[ilds] An Indian View of an Indian View: Durrell’s India

[sharbani banerjee(mukherjee)]

I agree with David and James that he was, perhaps, happiest in Cypress and
Corfu.....the ambience somehow alleviated the occidental sense of
oppression that he abhorred. This brings me back to the Indian influence
upon his psyche. Places like Jamshedpur, Jullunder where he was born,
Mymenshing, presently in Bangladesh and most importantly Kurseong and
Darjeeling somehow shaped and coloured his preference of the topos. In his
interviews while visiting USA.....he mentions how the hills and the
Buddhist ascetics keep revisiting his subconscious mind. He even shows how
he could do the Indian Yoga by sitting in the Lotus position!
On 18-Nov-2015 9:12 pm, "James Gifford" <james.d.gifford at gmail.com> wrote:

> I don't think I'd see that as a very contentious point to make, David.
> Indeed, why move?  You're right.
>
> That said, France is also there from the beginning, in /Pied Piper of
> Lovers/ and /Panic Spring/, so the affection for the French world seems
> very genuine as well, long before 1956 ('57?).  His intentions seem to have
> been very much to stay on Cyprus, but then the world intervened. He hadn't
> chosen Egypt, but would he have left Rhodes or Corfu? Yugoslavia and
> Argentine were clearly never "home," but he did write a very tender piece
> about Yugoslavia that's been quite overlooked.  The wound over "home" that
> Sharbani gestures to is, I think, very real for Durrell -- his position
> between locations rather than /in/ any of them is telling, and the first
> divide was between father England and mother India, sent "home" to a land
> his parents had never seen.
>
> You have much to say on the vampire house that I think needs to be said.
>
> Best,
> James
>
> On 2015-11-17 9:46 PM, Denise Tart & David Green wrote:
>
>> James, good point there. He was not made to leave France. Suspect he
>> would have stayed on Cyprus had be not been forced out, but he could have
>> gone back. No, Claude was French, so France it was and I do think he liked
>> southern France, the climate, the wine the people. Of course , he liked the
>> French approach to art and life and his works were popular there. I think
>> by the time Durrell got out of Cyprus, he had had enough of being an exile,
>> a displaced person. So now I am coming to my negative feeling and his own
>> negative feelings about the vampire house in sommieres - just couldn't be
>> bothered moving and he had the bottle for company.
>>
>> David
>> Sent from my iPad
>>
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