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“Fanatics,” Didier said thoughtfully, “for some reason always have an absolutely sterile and motionless gaze. They are like people who don't masturbate but think about it all the time."
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About the book: “Shantaram” - Gregory David Roberts
Gregory David Roberts “Shantaram” is a work that has already become popular all over the world, including in our country. The book, which tells the story of a person’s difficult journey, accompanied by difficult decisions and at the same time an oriental flavor, quickly won the hearts of different categories of readers. On this moment A film adaptation of the work is being prepared, where Johnny Depp is to play the main role in the film.
Gregory David Roberts "Shantaram": fate and literature
"Shantaram" is a book with an unusual story. This is mainly due to the personality of the author himself. To appear book "Shantaram", Gregory David Roberts has overcome a number of serious life challenges, not always associated with a good relationship with the law. The novel was written during the author's imprisonment, where he ended up as a result of a series of robberies committed with the help of an ordinary children's pistol. After a painful separation from his wife and daughter, the future writer fell into depression, after which he became addicted to drugs. After several robberies over many years, he was sentenced to nineteen years in prison in Australia. However future author The book "Shantaram" Roberts escaped from there, having served less than two years. For a long time he was hiding in Asia, Africa or European countries, but the authorities managed to detain him during his stay in Germany. He ended up behind bars again. Despite the fact that the guards often got rid of his creative work, the author still managed to write a novel, which later made him famous. At the moment, Roberts is free, visiting a wide variety of countries, and the book “Shantaram” published by Gregory David Roberts is selling multi-million copies.
"Shantaram" - autobiography book
Although the book is a stand-alone a work of art, it cannot be denied that the author’s debut novel is largely autobiographical. The main character is a criminal and drug addict who is facing prison. He manages to escape, and then his wanderings begin. The starting point is Bombay, where he quickly makes acquaintances and, together with local criminals, begins to conduct illegal transactions. However, the character's trials are accompanied by philosophical discussions about the meaning of life, freedom, and love. The exciting plot and interesting style of the writer makes you read the novel in one breath. That is why he has so many admirers around the world.
Description of the book "Shantaram"
For the first time in Russian - one of the most amazing novels beginning of the XXI century. This confession, refracted in artistic form, of a man who managed to get out of the abyss and survive, rammed all the bestseller lists and earned enthusiastic comparisons with the works of the best writers of modern times, from Melville to Hemingway. Like the author, the hero of this novel hid from the law for many years. Deprived of parental rights after his divorce from his wife, he became addicted to drugs, committed a number of robberies and was sentenced by an Australian court to nineteen years in prison. Having escaped from a maximum security prison for the second year, he reached Bombay, where he was a counterfeiter and smuggler, sold weapons and participated in showdowns with the Indian mafia, and also found his true love, in order to lose her again, in order to find her again... “A person who is not touched by “Shantaram” to the depths of his soul either has no heart, or is dead, or both. I haven't read anything with such pleasure for many years. “Shantaram” - “A Thousand and One Nights” of our century. This is a priceless gift for anyone who loves to read." Jonathan Carroll This edition contains the final, fifth part (chapters 37-42) of the five parts of the novel “Shantaram”. © 2003 by Gregory David Roberts © L. Vysotsky, translation, 2009 © M. Abushik, translation, 2009 © Edition in Russian, design. LLC “Publishing Group “Azbuka-Atticus””, 2009 Publishing House AZBUKA®
"Shantaram" - plot
Reads in 15 minutes
original - 39 h
Part one
The narrator, who escaped from prison and is hiding under the name Lindsay Ford, comes to Bombay, where he meets Prabaker - a little man with a huge radiant smile, “the best guide in the city.” He finds cheap housing for Ford and undertakes to show the wonders of Bombay.
Due to the crazy traffic on the streets, Ford almost gets hit by a double-decker bus. He is saved by the beautiful green-eyed brunette Carla.
Carla often visits the Leopold bar. Soon Ford becomes a regular at this semi-criminal bar and realizes that Carla is also involved in some kind of shady business.
Ford begins to become friends with Prabaker. He meets Carla often, and each time he falls more and more in love with her. Over the next three weeks, Prabaker shows Ford the “real Bombay” and teaches him to speak Hindi and Marathi, the main Indian dialects. They visit a market where orphans are sold, and a hospice where terminally ill people live out their lives.
By showing all this, Prabaker seems to be testing Ford's strength. The final test is a trip to native village Prabaker.
Ford lives with his family for six months, works in public fields and helps a local teacher teach English lessons. Prabaker's mother calls him Shantaram, which means "peaceful person." Ford is persuaded to stay on as a teacher, but he refuses.
On the way to Bombay he is beaten and robbed. Having no means of subsistence, Ford becomes an intermediary between foreign tourists and local hashish dealers and settles in the Prabakera slum.
During an excursion to the “standing monks” - people who have vowed never to sit down or lie down - Ford and Carla are attacked by an armed man high on hashish. The madman is quickly neutralized by a stranger who calls himself Abdullah Taheri.
There is a fire in the slums. Knowing how to provide first aid, Ford begins to treat burns. During a fire, he finds his place - he becomes a doctor.
Part two
Ford escaped from Australia's most secure prison in broad daylight through a hole in the roof of the building where the guards lived. The building was being renovated, and Ford was part of the repair crew, so the guards did not pay attention to him. He fled to escape the brutal daily beatings.
Ford dreams about prison at night. To avoid these dreams, he wanders around silent Bombay every night. He is ashamed that he lives in a slum and does not meet with his old friends, although he misses Karla. Ford is completely absorbed in the craft of healing.
During a night walk, Abdullah introduces Ford to one of the leaders of the Bombay mafia, Abdel Kader Khan. This handsome, middle-aged man, a respected sage, divided the city into districts, each of which is led by a council of crime barons. People call him Khaderbhai. Ford became close friends with Abdullah. Having lost his wife and daughter forever, Ford sees a brother in Abdullah and a father in Khaderbhai.
Since that night, Ford's amateur clinic has been regularly supplied with medicines and medical instruments. Prabaker doesn't like Abdullah - the slum dwellers consider him a hired killer. In addition to the clinic, Ford is engaged in mediation, which brings him a decent income.
Four months pass. Ford occasionally sees Carla, but does not approach her, ashamed of his poverty. Carla comes to him herself. They are having lunch on the 23rd floor of the World War II under construction. Shopping Center, where workers set up a village with farm animals - the “Heavenly Village”. There, Ford learns about Sapna, an unknown avenger who brutally kills the rich people of Bombay.
Ford helps Carla rescue her friend Lisa from the Palace, Madame Joux's notorious brothel. Due to the fault of this mysterious woman, Carla's lover once died. Pretending to be an American embassy employee who wants to ransom the girl on behalf of her father, Ford snatches Lisa from the clutches of Madame. Ford confesses his love to Carla, but she hates love.
Part three
A cholera epidemic begins in the slums, which soon covers the village. For six days Ford fights the disease, and Carla helps him. During a brief rest, she tells Ford her story.
Carla Saarnen was born in Basel, in the family of an artist and singer. The father died, a year later the mother poisoned herself with sleeping pills, and the nine-year-old girl was taken by her uncle from San Francisco. He died three years later, and Karla was left with her aunt, who did not love the girl and deprived her of the most necessary things. High school student Carla worked part-time as a babysitter. The father of one of the children raped her and said that Carla provoked him. The aunt took the side of the rapist and kicked the fifteen-year-old orphan out of the house. Since then, love has become inaccessible to Carla. She came to India after meeting an Indian businessman on a plane.
Having stopped the epidemic, Ford goes to the city to earn some money.
One of Karla's friends, Ulla, asks him to meet some person at Leopold's - she is afraid to go to the meeting alone. Ford senses danger, but agrees. A few hours before the meeting, Ford sees Carla, they become lovers.
On the way to Leopold's, Ford is arrested. He sits in an overcrowded police cell for three weeks and then ends up in prison. Regular beatings, blood-sucking insects and hunger deplete his strength over several months. Ford cannot send the news to freedom - everyone who tries to help him is severely beaten. Khaderbhai himself finds out where Ford is and pays a ransom for it.
After prison, Ford begins working for Khaderbhai. Carla is no longer in town. Ford is worried about whether she thought he had run away. He wants to find out who is to blame for his misfortunes.
Ford deals in smuggled gold and fake passports, earns a lot and rents a decent apartment. He rarely meets friends in the slum, and becomes even closer to Abdullah.
After the death of Indira Gandhi, turbulent times set in in Bombay. Ford is on the international wanted list, and only Khaderbhai’s influence protects him from prison.
Ford learns that he went to prison because of a denunciation from a woman.
Ford meets with Lisa Carter, whom he once saved from Madame Zhu's stash. Having gotten rid of drug addiction, the girl works in Bollywood. On the same day, he meets Ulla, but she knows nothing about his arrest.
Ford finds Carla in Goa, where they spend a week. He tells his beloved that he engaged in armed robbery to get money for drugs, to which he became addicted when he lost his daughter. On the last night, she asks Ford to quit his job with Khaderbhai and stay with her, but he cannot bear the pressure and leaves.
In the city, Ford learns that Sapna brutally killed one of the mafia council, and a foreigner living in Bombay put him in prison.
Part four
Under the leadership of Abdul Ghani, Ford is engaged in fake passports, making air travel both within India and abroad. He likes Lisa, but memories of the missing Karla prevent him from getting closer to her.
Prabaker is getting married. Ford gives him a taxi driver's license. A few days later Abdullah dies. The police decide that he is Sapna and Abdullah is shot dead in front of the police station. Ford then learns about Prabaker's accident. A handcart loaded with steel beams drove into his taxi. Prabaker's lower half of his face was blown off and he died in the hospital for three days.
Having lost his closest friends, Ford falls into a deep depression.
He spends three months in an opium den under the influence of heroin. Karla and Nazir, Khaderbhai's bodyguard, who has always disliked Ford, take him to a house on the coast and help him get rid of drug addiction.
Khaderbhai is sure that Abdullah was not Sapna - he was slandered by his enemies. He plans to deliver ammunition, spare parts and medical supplies to Kandahar, which is besieged by the Russians. He intends to complete this mission himself, and calls Ford with him. Afghanistan is full of warring tribes. To get to Kandahar, Khaderbhai needs a foreigner who can pretend to be an American "sponsor" of the Afghan war. This role falls to Ford.
Before leaving, Ford spends one last night with Carla. Carla wants Ford to stay, but she can't confess her love to him.
In the border town, the core of Khaderbhai’s detachment is formed. Before leaving, Ford learns that Madame Zhu put him in prison. He wants to return and take revenge on Madame. Khaderbhai tells Ford how in his youth he was kicked out of his native village. At the age of fifteen, he killed a man and started an inter-clan war. It ended only after Khaderbhai disappeared. Now he wants to return to the village near Kandahar and help his family.
Across the Afghan border, through mountain gorges, the detachment is led by Habib Abdur Rahman, obsessed with revenge on the Russians who massacred his family. Khaderbhai pays tribute to the leaders of the tribes whose territory the detachment crosses. In return, the leaders provide them with fresh food and feed for their horses. Finally the detachment reaches the Mujahideen camp. During the journey, Khabib loses his mind, runs away from the camp and starts his own war.
Throughout the winter, the detachment repairs weapons for Afghan partisans. Finally Khaderbhai orders preparations to return home. The evening before leaving, Ford learns that Karla worked for Khaderbhai - she was looking for foreigners who could be useful to him. That's how she found Ford. The acquaintance with Abdullah and the meeting with Karla were rigged. The slum clinic was used as a testing ground for smuggled drugs. Khaderbhai also knew about Ford's imprisonment - Madame Zhu helped him negotiate with politicians in exchange for his arrest.
Enraged, Ford refuses to accompany Khaderbhai. His world is collapsing, but he cannot hate Khaderbhai and Karla, because he still loves them.
Three days later, Khaderbhai dies - his squad falls into a snare set to capture Khabib. On the same day, the camp is shelled, fuel supplies, food and medicine are destroyed. The new head of the detachment believes that the shelling of the camp is a continuation of the hunt for Khabib.
After another mortar attack, nine people remain alive. The camp is surrounded, they cannot get food, and the scouts they sent disappear.
Habib suddenly appeared and reported that the south-eastern direction was clear, and the squad decided to break through.
On the eve of the breakthrough, a man from the detachment kills Khabib, having discovered chains on his neck that belonged to the missing scouts. During the breakthrough, Ford is concussed by a mortar shot.
Part five
Ford is saved by Nazir. Ford's eardrum was damaged, his body was injured and his hands were frostbitten. In the Pakistani field hospital, where the detachment was transported by people from a friendly tribe, they were not amputated only thanks to Nazir.
It takes Nazir and Ford six weeks to reach Bombay. Nazir must carry out Khaderbhai's last order - to kill some person. Ford dreams of taking revenge on Madame Zhu. He learns that the Palace was looted and burned by a crowd, and Madame lives somewhere in the depths of these ruins. He did not kill Madame Ford - she was already defeated and broken.
Nazir kills Abdul Ghani. He believed that Khaderbhai was spending too much money on the war and used Sapna to remove his rivals.
Soon the whole of Bombay learns about the death of Khaderbhai. Members of his group have to temporarily lie low. Civil strife related to the redistribution of power is ending. Ford again deals with false documents, and contacts the new council through Nazir.
Ford misses Abdullah, Khaderbhai and Prabaker. His affair with Carla is over - she returned to Bombay with a new friend.
Ford is saved from loneliness by his romance with Lisa. She says that Carla fled the United States, killing the man who raped her. After boarding a plane to Singapore, she met Khaderbhai and started working for him.
After Lisa's story, Ford is overcome with deep melancholy. He is thinking about drugs when Abdullah suddenly appears, alive and well. After an encounter with the police, Abdullah was kidnapped from the station and taken to Delhi, where he spent a year being treated for near-fatal wounds. He returned to Bombay to eliminate the remaining members of Sapna's gang.
The group still does not deal in drugs and prostitution - this disgusted Khaderbhai. However, some members are inclined towards drug dealing under pressure from the neighboring group's leader, Chukha.
Ford finally admits that he himself destroyed his family and comes to terms with this guilt. He is almost happy - he has money and Lisa.
Having reached an agreement with Sapna’s surviving accomplice, Chukha opposes the group. Ford participates in the destruction of Chukha and his henchmen. His group inherits the territory of Chukha with drug trafficking and pornography trade. Ford understands that now everything will change.
Sri Lanka is in the grip of a civil war in which Khaderbhai wanted to take part. Abdullah and Nazir decide to continue his work. There is no place for Ford in the new mafia, and he also goes to fight.
Ford in last time meets Carla. She invites him with her, but he refuses, realizing that he is not loved. Carla is going to marry her rich friend, but her heart is still cold. Karla admits that it was she who burned Madame Zhu’s house and participated in the creation of Sapna along with Gani, but does not repent of anything.
Sapna turned out to be indestructible - Ford learns that the king of the poor is gathering his own army. He spends the night after meeting Carla in the slums of Prabaker, meets his son, who has inherited his father’s radiant smile, and realizes that life goes on.
Story
The author began work on the book in prison, where the drafts were burned twice by prison guards. This is a biographical novel that tells the story of the life and rebirth of an Australian robber, Gregory David Roberts. Having found himself in another culture, Bombay (India), the hero experiences many different events, thanks to which he becomes a different person.
Criticism
An enormous (over 850 pages) and highly praised novel, following the main trends in world book publishing: the narrative is based on real events, the setting is the captivating East, and specifically the beautiful and dangerous India. The hero escapes from an Australian prison and ends up in Bombay, where, nicknamed local residents Shantaram (“peaceful man”), assimilates with mafia structures. What follows are fights, prisons, showdowns, fraud with gold and false documents, and smuggling. The hero also takes him to Afghanistan, where he fights on the side of the Mujahideen. Dialogues and descriptions make you remember Bollywood opuses: “I don’t know how much my forgiveness is worth,” I said, “but I forgive you, Carla, I forgive you and love you, and will always love you. Our lips met and merged, as waves collide and merge in the whirlpool of a raging sea.” Meanwhile, this work impressed not only sensitive observers of USA Today and the Washington Post. But also Johnny Depp, who is now producing a film based on the book. Fortunately, there is probably no room for lengthy philosophy, which would greatly burden the text. As one review said, the novel sorely lacked an editor with a pencil in one hand and a baseball bat in the other. However, if you have a long vacation, the book is just for you.
Gregory David Roberts
Copyright © 2003 by Gregory David Roberts
All rights reserved
Translation from English by Lev Vysotsky, Mikhail Abushik
After reading Gregory David Roberts' first novel, Shantaram, own life will seem insipid to you... Roberts has been compared to the best writers, from Melville to Hemingway.
Wall Street Journal
Fascinating reading... An extremely sincere book, it feels like you yourself are participating in the events depicted. This is a real sensation.
Publishers Weekly
A masterfully written finished film script in the form of a novel, where real people are shown under fictitious names... It reveals to us an India that few people know.
Kirkus Review
Inspirational storytelling.
A highly entertaining, vibrant novel. Life passes in front of you, as if on a screen, in all its unvarnished beauty, leaving an unforgettable impression.
USA Today
“Shantaram” is an outstanding novel... The plot is so fascinating that it is of great value in itself.
New York Times
Excellent... Wide panorama of life, free breathing.
Time Out
In his novel, Roberts describes what he himself saw and experienced, but the book goes beyond the autobiographical genre. Don't be put off by its length: Shantaram is one of the most compelling tales of human redemption in world literature.
Giant Magazine
The surprising thing is that after everything he had experienced, Roberts was able to write anything at all. He managed to get out of the abyss and survive... His salvation was his love for people... Real literature can change a person's life. The power of Shantaram is in affirming the joy of forgiveness. We must be able to empathize and forgive. Forgiveness is guiding star In the dark.
Dayton Daily News
"Shantaram" is full of colorful humor. Do you feel spicy aroma the chaos of Bombay life in all its splendor.
Minneapolis Star Tribune
If you asked me what this book was about, I would answer that it was about everything, about everything in the world. Gregory David Roberts did for India what Lawrence Durrell did for Alexandria, Melville for the South Seas, and Thoreau for Walden Lake. He introduced it to the circle of eternal themes of world literature.
Pat Conroy
I have never read such an interesting book as Shantaram, and I am unlikely to read anything in the near future that surpasses it in the breadth of its coverage of reality. This is a fascinating, compelling, multi-faceted story told in a beautifully crafted voice. Like a shaman - a ghost catcher, Gregory David Roberts managed to capture the very spirit of the works of Henri Charrière, Rohinton Mistry, Tom Wolfe and Mario Vargas Llosa, fuse it all together with the power of his magic and create a unique monument of literature. The hand of the god Ganesha has released the elephant, the monster is running out of control, and you are involuntarily filled with fear for the brave man who intends to write a novel about India. Gregory David Roberts is a giant who was up to this task, he is a brilliant guru and genius, without any exaggeration.
Moses Isegawa
A person who is not touched to the core by Shantaram either has no heart, is dead, or both. I haven't read anything with such pleasure for many years. "Shantaram" is the "Thousand and One Nights" of our century. This is a priceless gift for anyone who loves to read.
Jonathan Carroll
Shantaram is great. And most importantly, he teaches us a lesson by showing us that those we throw in prison are people too. Among them there may be exceptional personalities. And even brilliant ones.
Eilet Waldman
Roberts has visited such places and looked into such corners human soul, which most of us can see only in our imagination. Returning from there, he told us a story that penetrates the soul and affirms eternal truths. Roberts experienced sadness and hope, hardship and the drama of life's struggle, cruelty and love, and he beautifully described all this in his epic work, which from beginning to end is imbued with a deep meaning revealed in the first paragraph.
Barry Eisler
Shantaram is absolutely unique, bold and frenetic. It takes the wildest imagination by surprise.
"Shantaram" captivated me from the very first line. This is an amazing, touching, scary, magnificent book, vast as the ocean.
Detroit Free Press
This is a comprehensive, insightful novel populated by characters who are full of life. But the strongest and most gratifying impression is left by the description of Bombay, Roberts’s sincere love for India and the people inhabiting it... Roberts invites us to the Bombay slums, opium dens, brothels and nightclubs, saying: “Come in, we are with you.”
Washington Post
In Australia they called him the Noble Bandit because he never killed anyone, no matter how many banks he robbed. And after all, he went and wrote this absolutely beautiful, poetic, allegorical thick novel that literally blew my mind.
Part 1
Chapter 1
It took me many years and travels around the world to learn everything I know about love, about fate and about the choices we make in life, but the most important thing I understood in that moment when I was chained to the wall. beat up. My mind screamed, but even through this scream I realized that even in this crucified, helpless state I was free - I could hate my tormentors or forgive them. Freedom seems to be very relative, but when you feel only the ebb and flow of pain, it opens up a whole universe of possibilities for you. And the choice you make between hatred and forgiveness can become the story of your life.
In my case it's Long story, filled with people and events. I was a revolutionary who lost his ideals in a drug haze, a philosopher who lost himself in a world of crime, and a poet who lost his gift in a maximum security prison. Having escaped from this prison through a wall between two machine-gun towers, I became the most popular person in the country - no one was looking for a meeting with anyone as persistently as with me. Luck was with me and took me to the ends of the world, to India, where I joined the ranks of the Bombay mafiosi. I was an arms dealer, a smuggler and a counterfeiter. On three continents I was shackled and beaten, wounded and starved more than once. I was in a war and went into the attack under enemy fire. And I survived while people around me died. For the most part, they were better than me, their lives just went astray and, colliding at one of the sharp turns with someone’s hatred, love or indifference, they went downhill. I had to bury too many people, and the bitterness of their lives merged with my own.
But my story begins not with them or with the mafia, but with my first day in Bombay. Fate threw me there, drawing me into its game. The arrangement was successful for me: I had a meeting with Carla Saarnen. As soon as I looked into her green eyes, I immediately went all in, accepting all the conditions. So my story, like everything else in this life, begins with a woman, with a new city and with a little bit of luck.
The first thing I noticed on that first day in Bombay was the unusual smell. I felt it already in the transition from the plane to the terminal building - before I heard or saw anything in India. This smell was pleasant and excited me in that first minute in Bombay, when, having broken free, I re-entered Big world, but he was a complete stranger to me. Now I know that it is the sweet, disturbing smell of hope destroying hate, and at the same time the sour, musty smell of greed destroying love. It is the smell of gods and demons, of decaying and reborn empires and civilizations. This is the blue smell of the skin of the ocean, noticeable anywhere in the city on the seven islands, and the bloody metallic smell of cars. This is the smell of bustle and peace, all the vital activity of sixty million animals, more than half of which are human beings and rats. It is the smell of love and broken hearts, the struggle for survival and cruel defeats that forge our courage. This is the smell of ten thousand restaurants, five thousand temples, tombs, churches and mosques, as well as hundreds of bazaars where they sell exclusively perfumes, spices, incense and fresh flowers. Carla once called it the worst of the most beautiful scents, and she was undoubtedly right, as she is always right in her own way in her assessments. And now, whenever I come to Bombay, the first thing I smell is this smell - it welcomes me and tells me that I have returned home.
The second thing that immediately made itself felt was the heat. Just five minutes into the air-conditioned coolness of the air show, I suddenly felt that my clothes were sticking to me. My heart was pounding, fighting off the attacks of the unfamiliar climate. Each breath was a small victory for the body in a fierce battle. Subsequently, I became convinced that this tropical sweat does not leave you day or night, because it is generated by the humid heat. The stifling humidity turns us all into amphibians; in Bombay you continuously inhale water along with the air and gradually get used to living like this, and even find pleasure in it - or you leave here.
And finally, people. Assamese, Jats and Punjabis; natives of Rajasthan, Bengal and Tamil Nadu, Pushkar, Cochin and Konarak; Brahmins, warriors and untouchables; Hindus, Muslims, Christians, Buddhists, Parsis, Jains, Animists; light-skinned and dark-skinned, with green, golden-brown or black eyes - all the faces and all the forms of this unique diversity, this incomparable beauty - India.
Several million Bombay residents plus a million visitors. Two best friend smuggler - mule and camel. Mules help him transport goods from country to country, bypassing customs checkpoints. Camels are simple-minded wanderers. A man with a false passport ingratiates himself into their company, and they quietly transport him, violating the border without even knowing it.
All this was still unknown to me then. I mastered the subtleties of smuggling much later, years later. On that first visit to India I acted purely on instinct, and the only contraband I carried was myself, my fragile persecuted freedom. I had a fake New Zealand passport, in which, instead of the previous owner's photograph, mine was pasted in. I did this operation myself and not flawlessly. The passport should have withstood an ordinary check, but if customs officers had become suspicious and contacted the New Zealand Embassy, the fake would have been discovered very quickly. Therefore, immediately after taking off from Auckland, I began to look for a suitable group of tourists on the plane and discovered a group of students who were not on this flight for the first time. Asking them about India, I struck up an acquaintance with them and settled down with them at customs control in an Aeroport. The Indians decided that I belonged to this liberated and simple-minded brethren and limited themselves to a superficial search.
Already alone, I left the airport building, and the stinging sun immediately attacked me. The feeling of freedom made my head spin: another wall has been overcome, another border is behind me, I can run in all four directions and find refuge somewhere. Two years have passed since my escape from prison, but the life of one who is declared an outlaw is a continuous flight, day and night. And although I did not feel truly free - this was ordered for me - I looked forward with hope and apprehensive excitement to meeting a new country, where I would live with a new passport, acquiring new alarming wrinkles under gray eyes on my young face. I stood on the footpath under the overturned blue bowl of the baked Bombay sky, and my heart was as pure and full of bright hopes as an early morning on the monsoon-swept Malabar coast.
Someone grabbed my hand. I stopped. All my fighting muscles tensed, but I suppressed my fear. Just don't run. Just don't panic. I turned around.
A small man in a dull brown uniform stood in front of me, holding my guitar. He was not just small, but tiny, a real dwarf with a frightened, innocent expression on his face, like that of a weak-minded person.
- Your music, sir. You forgot your music, right?
Apparently I left it at the carousel where I received my luggage. But how did this little man know that the guitar was mine? When I smiled in surprise and relief, he grinned back at me with such complete spontaneity that we usually avoid for fear of appearing simple-minded. He gave me the guitar, and I noticed that his fingers were webbed, like a waterfowl. I pulled some bills out of my pocket and handed them to him, but he awkwardly backed away from me on his thick legs.
- Money - no. We are here to help. “Welcome to India,” he said and trotted off, getting lost in the human forest.
I bought a ticket to the center from the conductor of the Veteran Bus Line. A retired military man was driving. Seeing how easily my duffel bag and suitcase flew up onto the roof, as if landing on free place Among other luggage, I decided to keep the guitar with me. I sat down on the back bench next to two long-haired tourists. The bus quickly filled with locals and visitors, mostly young and eager to spend as little as possible.
When the cabin was almost full, the driver turned around, looked at us menacingly, blew a stream of bright red betel juice from his mouth through the open door and announced that we were leaving immediately:
– Thik hain, chalo!1
Okay, let's go! (Hindi)
The engine roared, the gears grinded together, and we rushed forward with terrifying speed through the crowd of porters and pedestrians who shied away from the wheels of the bus at the last second. Our conductor, riding on the step, showered them with choice abuse.
At first, a wide modern highway lined with trees and bushes led into the city. It looked like a clean, well-maintained landscape around international airport in my hometown of Melbourne. Lulled and pleased by this similarity, I was stunned when the road suddenly narrowed to the limit - one would think that this contrast was designed specifically to amaze the visitor. Several lanes of traffic merged into one, the trees disappeared, and instead there were slums on both sides of the road, the sight of which made the cats scratch my heart. Whole acres of slums stretched into the distance like undulating black-brown dunes, disappearing into the horizon in a hot haze. The pitiful shacks were constructed from bamboo poles, reed mats, scraps of plastic, paper, and rags. They pressed close to each other; here and there narrow passages twisted between them. In the entire space spread out in front of us, not a single building was visible that would exceed the height of a person.
It seemed incredible that a modern airport with a crowd of wealthy, purposeful tourists was located just a few kilometers from this vale of broken and scattered aspirations. The first thing that came to my mind was that something happened somewhere terrible disaster and this is the camp in which the survivors found temporary shelter. Months later, I realized that the inhabitants of the slums could indeed be considered survivors - they had been driven here from their villages by poverty, hunger, massacres. Every week five thousand refugees arrived in the city, and so week after week, year after year.
As the driver's meter ticked up the kilometers, the hundreds of slum dwellers became thousands and tens of thousands, and I was literally cringing inside. I was ashamed of my health, the money in my pockets. If you are in principle capable of feeling such things, then the first unexpected encounter with people rejected by the world will be a painful accusation for you. I robbed banks and dealt drugs, and the jailers beat me until my bones cracked. I've had a knife stabbed at me more than once, and I've stabbed myself back. I escaped from prison with tough guys and men, climbing over a steep wall in the most visible place. Nevertheless, this sea of human suffering, widening to the very horizon, cut me in the eyes. It was as if I had run into a knife.
The feeling of shame and guilt smoldering inside me flared up more and more, forcing me to clench my fists because of this injustice. “What kind of government is this,” I thought, “what kind of system is this that allows this?”
And the slums went on and on; Occasionally, thriving businesses and offices stood out in stark contrast, as well as shabby apartment buildings inhabited by those who were slightly richer. But behind them the slums stretched out again, and their inescapability erased from me all respect for a foreign country. With some trepidation I began to observe the people who lived in these countless ruins. The woman leaned forward to comb a black satin lock of hair forward. Another bathed children in a copper basin. A man was leading three goats with red ribbons tied to their collars. Another was shaving in front of a cracked mirror. Children were playing everywhere. People were carrying buckets of water and repairing one of the huts. And everyone I looked at smiled and laughed.
The bus stopped, stuck in traffic, and a man came out of a hut very close to my window. He was a European, as pale-skinned as the tourists on our bus, only his entire clothing consisted of a piece of fabric painted with roses wrapped around his torso. The man stretched, yawned and unconsciously scratched his bare stomach. There was a real cow-like serenity about him. I envied his calmness, as well as the smiles with which the group of people heading towards the road greeted him.
The bus jerked away, and the man was left behind. But meeting him radically changed my perception of my surroundings. He was a foreigner like me, and this allowed me to imagine myself in this world. What seemed completely alien and strange to me suddenly became real, quite possible and even exciting. Now I saw how hardworking these people are, how much effort and energy there is in everything they do. A casual glance into one or another hut demonstrated the amazing cleanliness of these miserable abode: floors without a single spot, shiny metal dishes arranged in neat piles. And finally I noticed what I should have noticed from the very beginning - these people were amazingly beautiful: women wrapped in bright scarlet, blue and gold fabrics, walking barefoot among this cramped space and squalor with patient, almost unearthly grace, white teeth men with almond-shaped eyes and cheerful, friendly children with thin arms and legs. The elders played with the kids, many had their little brothers and sisters sitting on their laps. And for the first time in the last half hour I smiled.
“Yes, it’s a pitiful sight,” said the young man sitting next to me, looking out the window.
He was a Canadian, as could be seen from the maple leaf-shaped patch on his jacket, tall and heavily built, with pale blue eyes and shoulder-length brown hair. His comrade was a smaller copy of him - they were even dressed the same: jeans washed almost white, soft jackets made of printed calico and sandals on their feet.
- What are you saying?
– Are you here for the first time? – he asked instead of answering, and when I nodded, he said: “I thought so.” It will be a little better - less slums and all this. But really good places you won’t find it in Bombay - the most seedy city in all of India, you can believe me.
“That’s true,” the smaller Canadian remarked.
- True, along the way we will come across a couple of beautiful temples, quite decent English houses with stone lions, copper Street lights etc. But this is not India. Real India near the Himalayas, in Manali, or in the religious center of Varanasi, or on South coast, in Kerala. The real India is not in the cities.
– And where are you going?
– We will stay at the ashram of the Rajneeshites 2
Ashram– originally a hermit’s shelter; often also a center for religious education; Rajneeshism- a religious doctrine founded in 1964 by Bhagwan Shri Rajneesh (Osho) and combining the tenets of Christianity, ancient Indian and some other religions.
In Pune. This is the best ashram in the whole country.
Two pairs of transparent pale blue eyes stared at me critically, almost accusingly, as is typical of people who are convinced that they have found the only right path.
-Will you stay here?
- In Bombay, you mean?
– Yes, are you going to stop somewhere in the city or will you move on today?
“I don’t know yet,” I answered and turned to the window.
It was true: I didn't know if I wanted to spend some time in Bombay or if I would immediately move... somewhere. At that moment I didn’t care, I was what Carla once called the most dangerous and most interesting animal in the world: a tough guy with no goal.
“I have no definite plans,” I said. “Maybe I won’t stay in Bombay for long.”
“We’ll spend the night here and in the morning we’ll go to Pune by train.” If you want, we can rent a room for three. It's much cheaper.
I looked into his guileless blue eyes. “Perhaps it would be better to move in with them at first,” I thought. “Their authentic documents and simple-minded smiles will serve as a cover for my fake passport.” Perhaps it will be safer this way.”
The novel "Shantaram", reviews of which are collected in this article, is the most famous work Australian novelist Gregory David Roberts. The book is based on real events that happened to the author. The action of the work takes place on the streets of Indian Bombay. The novel was first published in 2003, and 7 years later it was translated into Russian. By this time, the worldwide circulation of the book exceeded one million copies.
What is this book about
Reviews about the novel "Shantaram" help to form an impression of this work. It is narrated in the first person. It begins with the moment the main character escapes from prison. At large, he is hiding under the name Lindsay Ford.
To escape from his pursuers, he comes to Bombay. This is one of the largest cities in the world, where it is easy to get lost. In the first part of this work, Lindsay Ford meets Prabaker, who characterizes himself as the best guide of this city. He helps Ford find housing and shows why Bombay is so unusual.
Literally in the first days main character Almost gets hit by a huge double-decker bus, as the traffic on the streets of Bombay is simply crazy. saves him from misfortune charming girl, whose name is Karla. Reader reviews of the book "Shantaram" especially note how vividly the author described it. The girl has huge green eyes. It seems to the hero that this is what the sea could be like if it could achieve perfection.
Carla admits that she often goes to the Leopold bar, and she can be found there. In reviews of the book "Shantaram 1" many emphasize the documentary nature of everything the author writes about. He uses real-life place names and names of establishments. For example, the Leopold bar actually operates in Bombay; book lovers can sit there with pleasure.
Readers' reviews of the novel "Shantaram" focus on the fact that the bar is shown by the author as a semi-criminal place. This is how it is in real life. Ford becomes a regular there. Over time, he realizes that Karla is not here by chance, since she is somehow connected with shady business.
Friendship with Prabaker
A true friendship develops between the main character and Prabaker. In reviews of the book "Shantaram" (volume 1), many note that they like this kind of multiculturalism. Ford often sees Carla, falling in love with her more and more each time.
Prabaker shows the Australian guest what the real Bombay is, teaches him to speak Hindi and Marathi - the main Indian dialects, understandable to everyone here. Prabaker takes Ford to various places, as if testing him. They visit a market where children are sold, and come to a hospice where old people live out their last days.
Finally, they go to the guide’s home village. Here Ford spends the next six months. He works in the field with everyone else, teaching children English language. Here they start calling him Shantaram. As Prabaker's mother notes, literally translated it means "peaceful person." In reviews of the book "Shantaram", readers note that the hero has a chance to live on in peace. He is offered a teaching position, but he refuses.
On the way back to Bombay, he is beaten and all his most valuable things are taken away. Left without a livelihood, Ford makes money by becoming an intermediary between hashish sellers and foreign tourists. He remains to live in Prabaker's slums.
In reviews of the book "Shantaram", many note an important episode - Ford's journey with Carla to the so-called "standing monks". These are people who have vowed never to sit down. On this trip, the couple is attacked by an armed man intoxicated with hashish. They are saved by a stranger who introduces himself as Abdullah Taheri.
Returning to the slums, Ford finds a major fire in them. Having first aid skills, the main character finally finds his place. He becomes a doctor.
Second part of the novel
The second part of the novel "Shantaram", according to reader reviews, is just as exciting as the first. It tells the story of Ford's life. He managed to escape from Australia's most secure prison using a hole in the roof. He learned about it when he worked on a repair team. Severe beatings forced him to escape.
Ford still dreams about prison even when he goes to bed in Bombay. In reader reviews of the book "Shantaram" many note original way, with which he fights nightmares. Ford walks around the city at night.
During one of these walks, he meets Abdel Kader Khan. He is one of the leaders of the Bombay mafia. The description of the book "Shantaram" and reviews of it highlight how skillfully the author depicted the division of the city between the crime barons, the young and ugly-looking Abdel Khan. Ford begins to communicate closely with him. He still has a family in Australia, but he does not expect to return to them, so he begins to consider Abdullah his brother, and Khan, whom everyone calls Khaderbhae, his father.
Ford Clinic
In reviews and reviews of the book "Shantaram", critics note that all the events in it are closely connected and interestingly intertwined. Thus, the main character, after a chance meeting on a night walk, finds his calling in the clinic. Having escaped from prison, he makes friends with crime bosses while free, but he himself remains law-abiding. His new friend Abdullah is feared by the slum dwellers, whom Ford plans to treat with medicines supplied by the same Abdullah and his accomplices.
4 months of such a measured and at the same time eventful life pass. Ford meets Carla, whom he has not seen for a long time, embarrassed by the fact that he lives in the slums. They have lunch on the 23rd floor of the World Trade Center. It is there that the main character learns about the mysterious Sapna, a local vigilante who kills rich people.
At the end of this part of the book, Ford confesses his love to Carla, but she rejects him because she hates love, because her lover once died due to the fault of the brothel owner.
The third part
Reviews of the book "Shantaram" by Gregory David Roberts note that the author keeps readers in suspense all the time. Thus, the next chapters describe a new scourge that befalls the inhabitants of the slums. A cholera epidemic begins there. All residents of the village are at risk. Ford and Carla have been fighting the epidemic for a week. In rare moments of rest, the girl tells him her story.
In critics' reviews of the book "Shantaram", many point out that this is one of the most important parts of the novel. It turns out that Carla was born in Switzerland. Her parents were creative people- artist and singer. When she was 9 years old, her father died, and her mother, unable to bear the loss, committed suicide.
The girl was taken in by her uncle, who lived in San Francisco. But he also died 3 years later. Karla remained to live with his wife, who hated her and deprived her of the most necessary things. As a high school student, she had to work as a nanny in order to have pocket money and the opportunity to buy something for herself.
This simple and peaceful work turned out to be risky for Clara. The father of one of her charges raped the girl. The aunt sided with the man and kicked 15-year-old Clara out of the house. After that she had to endure a lot of grief. One day she met an Indian businessman, who brought her to Bombay.
Dark Deeds
Having stopped the epidemic, Ford goes to the city to earn a little extra money. The clinic does not bring him any income. He used to earn money as a broker, but because of cholera, his services in the slums in Lately have become unnecessary.
In the novel "Shantaram", the plot and reviews of which are given in this article, Ford's friend Carla asks for help. She needs to meet a certain person at Leopold, but she is afraid to go alone. A few hours before this meeting, an important event in the novel occurs - Ford and Carla become lovers.
The main character does not make it to the bar, but not because of Clara, but because he is arrested on the way. In reviews of the book "Shantaram", the genre of which is defined as drama, readers note that everything repeats itself in the hero's life. After a period of quiet life, he again finds himself in terrible conditions, where there are regular beatings and hunger. All this exhausts him greatly.
He is saved by Khaderbhai, who, having learned that Ford was in prison, pays a ransom for him.
Once free, Ford begins working for Khaderbhai. By this time, Carla had left town. Where, he doesn't know. He also does not know whose fault he ended up behind bars.
The main character's new occupation is false documents and smuggled gold. He starts earning decent money and rents an apartment in an elite area.
Troubled times in Bombay begin after the assassination of Indira Gandhi. There are police everywhere, and Ford is on the international wanted list. Suddenly he finds out that he ended up in prison because of a denunciation by a certain woman. But this does not clarify the situation.
He finds Karla in Goa. He admits to her that he went on an armed robbery in Australia to get money for the drugs he became addicted to after losing his daughter. That's how I ended up in prison for the first time. The girl asks him to stop working for Khaderbhai, but Ford decides that she is putting pressure on him and leaves.
In Bombay, he finds out that Sapna (a local vigilante) has been killed, and the woman who sent him to prison is a foreigner.
Fourth part
After a disagreement, Carla disappears. Ford likes her friend Lisa, but memories of his beloved prevent him from getting closer to her.
Meanwhile, Prabaker gets married. For the wedding, Ford gives him a taxi driver's license, and a few days later Abdullah dies in a shootout with the police. Soon Ford learns about the accident in which Prabaker was also involved. His taxi was hit by a handcart loaded with steel beams. Three days later, his friend dies in the hospital.
This is how Ford loses his closest people. He becomes depressed and spends three months in an opium den. Only Karla and Khaderbhai's bodyguard named Nazir save him.
Khaderbhai's new plan
Khaderbhai has a new case. He decides to supply weapons and medicine to Kandahar, which is besieged by Russian troops. He takes Ford with him as his assistant. Afghanistan has many conflicting tribes. To get into Kandahar, the mafia needs a foreigner who will introduce himself as an American sponsor of the war. This is the role Ford will have to fill.
Before leaving, Ford spends the night at Carla's. She persuades him to stay, but cannot confess her love.
Just before leaving, the main character learns that he was sent to prison by Madame Zhu, the owner of the brothel from which Ford freed Carla's friend. So she took revenge on him.
Meanwhile, readers will learn the life story of another hero - Khaderbhai. At the age of 15, he killed a person for the first time, starting a war between the clans. It happened in a village near Kandahar. Now he wants to return there to help his family.
Khaderbhai’s detachment moves across the territory of Afghanistan, constantly bumping into local tribes who have to pay tribute. They supply them with food and feed for the horses. The main character concludes that people are divided into those who kill to survive and those who live to kill.
It is worth noting that the novel is replete with similar reflections on life, which are widely quoted among fans. At the same time, many negative reviews about the book "Shantaram" are based precisely on the fact that all these wise phrases overly pompous and worthless. The author is trying to be like Paolo Coelho. But his wisdom, like the reflections of the Brazilian prose writer, can only impress teenagers.
Let's return to the plot of the novel. Khaderbhai's detachment reaches the partisans. They spend the entire winter restoring their weapons, and plan to return home in the spring. On the last evening, Ford learns that Karla, like him, worked for Khaderbhai. She was looking for foreigners who could be useful to the mafiosi.
That's how she found Ford. It turns out that everything was a set-up - both the meeting with Karla and the acquaintance with Abdullah. The bandits used the clinic in the slums as a testing ground for smuggled drugs that were brought from abroad. Moreover, all this time Khaderbhai was aware of who was responsible for Ford's imprisonment, since Madame Zhu had repeatedly helped him in various matters.
Such unexpected plot twists have earned many positive reviews about the book "Shantaram" famous people. By the way, now they are going to film the novel. For this right, Warner Bros. Already paid two million dollars.
Among the reviews of the book "Shantaram" by famous people is the opinion of Johnny Depp, who liked this work. Now he plans to play the main role in the film.
Meanwhile, Ford refuses to accompany Khaderbhai in the future, since he betrayed him. But he cannot sincerely begin to hate either the head of the mafioso or Karla, since during this time he has fallen in love with them.
Three days later, Khaderbhai's squad is ambushed. The mafiosi are killed and his camp is shelled. As a result, supplies of food, medicine and fuel were almost completely destroyed. The detachment believes that the reason for the shelling was the betrayal of their guide Habib, who brought them to Kandahar and then went to fight against the Russians, whom he hates.
Mortar attacks continue with enviable regularity. After one of them, only 9 people remain alive. The camp is surrounded on all sides. Supplies are depleted, and none of the scouts have returned. When everyone thinks the end has come, Khabib appears. He says that you can go to the southeast. The squad decides to fight their way to freedom.
Before leaving, one of Khaderbhai’s men finds chains on Habib’s neck that belonged to the disappeared scouts. Khabib is killed. The squad successfully breaks through, but Ford is concussed. He was wounded by a mortar.
Fifth part
The main character has a damaged eardrum, frostbitten hands, and wounds all over his body. He is placed in a Pakistani field hospital, and from there he is transferred to one of the friendly tribes. Nazir helps him in everything. Only thanks to him is it possible to avoid amputation of his hands.
It takes Ford and Nazir a month and a half to get to Bombay. It turns out that in the city Nazir must carry out Khaderbhai’s last order - to kill some person. Ford also has things to do - he wants to take revenge on Madame Zhu. It turns out that her brothel was looted and burned. She herself settled in some ruins. Ford is convinced that this woman is already broken and decides to let her live.
Meanwhile, the whole city learns about Khaderbhai's death. His people are forced to temporarily lie low. A new redistribution of power in the criminal world is beginning.
Ford grieves for his friends who died and for Carla, who betrayed him. Their romance is over, she is dating a new young man. Out of loneliness, the main character starts a relationship with Carla's friend Lisa, whom he once saved from Madame Zhu's brothel.
Lisa tells him the real story of Carla's life. She escaped from America, killing the man who raped her. On the plane flying to Singapore, I met Khaderbhai, and from then on I worked for him.
The ending of the novel
Ford becomes depressed. Abdullah brings him out of this state, who, it turns out, did not die. He was treated for his fatal wounds in Delhi. To take him to the Indian capital, friends had to kidnap the wounded Abdullah from the police station. A large number of such far-fetched storylines bordering on fantasy, led to a large number negative reviews about the novel.
Ford is going through a deep personal crisis. He understands that he is to blame for the fact that his family in Australia has collapsed. At the same time, he is happy with Lisa. They understand each other, and he also has money, which is also important.
The people left from Khaderbhai's group have a real enemy. This is Chukha. Ford has to participate in its destruction. The group takes over the affairs that Chukha was in charge of, and this is the sale of pornography and drug trafficking. Ford understands that everything around him is changing.
Together with Abudullah and Nazir, he goes to Sri Lanka, where the Civil War. Everyone is sure that friends are leaving to fight.
Finally, Ford sees Carla for the last time. She is going to marry a wealthy admirer. But her heart still remains cold. Carla confesses to Ford that she was the one who destroyed Madame Zhu's business and burned down the brothel.
Ford learns details about Sapna, who, as it turns out, was not killed either. The King of the Poor, as everyone calls him, is gathering his own army. Ford spends his last night in Bombay in the slums. He meets Prabaker's son, who inherited his father's radiant smile and cheerful disposition. Ford understands the main thing: life goes on.
Like the novel "Shantaram". Already released A new book Roberts "Shantaram. Shadow of the Mountain."
Shantaram was written by Australian writer Gregory David Roberts and was first published in 2003. This novel, being essentially autobiographical, became a world bestseller. Roberts' book "Shantaram" is compared to the works of the best American writers of modern times, from Melville to Hemingway. “Shantaram” is an eternal love story: love for humanity, for friends, women, country and city, love for adventure, and undisguised love for the reader.
In his review, Jonathan Carroll said: “A person who is not deeply touched by Shantaram either has no heart, is dead, or both. I haven't read anything with such pleasure for many years. "Shantaram" - "A Thousand and One Nights" of our century. This is a priceless gift for anyone who loves to read." You can read the book “Shantaram” by Gregory David Roberts online or download it for free on our Internet resource.
On our website about books you can download the book “Shantaram” by Gregory David Roberts for free in epub, fb2, txt, rtf formats.
The plot of the book reveals how from a curious tourist the main character turns into a resident of exotic Bombay, and acquires a new “I” and a new name - Shantaram. The novel describes events taking place in the mid-1980s. Lindsay, the main character, is a very extraordinary person. He is a criminal who has escaped from prison, and with a forged passport, he crosses the Indian border. Lindsay is a bit of a philosopher, a bit of a writer, and something of a romantic. No wonder that amazing world the unique Bombay evokes in him sincere feelings and a storm of emotions. Such vivid impressions of the hero are fueled by a romantic acquaintance with a beautiful and dangerous girl, Karla. Such a life exposes him to the face of war, torture, murder and a series of bloody betrayals. His trusty guide Prakaber takes him to such terrifying places as a drug den, a child slave market and abandoned corners of the Bombay slums. The keys that will help to understand what is happening, expose secrets and intrigues, connect him with two heroes: Khader Khan, a mafia leader and criminal, and Carla, who is engaged in a very dangerous and mysterious business.
Download “Shantaram” for free for iPad, iPhone, Android and Kindle - in epub, fb2, txt, rtf and doc - you can visit David Roberts’s website
"Shantaram" is a story about how a man without a home and family searches for love and the meaning of life. He works as a doctor in the inner city and learns the dark arts of the mafia. Reading this book is fascinating, it will be of interest to all fans of the thriller and action genres, and will bring real pleasure from reading the hero’s internal monologues.
(estimates: 1
, average: 5,00
out of 5)
Title: Shantaram
Author: Gregory David Roberts
Year: 2003
Genre: Foreign Adventure, Contemporary foreign literature
About the book “Shantaram” by Gregory David Roberts
"Shantaram" by Roberts Gregory David is one of the most readable novels of our century, which tells about the difficult life path a person who has decided to gain freedom in all its senses. The novel has earned widespread recognition around the world, both from readers and critics. Having familiarized yourself with this work more closely, you will understand that the significance of this book, as well as the comparison of its author with the classics last century not exaggerated at all. This great novel was written by Gregory David Roberts during his imprisonment as a result of years of illegal activities. After divorcing his wife, his life completely went downhill: deprived of communication with his beloved daughter, he fell into depression and, as a result, became addicted to heroin. After a series of robberies committed with a child's pistol, the author was sentenced to 19 years in prison in Australia.
However, less than two years later he managed to escape, after which Roberts was forced to hide in Asia, Europe, Africa and New Zealand over the next ten years. In 1990, authorities finally managed to catch him in Germany, and Roberts went back to jail. The writer had a hard time in his new home: prison guards more than once destroyed his manuscripts. Now the writer has been released and spends his life traveling around the world, considering Bombay his homeland, and his novel is already being prepared for a film adaptation. Johnny Depp will play the main role in the upcoming film, so we can hope that even if the film does not better than books, then, in any case, it won’t be a shame to put it next to each other on the same shelf.
And now about the novel itself. For the most part, this is an autobiographical work with artistic elements- the main character is the prototype of the writer, and Gregory describes many events and places from his own life experience. The plot centers on a former drug addict and robber who was sentenced to nineteen years in prison, but managed to make a daring escape (sound familiar?). Some time later, using a false passport in the name of Lindsay Ford, he arrives in Bombay, where, thanks to his character, he quickly makes friends. A local peasant woman gives the hero a new name - “Shantaram”. To earn a living, he contacts bandits and begins to conduct illegal transactions. At the same time, he finds himself a patron in the form of a local crime boss. A father-son relationship develops between the hero and the mafioso. Prisons, exhausting journeys, death of loved ones and separation from loved ones, as well as betrayal and human cruelty - all this haunts the hero throughout the novel and is accompanied by the writer's philosophical reflections. Shantaram is a book that every person living today should read.
On our website about books, you can download the site for free without registration or read online the book “Shantaram” by Gregory David Roberts in epub, fb2, txt, rtf, pdf formats for iPad, iPhone, Android and Kindle. The book will give you a lot of pleasant moments and real pleasure from reading. Buy full version you can from our partner. Also, here you will find last news from literary world, learn the biography of your favorite authors. For beginning writers there is a separate section with useful tips and recommendations, interesting articles, thanks to which you yourself can try your hand at literary crafts.
Quotes from the book "Shantaram" by Gregory David Roberts
Courage has a curious quality that gives it a special value. This trait lies in the fact that it is much easier to be brave when you need to help someone else than in those cases when you need to save yourself.
When a woman is about to give birth to a child, she has water inside her in which the child grows. This water is almost exactly the same as the water in the sea. And about the same salty. A woman creates a small ocean in her body. And that's not it. Our blood and our sweat are also salty, about as salty as sea water. We carry oceans within us, in our blood and sweat. And when we cry, our tears are also an ocean.
I don't know what scares me more:
the force that oppresses us
or the endless patience with which we treat it.
In any life, no matter how fully or, on the contrary, poorly lived, there is nothing wiser than failure and nothing clearer than sadness. Suffering and defeat - our enemies, whom we fear and hate - add a drop of wisdom to us and therefore have a right to exist.
Optimism is a brother of love and is absolutely similar to it in three respects: it also knows no barriers, it also has no sense of humor and it also takes you by surprise.
When all people are like cats at two o'clock in the afternoon, the world will reach perfection.
Too often the good feelings I felt during those years of exile remained unspoken, locked in the prison cell of my heart, with its high walls of fear, barred window of hope and hard bed of shame. I express these feelings now. Now I know that when you have a bright, loving moment, you have to grab it, you have to talk about it, because it may not happen again. And if these sincere and true feelings are not voiced, not lived, not transmitted from heart to heart, they wither and wither in the hand that reaches out to them with a belated memory.
So my story, like everything else in this life, begins with a woman, with a new city and with a little bit of luck.
“I love Ulla,” she answered, smiling again. “Of course, she has no king in her head and you can’t rely on her, but I like her.” She lived in Germany, in a rich family. In my youth I started dabbling in heroin and became addicted. She was kicked out of the house without any means, and she left for India with a friend, a fellow drug addict, and a scumbag at that. He got her a job in a brothel. Creepy place. She loved him and did this for him. She was ready to do anything for him. Some women are like that. This is how love happens. Yes, for the most part, this is exactly what happens, as you look around. Your heart becomes like an overloaded lifeboat. In order not to drown, you throw overboard your pride and self-respect, your independence. And after a while, you start throwing people away - your friends and everyone else you've known for years. But this doesn’t help either. The boat is sinking deeper and deeper, and you know that soon it will drown and you along with it. This happened before my eyes with so many girls. This is probably why I don’t want to think about love.