204 in anger, compassion and contempt. They are not without value. I believe in acceptance that incorporates all three, makes use of them. I am incurably critical and sceptical. That is what I am in relation to India alsOc And to myself. I find it does not prevent the growth of love. In this sense only, I love India, I expect nothing in return because critical, sceptical love does not beget 1ove» It performs another, more objective function., In a very small, even negligible way, this objective function may bring results which have eluded the prophets and reformers of India, or so it suits my sardonic conceit to think. Mice may gnaw through the ropes of bondage where the roaring of lions makes no impression. It is at least an experiment worth trying^ Not being Hindu, I cannot identify myself with India's past as a comprehensive heritage or reject it as if it were mine to rejecto I can identify myself only with modern India, a place with more things in it than are dreamt of in Mr. Naipaul's philosophy. I am neither proud nor ashamed of being an Indian. I an neither proud nor ashamed of being Westernized. History is behind me. I live on the frontiers of the future that is slowly receding before me. Contempt for background impresses me as little as pride in background. Both are distorting., Tormented, self-regarding resolutions of cultural conflict create new, tormenting problems. Poise, a sense of proportion and that irony which Mr. Naipaul finds lacking in Indians, must be maintained if one wants to help. Otherwise, criticism is self-indulgence. It must attack, even denounce, but it must not deny human beings their humanity. In An Area of Darkness Mr. Naipaul comes dangerously close to doing thato The South Indian way of eating he mocks, but he does not seem to have met these people who eat so coarsely., I don't know if he is serious or merely guilt-ridden when, surprisingly, he writes near the end of the book, "Nowhere were people so heightened, rounded and individualistic; nowhere did they offer themselves so fully and with such assurance^ To know Indians was to take a delight in people as people; every encounter was an adventure." I distrust that "nowhereo" Excessive moralizing on the incongruities of Indian life has betrayed him into an excess here. He who exaggerates blame will exaggerate praise. My concern with Mr. Naipaul*s criticism of India has been to analyse the way the job is done. I have made it clear that it is an unsatisfactory way, from my point of view, and heavily flawed in detail. All the same, I am on the side of the criticism against the myriad Indian and foreign evaders of Indian reality. Culture doesn't consist only of literature, and philosophy and art, and it is certainly not acquired by adhering to the beliefs of the past and conforming to its institutional demands. Its living presence is indicated in behaviour, by rich and poor alike, and there are universal human standards by which it may be judged. Mr. Naipaul is right to see us as we are in the streets, in buses and trains, in our kitchens and lavatories.