Family Matters
by Rohinton Mistry
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Book Summary Information
Author: Rohinton MistryEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2003-11-18
ISBN: 037570342X
Number of pages: 448
Publisher: Vintage Books
Book Reviews of Family Matters
Book Review: Human Matters
Summary: 5 Stars
I was initially attracted to Rohinton Mistry's fine novel "Family Matters" (2002) because its central characters are adherents of the Zoroastrian (Parsee) religion living in Bombay. Zoroastrianism and its practitioners are rarely treated in fiction. The religion is ancient, one of the world's first monotheistic faiths, and small with a dwindling number of adherents. As emphasized in Mistry's novel, Zoroastrianim is threatened by assimilation and intermarriage, and there are currently factions between the more traditional and the more reformist elements of the faith. In reading Mistry's book, I was reminded of a nonscholarly but still good introduction to Zoroastrianism that I read some time ago, Paul Kriwaczek's "In Search of Zarathurstra: Across Iran and Central Asia to find the World's First Prophet". This book is available in paperback, and I recommend it to readers of this novel who may wish to explore Zoroastrianism. It more than merits studying.
With that said, Mistry's novel is less about Zoroastrianism per se than about common and intimate human concerns that, in this book, arise in a Parsee family in Bombay but, with allowances for place and culture, could arise frequently elsewhere. I was struck with the painful and in part intractable themes in this book. The story deals with questions of religious intermarriage, problems arising in a "blended" family between parents, steparents, children, and stepchildren, the difficulties of caring for an aged and ailing parent, and questions of guilt and change that can result in a family member as a result of dealing with these dilemmas.
The central character of the book is Nariman Vakeel, a retired professor of English, 79 years old at the outset of the story and suffering from Parkinson's disease. In middle-age, Nariman fell in love with a non-Parsee woman, Lucy, but reluctantly gave her up based upon objections from his family. He married instead a widow whom he did not love, Yasmin, with two children, a daughter, Coomy and a son, Jal. Nariman has never lost his feelings for Lucy who haunts and follows him incessantly during the early years of his marriage to Yasmin.
At the outset of the book Coomy and Jal, unmarried, live with each other and their stepfather. Nariman and Yasmin have their own daughter, Roxanna, who is married to Yezad with two young boys, Jehangir and Murad. They live in a small flat Nariman has purchased for them with his retirement savings.
When Nariman breaks his ankle and become bedridden, Coomy and Jal resent having to care for him -- particularly for the need of tending to his bodily function which are intimately and fully described in the book. They foist Nariman's care onto Roxanna and Yezad. The book deals with the difficulties the couple and their children encounter in their tiny flat in caring for their grandfather and in finding space and money. Roxanna and Yezad begin to quarrel and each member of the family engages in compromising, questionable practices to bring in more money, to the detriment of their views of themselves.
The novel details the fighting between Roxanna and Yezad and thier relationships with Coomy and Jal. The characters are admirably individual and well-differentiated in this troubled story. There are many well-drawn secondary characters, including Yezad's boss, Mr. Kapur, the owner of a sporting-goods store, and Daisy a violinist in the Bombay Symphony Orchestra and a neighbor of Roxanna and Yezad who befriends the family and Nariman. She visits the flat to play the violin to comfort him.
As the story progresses, events with Nariman and between Rozanna and her siblings come to a sharp climax and denoument. The plot line is melodramatic in places. Yezad, guilt-ridden and needing consolation from the difficulties resulting from caring for Nariman, becomes increasingly attracted to Zoroastrian observances, seeking the consolation of religion. As the book progresses, he moves from skepticism and secularism to a traditional form of Zoroastrian practice, to the distress of his family. In the long epilogue to the story, Yezad becomes highly critical of his adolescent sons for dating and becoming involved with non-Zoroastrian young women. In a sense, "the wheel has come full circle" as Yezad comes to adopt the behavior of Nariman's family, with their strong discouragement of Nariman's romantic interest in Lucy.
The book deals with common matters but not easy matters with a realism (in spite of some plot machinations) both provocative and wrenching. There are places in the book where each of the characters could have behaved differently. But I came away from the book with a feeling that I didn't want to judge any of the characters too harshly or to impose "shoulds" on them.
I want to mention two thoughts that stayed with me upon completing the book. First, the book left with me with a feeling of compassion for human frailty -- and with the vague impression of the importance of some form of religion for teaching a sense of compassion. (There is a wonderful passage in the book in which Yezad and his family discuss having pictures and memorabilila of all the great religions of the world in one's home -- to promote a sense of tolerance and to remind oneself that each religion has something to teach in approaching transcendent reality.) Second, and with a more secular bent, the book reminded me of the power or art, coupled with compassion, to ease the difficult problems of human life. I found Daisy, who faithfully comes to soothe Nariman with music from her violin exemplifies both art and compassion. In the book, Daisy realizes her dream of playing the solo part in Beethoven's violin concerto with the Bombay Philharmonic. In this great work of music, and in the book, there is a timeless message of the power of art to transcend human suffering.
Robin Friedman
Summary of Family Matters
Rohinton Mistry?s enthralling novel is at once a domestic drama and an intently observed portrait of present-day Bombay in all its vitality and corruption. At the age of seventy-nine, Nariman Vakeel, already suffering from Parkinson?s disease, breaks an ankle and finds himself wholly dependent on his family. His step-children, Coomy and Jal, have a spacious apartment (in the inaptly named Chateau Felicity), but are too squeamish and resentful to tend to his physical needs.Nariman must now turn to his younger daughter, Roxana, her husband, Yezad, and their two sons, who share a small, crowded home. Their decision will test not only their material resources but, in surprising ways, all their tolerance, compassion, integrity, and faith. Sweeping and intimate, tragic and mirthful, Family Matters is a work of enormous emotional power.
Set during the 1990s in an overcrowded and politically corrupt Bombay, Rohinton Mistry's Family Matters depicts a family being torn apart by lies, love, and its unresolved demons of the past. Nariman Vakeel is an aging patriarch whose advancing Parkinson's disease and its related complications threaten to destroy his large Parsi family. When Nariman breaks his ankle and becomes bedridden, his two stepchildren turn his care over to their half-sister, Roxanne, who lives in a two-room flat with her husband and two sons. What follows is each character's reaction to this situation, from Roxanne's husband's struggle to provide for his family without neglecting his conscience to their sons' coming of age in an era of uncertainty. Expertly interspersed between these dilemmas are Nariman's tortured remembrances of a forbidden love and its inescapable consequences ("no matter where you go in the world, there is only one story: of youth, and loss, and yearning for redemption. So we tell the same story, over and over. Just the details are different").
Family Matters is a compelling, emotional, and persuasive testimony to the importance of memories in every family's history. In a poetic style rich with detail, Mistry creates a world where fate dances with free will, and the results are often more familiar than anyone would ever care to admit. --Gisele Toueg
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