Characterisation of the narrator

The narrator of the novel “heat and dust” from Ruth Prawer Jhabvala is an English woman. She comes to India for retracing the steps of Olivia, a distant relative, who went to India with her husband in the 1920s. When she comes to India, she´s not knowing much about that country. She only knows, what she has read in Olivia´s letters. She´s naive and careless. But that´s only at the beginning of the novel. She moves to Satipur into an apartment. Her landlord is Inder Lal, a man with children and wife. The narrator lives there and retraces the steps of Olivia. By doing that, she gets nearer and nearer to the Indian population. She also starts learning to speak Hindu. When the summer-heat comes, it´s impossible to sleep inside. Thus she has to sleep outside with all the other people. Firstly she doesn´t really like that, but then, her opinion changes and she also feels that she really arrived now and is integrated into the community. She gets in contact with Inder Lals mother and also her friends, whom she sometimes joins in their jaunts through the town. The oldest one of these midwifes, called Maji, gets a very good friend of the narrator. There is a festival, called Husband´s Wedding Day, of which the narrator is critical. That shows that she also has her own opinion. But although being critical, the narrator feels again part of it all. In India there are often cripples and beggars on the streets. At the beginning, the narrator had to adapt, but by and by she got used to them. One time, she saw and beggar woman, who was ill and couldn´t help herself anymore. The narrator wants to help her and asks other people, also a doctor in hospital, for help, but no one wants to. Nearly accepting it, she realises that she has changed. She has become more like all the other Indians living there. Also situation with the sadhu Chid, living at her apartment for some time, shows some of the narrators (character) traits. She accepts many things, for example Chid going through her personal things, but if she thinks that it´s enough, she also draws the consequences, for example throwing Chid out. At the end of the novel, the narrator gets pregnant from Inder Lal. Firstly she doesn´t know what to do, but after Maji starting to make an massage for an abortion, she is sure, that she wants to have the baby and stops Maji doing the massage. The narrator stands by her pregnancy. She leaves Satipur and goes to the mountains into the house the Nawab has given to Olivia. The narrator experiences, how Olivia´s last years of life could have been.

The narrator comes to India not knowing much about the country. But she settles in soon. She gets in contact with many Indians and even learns Hindu.