Book Review: Namita Gokhale's The Blind Matriarch is a compassionate exploration of life in lockdown

Have you ever read a book that has felt like a cure for an ache, a poultice on a wound, an incantation to still the suffering of your mind? I have just finished reading Namita Gokhale’s latest novel The Blind Matriarch (2021), and it is easily among my favourite books this year. The luminous, comforting quality of the writing comes from the author’s ability to empathize with her characters, especially their fears and agonies during the COVID-19 pandemic. The title of the book refers to Matangi-Ma, a woman of intuition and generosity who refuses to let herself be defined by her widowhood and her blindness. She is the head and heart of a large joint family made up of two sons, a daughter, a daughter-in-law, two grandchildren, two housekeepers, a dog named Dollar, a cat named Trump, and two guests – one of them is a little boy, the other is a baby barbet rescued from a predator and nursed back to health. Published by Viking, an imprint of Penguin Random House, this novel looks at the pandemic’s impact on familial ties when Gokhale’s characters are forced to stay indoors during a national lockdown to contain the spread of the coronavirus in India. Her approach to the subject is tender and compassionate. She succeeds in evoking the distress that each person goes through, and avoids reducing them to their errors in judgement or their emotional outbursts. This book does not try to gloss over the fact that birth, sickness and death are inescapable parts of the human experience. It tries to investigate how these experiences affect our minds and bodies. It examines how the pain that we associate with change can be reduced if we stop drowning in self-pity and look around carefully. There are others who need a helping hand, and we can offer it. In the process, we can find a new meaning and purpose for our life. Though the author may not have written this book with the intention to guide her readers in managing their knotty personal relationships, it is impressive to observe how family members with seemingly incompatible personalities rise to the occasion and rally around each other. Instead of watering the seeds of conflict, they choose to be kind when they see others struggling physically, mentally, and financially. They are able to look beyond themselves. Matangi-Ma’s daughter, Shanta, stumbles upon an old photograph of her dead father with his girlfriend Galina, and this makes Shanta reflect on all the hardships that Matangi-Ma had suffered in her marriage. Matangi-Ma’s youngest grandson, Rahul, understands that his mother Ritika is having a tough time with her work-from-home situation. When she is irrational, rude and violent with him, he shows the kind of maturity that even adults do not. Rahul tells Ritika, “Grown-ups can have problems too, just like children. I’m old enough to understand that.” Her heart melts, and she breaks down. Rahul rushes to hug and console her, to stroke her hair with his little hands. The alert Matangi-Ma hears Ritika’s sobbing, and tells her, “Everything will be all right. You may think your world is falling apart, but it’s not. You will get some good news today or tomorrow, and you will soon be sitting here, smiling.” I will not ruin your experience of reading the novel by telling you what happens right after this but this episode shows what a huge source of strength Matangi-Ma is for everyone in her family. She was belittled and beaten by her husband when she was alive but she did not let her pain destroy the kindness that she was capable of. Matangi-Ma’s presence is a blessing, not only for people related to her by blood but for everyone who enters her orbit. One day, she tells the housekeeper Lali, “There is a bird. A green bird. I can see the bird. It is hurt. It is lying under a tree. It doesn’t know how to fly.” Lali is not convinced. She thinks that Matangi-Ma is just imagining things. Soon, Matangi-Ma’s older grandson, Samir, comes by. He says, “I will go in search of this mysterious bird, which has sent you such a powerful telepathic distress signal.” Samir’s father, Suryaveer, helps him bring the barbet home. Gokhale writes, “Lali said nothing. The old lady scared her, sometimes. It was as though Allah had taken away her eyesight but given her some other faculties instead.” Matangi-Ma is quite pleased to meet the injured bird, which had probably fallen from a tree, and needed help. She holds the bird, and drapes her embroidered handkerchief over its tiny body. The author paints a beautiful description of Matangi-Ma’s relationship with this bird, later named Mirchi. Matangi-Ma tells Mirchi, “Hello, you little flyaway. You called out to me, and now you are here. Do I have to look after you, I wonder, or are you destined to look after me? Our karma is intertwined, you and me, together and alone.” Gokhale writes about the interaction between humans, animals and gods in an effortless manner that will resonate with anyone who is curious and open-minded, and may have sought refuge in nature or prayer. The Blind Matriarch shows that healing is possible when we acknowledge, confront and release the troubling aspects of our past that continue to haunt us. If you do not believe people who say that the pandemic has improved their relationships with their parents and their partners, their children and their neighbours, their employers and their employees, read this book. Sometimes, fiction helps us appreciate truths that are otherwise hard to digest. I am not sure if Gokhale would agree but her novel seems to invite us to think about what ‘home’ and ‘family’ mean after having lived through this pandemic. Do we associate them with physical places, or with feelings and memories? How do we decide who deserves our care, and who does not? Are we ready to forgive so that we have less baggage to carry? Can we extend compassion to humans, animals and birds without expecting fame or reciprocity? I would like to read The Blind Matriarch again, to delve deeper into these questions that it has stirred up for me and to relish the company of Matangi-Ma. The wisdom and love that she radiates have touched me in ways that fiction rarely does. As I watch myself age, I wonder what it takes for people like her to keep the mind free of anger, jealousy and helplessness even when the body seems too frail to cooperate. There is much to learn. Chintan Girish Modi is a Mumbai-based writer who tweets @chintan_connect