阿拉文德·阿迪加一九七四年齣生於印度海港城市馬德拉斯,後移居澳大利亞。畢業後曾任《時代周刊》駐印度通訊記者,並為《金融時報》、《獨立報》、《星期日泰晤士報》等英國媒體撰稿。現居孟買。《白老虎》是其處女作。
Aravind Adiga's extraordinary and brilliant first novel takes the form of a series of letters to Wen Jiabao, the Chinese premier, from Balram Halwai, the Bangalore businessman who is the self-styled “White Tiger” of the title. Bangalore is the Silicon Valley of the subcontinent, and on the eve of a state visit by Jiabao, our entrepreneur Halwai wishes to impart something of the new India to the Chinese premier - “out of respect for the love of liberty shown by the Chinese people, and also in the belief that the future of the world lies with the yellow man and the brown man now that our erstwhile master, the white-skinned man, has wasted himself through buggery, mobile phone usage and drug abuse”.
Halwai's lesson about the new India is drawn from the rags-to-riches story of his own life. For Halwai, the son of a rural rickshaw-puller, is from the “Darkness”: “Please understand, Your Excellency, that India is two countries in one: an India of Light, and an India of Darkness. The ocean brings light to my country. Every place on the map of India near the ocean is well-off. But the river brings darkness to India - the black river.”
The black river is the Ganges, beloved of the sari-and-spices tourist image of India. (“No! - Mr Jiabao, I urge you not to dip in the Ganga, unless you want your mouth full of faeces, straw, soggy parts of human bodies, buffalo carrion, and seven different kinds of industrial acids.”)
At first, this novel seems like a straightforward pulled-up-by-your-bootstraps tale, albeit given a dazzling twist by the narrator's sharp and satirical eye for the realities of life for India's poor. (“In the old days there were 1,000 castes...in India. These days, there are just two castes: Men with Big Bellies, and Men with Small Bellies.”) But as the narrative draws the reader further in, and darkens, it becomes clear that Adiga is playing a bigger game. For The White Tiger stands at the opposite end of the spectrum of representations of poverty from those images of doe-eyed children that dominate our electronic media - that sentimentalise poverty and even suggest that there may be something ennobling in it. Halwai's lesson in The White Tiger is that poverty creates monsters, and he himself is just such a monster.
發表於2024-05-12
The White Tiger 2024 pdf epub mobi 電子書 下載
抱著好奇的心開始看這本書,起初對印度北部農村的一些陋習感到好笑,漸漸地,心情變得沉重,透過小說錶麵戲虐 的描述,我看到的是雞籠般桎梏人性的壓抑,窮苦大眾也好,富商也罷,抑或高科技産業的從業人員,無不是生活在雞籠中,耗費生命和智慧的掙紮。正如小說中提及的人們到...
評分白老虎的睏境 書評人:蘇七七 書名:《白老虎》 作者:阿拉文德•阿迪加 齣版:人民文學2010年4月版 白老虎,就是孟加拉虎。是這個小說的敘事者,巴爾拉姆•哈爾維的自喻。他現在是一個“企業傢”——這是他對自己的稱呼,他也是一個前茶倌、前司機,與前殺...
評分白老虎的睏境 書評人:蘇七七 書名:《白老虎》 作者:阿拉文德•阿迪加 齣版:人民文學2010年4月版 白老虎,就是孟加拉虎。是這個小說的敘事者,巴爾拉姆•哈爾維的自喻。他現在是一個“企業傢”——這是他對自己的稱呼,他也是一個前茶倌、前司機,與前殺...
評分This is first book I ever read about India, which recommended by a financial theory professor. But I don't think he implies us to follow the strategy of Balram to become an "entrepreneur" by murdering his master, taking possession of his money which suppose...
圖書標籤: 印度 布剋奬 小說 英文原版 Booker 英文 India AravindAdiga
其實沒讀下去。。。
評分傢寶總理,你是否能從這隻印度白老虎的血盆大口中聽到來自中國底層社會的憤怒?中國大地上又有多少“社會企業傢”正在醞釀著那緻命的一擊呢?
評分雖然主角是Balram,但最復雜、最迷人,我最喜歡、也最惋惜的角色是Ashok。
評分Just after turning the first few pages, i am absorbed and can't stopped reading it and saying it a great fun.
評分an alternative of "slumdog millionaire"
The White Tiger 2024 pdf epub mobi 電子書 下載