V. S. Naipaul, the Man Versus the Work

V. S. Naipaul. Photo: Chris Ison.

During the long hot summer of 1978, I found myself living in a small town in New Hampshire. My parents had moved there from suburban Boston six months before, and I felt marooned. Before or since, I have never known such an overpowering depression. I worked nights as a waitress at a Ramada Inn off the highway, where I wore a Swiss milkmaid uniform and plaited my long hair into a crooked bun. The long days I spent wallowing in my discontent. The only thing keeping me above water was that in the fall, I would return as a junior to the academic wonderland of Wesleyan University. Of utmost interest to me was a course in fiction writing that was to be taught by V. S. Naipaul.

I ordered several books of and . It was the first time I had ordered a book—except for schoolbooks and used paperbacks, I rarely bought new ones. Despite the fact that my parents intended my waitress earnings to go to school tuition, not incidentals, I felt I had a right to these books.