Page 142 - The Apu Trilogy_ Satyajit Ray and the Making of an Epic

The World of Apu: Critique 129
a dark blotch on his disordered bedsheet and his vest, and a bare
electric bulb on the wall that is still burning subtly suggest that
he is now a would-be writer who must have fallen asleep over
his manuscript while writing at night. Getting up quickly, he
investigates the damage, hastily takes the soiled sheet outdoors
onto the terrace to soak it in a bucket, is briefly distracted by
the whistles and movement of a nearby train below, then looks
over the parapet and sees a woman down below in the court-
yard on the ground floor fiddling with a water tap; immediately,
he decides not to bother going all the way downstairs and back
for water, and with a touch of imagination shoves the bucket
under a stream of rainwater gushing from a roof gutter onto the
terrace. His cleaning problem temporarily solved, he now gives
himself a free shower by happily standing in the downpour while
doing physical jerks. Apu’s abandon in the rain, plus the bareness
and untidiness of his room, together suggest a youthful capacity
to take pleasure in simple things whilst letting his mind roam
over higher matters – like the boy Apu we have seen in Pather
Panchali and Aparajito.
But the brute facts of existence soon reassert themselves.
There is an introductory cough at the door, as Apu stands in the
midst of shaving. His landlord, a late middle-aged man with a
receding hairline, a calculating face and pursed lips who leans on
a stick – the physical antithesis of Apu – enters. He speaks to his
tenant civilly enough but with a faint whiff of menace:

Landlord: Namaskar!
Apu: (casually, continuing to shave) Namaskar. Take a
seat.
Landlord: Will taking a seat do any good, Apurba Babu?
Apu: It’ll rest your tired limbs. Walking up three fl ights
of stairs is hard work.
Landlord: (with a mirthless smile) I haven’t come up all those
stairs to rest my limbs. You know as well as I do
what I’ve come for. I’ll put a straight question to

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