actually existed. Ugra, the author of Chocolate and other stories on homosexual desire caused a furore in his time. A prominent name in the history of Indian queer literature, who was forced to quit writing, he has been wonderfully humanised in this work. Questions of self, desire and expression take centre stage as A Slight Angle progresses. The reader is conscious that a section of society that, for the longest time, was considered unworthy of serious literary attention, is now being treated with empathy. The book also presents the struggle to overcome the prejudices that come with patriarchy and colonialism and seems filled with the possibilities of the many revolutions that are waiting to happen.
In the end, whether they yearn to climb the social ladder or live life on their own terms free from the compulsions of marriage, the different characters populating this novel are all intent on challenging normativity. Indeed, the demand for a new world is the driving force of A Slight Angle.
Chittajit Mitra (he/him) is a queer writer, translator and editor from Allahabad. He is co-founder of RAQS, an organization working on gender, sexuality and mental health.