It’s difficult to explain why this book appealed to me so much. It’s probably because Majumdar is such a remarkable writer who knows how to create nuanced characters. The characters in this book are striving for survival. Food is scarce in a slightly futuristic Kolkata, India. We might easily decide to sympathize with Ma, who is trying to provide food for her two-year-old daughter, Mishti, and her elderly father, Dadu. Ma’s husband is in Ann Arbor, Michigan, waiting for them to obtain passports and emigrate to the USA. However, we find out early in the novel that while employed as a manager at a shelter, Ma had been stealing food for her own family.
When Boomba, a resident of the shelter where Ma had worked, breaks into Ma’s home and steals food and the three passports necessary for leaving India, it is easy to see him as the thief. And, although he is, he is also a guardian, and Ma is also both a thief and a guardian. Ma has more status than Boomba, but both desire to take care of their families, and the reader must determine which actions are justifiable and what redeeming value they hold. One must consider whether dressing nicely and speaking formally represent a more admirable moral compass.
In the Kolkata community, police officers often lack the desire to conduct thorough investigations into theft and determine the culpability of citizens. There is a sense of total disarray in the once-tight community where climate change has affected the production of food and the well-being of the citizenry. Dishonesties and assaults prevail, and violence is commonplace.
A billionaire who lives on a floating hexagon on the river is an elusive character in the book. This billionaire funds the shelter and occasionally provides food. Still, I think this billionaire further illustrated the class system in the community, and I wondered whether the billionaire’s hexagon logo highlights the irony between the typical symbolism of hexagons representing strength and unity, and this billionaire’s actions serving to further divide with tokenism and perplexing promises.
Cauliflower is another mixed symbol in the story. Mishti, who is often hungry, continually requests cauliflower. Cauliflower has both negative and positive symbolic and spiritual connotations, especially in India. Of course, it is also nourishing, and Majumdar’s use of it in this story was confusing since the city was in turmoil and the people were reacting in unusual and sometimes incomprehensible ways.
Overall, I found A Guardian and a Thief a riveting read. The characters, although not always likable, represented many duplicitous features of all human beings, especially when basic human needs are threatened and one’s living environment becomes untenable. I highly recommend it as a tale for our time—climate change, poverty, social class, immigration, and other themes emerge through the characters’ actions.
