"Can you go home again?"
This was the question Suketu Mehta, author of the international bestseller and 2005 Pulitzer Prize finalist book "Maximum City: Bombay Lost and Found," sought to answer in a lecture Tuesday.
The talk, entitled "A Conversation About Being Human in Megacities," was jointly sponsored by the African and Asian Languages and Literature Department, the North Carolina Center for South Asian Studies and Duke Diya.
Mehta spoke about his experiences returning to his native Bombay after a 21-year absence.
"Bombay is the future of urban civilization on the planet," Mehta read aloud from his book in the opening minutes of the presentation. "God help us."
The author's discussion focused on the human aspect of the violence that pitted ordinary Hindus and Muslims against one another during riots from 1992 to 1993.
"I saw a lot of sadness in the city that I loved," he said.
Mehta, who spent seven years writing and researching the book, also talked about the extensive interviews he conducted with such infamous characters as Hindu and Muslim gangsters, mob bosses and hit men.
"I followed [them] to understand what makes a human being into a murderer.... What does it feel like to take a human life?" Mehta asked. "I found that they were consumed, wracked by guilt.... Nobody can live lightly with the fact of having murdered."
The discussion, however, was not without its lighter moments.
Mehta recounted his run-in with a street vendor who attempted to sell him a pirated copy of his own book for 600 rupees. Upon being informed that he was speaking to the author himself, the vendor lowered the price to 400, Mehta said.
Later in the presentation, Mehta responded to questions about why he chose to portray the city of his birth in such a harsh light.
"I wrote this book for Bombay. It was my gift of seven years to the city," Mehta said. "I had to be honest."
Ultimately, the author said he wanted to not only explore the individual events that shaped the history of Bombay, but also to look at the universal themes that could be garnered from such a megacity.
"I was concerned with how an individual finds his place in a megalopolis." Mehta said. "The battle of Bombay is a battle of the individual against the masses."
Mehta's message of humanity amidst tumultuous external forces resonated with many of those in attendance.
"He touches the essence of being human in large cities and it's a difficult thing for people to find out on their own," said senior Dhawal Sharma, political chair of Duke Diya.
Mehta's book is powerful because his research stemmed from his own interests, rather than academic or journalist pursuits, said Satti Khanna, associate professor of the practice in the AALL department and the head of the Hindi program at Duke.
"He's not reducing their lives to the logic of some economic or political forces," he said. "The fact that he's writing about people living in large cities-making room for their innerness, their individuality, the complex of forces within them-makes him special."
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