You have not read the "Shantaram", the reviews of which are the most positive? Perhaps, after acquaintance with the brief content of the work, you will want to do this. Description of the famous creation of Gregory David Roberts and its plot are presented in this article.
Briefly about the novel
Surely you have already heard something about such a novel as Shantaram. Quotes from the work increasingly appear on the pages of social networks. What is the secret of his popularity?
The novel "Shantaram" is a work of about 850 pages. However, this does not stop numerous readers. Shantaram is a book recognized as one of the best novels of the early 21st century. This is the confession of a man who managed to break out of the abyss and survive, survive. The novel became a real bestseller. He deserves a comparison with the works of such famous authors as Hemingway and Melville.
Shantaram is a book based on real events. Her hero, like the author, has been hiding from the law for many years. After a divorce from his wife, he was deprived of parental rights, then became a drug addict, committed a series of robberies. An Australian court sentenced him to 19 years in prison. However, already in the second year, Roberts escaped from maximum security prison, as did Shantaram. Quotes from his interviews often appear in the press. The subsequent life of Roberts is connected with India, where he was a smuggler and counterfeiter.
In 2003, Shantaram was published (by G. D. Roberts, pictured below). The work impressed the observers of the Washington Post and USA Today. It is currently planned for the film "Shantaram" film adaptation. The picture should be produced by Johnny Depp himself.
Today, many are advised to read Shantaram. Reviews about him are the most positive. However, the novel is quite large in volume; not everyone can master it. Therefore, we suggest you familiarize yourself with the retelling of the novel "Shantaram." The summary will give you some idea of ​​this work.
Summary
The narration is conducted on behalf of a person who escaped from prison. The scene of the novel is India. Shantaram - this is the name of the protagonist, also known as Lindsay Ford (under this name he is hiding). Lindsay arrives in Bombay. Here he meets the “best city guide” Prabaker, who finds him cheap accommodation, and also volunteers to show the city.
Ford almost gets hit by a bus due to a lot of traffic on the streets, but Carla, a green-eyed brunette, saves the protagonist. This girl often visits the Leopold Bar, which Ford will soon become a regular. He understands that this is a semi-criminal place, and Carla is also involved in some kind of shadow business.
Lindsay makes friends in Prabaker, as well as with Carla, with whom she often meets and falls in love with her more and more. Prabaker shows the protagonist "the real Bombay." He teaches him to speak Marathi and Hindi - the main Indian dialects. Together they visit a market where they sell orphans, as well as one of the hospices in which terminally ill people live their lives. Prabaker, showing Ford all this, as if testing him for durability.
Ford lives in his family for six months. He works with others in public fields and also helps one teacher who leads English classes. Prabaker’s mother calls the main character Shantaram, which means “peaceful person”. He is persuaded to stay, to become a teacher, but he refuses.
Ford is robbed and beaten on the way to Bombay. Having lost money, he is forced to become an intermediary between hash traders and foreign tourists. Ford now lives in the slum of Prabaker. During the hero’s visit to the “standing monks,” who vowed never to go to bed or sit down, Karl and Ford are attacked by a smoked hash man with a gun. The stranger, who introduced himself as Abdullah Taheri, neutralizes the madman.
Further in the slums there is a fire. Ford, knowing the basics of first aid, is taken to treat burns. During a fire, he finally decides to become a Shantaram doctor. The author goes on to present the second part of the novel.
Second part
Ford escaped from Australia's most secure prison in broad daylight. He crawled into a hole in the roof of the building where the guards lived. The prisoners were repairing this building, and Ford was among them, so the guards did not pay attention to it. The main character fled, trying to escape from the brutal beatings to which he was subjected every day.
At night in a dream fugitive Shantaram sees prison. Description of his dreams, we will not set out. To avoid them, the hero wanders around Bombay at night. Ford is ashamed of the fact that he lives in a slum and does not meet with his former friends. He misses Karla, but is focused on his healing profession.
Abdullah introduces the protagonist to one of the leaders of the local mafia named Abdel Kader Khan. This is a wise man and respected by all. He divided Bombay into districts, and each of them is governed by a council of criminal barons. Residents name is Abdel Kaderbhay. The main character agrees with Abdullah. Ford forever lost his daughter and wife, so he sees him as a brother, and in Abdel as his father.
Ford's clinic, after meeting Kaderbhai, is supplied with medical instruments and medicines. Prabaker dislikes Abdullah, as slum dwellers believe he is a hired killer. Ford deals not only with the clinic, but also with mediation. This brings the hero a significant income.
So 4 months pass. The hero sometimes sees Carla, but does not approach the girl, fearing his own poverty. Carla herself comes to him. They dine, and Ford finds out about a certain Sapna - the avenger who kills the rich of the city.
The main character helps Carla rescue her friend Lisa from the brothel. This Palace, owned by Madame Zhu, is notorious in Bombay. Once, through the fault of Madame, Carla's lover died. Ford pretends to be an employee of the American embassy, ​​on behalf of the father of the girl who wants to buy it. The hero speaks with Carla, but she says that she hates love.
The third part
The cholera epidemic covers slums, and soon the whole village. Ford has been fighting the disease for 6 days, and Carl is helping him. The girl tells the hero her story. She was born in Basel, her father was an artist, and her mother was a singer. The girl’s father died, and her mother a year later was poisoned with sleeping pills. After that, 9-year-old Carla was taken by an uncle who lived in San Francisco. After 3 years, he died, and the girl stayed with her aunt. She did not love Carla, and she did not receive even the most necessary.
When Carla became a high school student, she began to work as a nanny. One day, the father of the child to whom she came raped her and announced that Karl had provoked him. Aunt sided with the rapist. She kicked Carla out of the house. At this time, she was 15 years old. Since then, for Carla, love has become inaccessible. She came to India, meeting an Indian businessman on a plane.
Ford, having stopped the epidemic, goes to the city to earn money. Ulla, one of Carla’s friends, asked him to meet with one person at Leopold, as she was afraid to go alone to meet him. Ford feels imminent danger, but agrees. Shortly before this meeting, the hero meets with Carla, they become close.
Ford goes to jail
Ford is being arrested on the way to Leopold. He spends three weeks in a police station, in a crowded cell, and then ends up in jail. Constant beating, hunger, and bloodsucking insects drain Ford’s strength in just a few months. He cannot send the news to the outside, as those who want to help him are beaten. However, Kaderbhai finds out where Ford is located. He pays a ransom for him.
Long-awaited freedom
After prison he works for Kaderbhai Shantaram. A summary of his further misadventures is as follows: he tries in vain to find Karla, but does not find her in the city. The hero thinks that the girl may have decided that he escaped. Ford wants to find out who is responsible for his misfortunes. The hero deals with false passports and contraband gold. He earns decently, rents a good apartment. Ford rarely sees his friends in a slum and comes closer to Abdullah.
In Bombay, after the death of Indira Gandhi, a turbulent period begins. The main character is on the international wanted list. Only the influence of Kaderbhay saves him from prison. The hero finds out that he was imprisoned by the denunciation of one woman. He meets Lisa, who once saved from a brothel. The girl got rid of drug addiction and works in Bollywood. Ford meets Ulla, however, she does not know anything about his arrest.
Meeting with Carla in Goa
The main character finds Carla, who went to Goa. Together they spend a week. Ford tells the girl that he committed armed robbery in order to get money for drugs. He became addicted to them after losing his daughter. Carla on the last night asks the hero to stay with her, not to work for Kaderbhai anymore. However, Ford does not tolerate pressure and sent back. Once in Bombay, the hero learns that Sapna killed one of the members of the Mafia Council, as well as that he ended up in jail on the denunciation of a foreigner who lives in Bombay.
Fourth part
Ford, led by Abdullah Ghani, deals with fake passports. He flies within India, as well as abroad. He likes Lisa, but he does not dare to get close to her. Ford is still thinking about the disappeared Karl.
Further in the work of Gregory, David Roberts describes the marriage of Prabaker, to whom Ford gives a taxi driver license. A few days later, Abdullah dies. The police believe that he is Sapna, and he is shot at the police station.
After a while, the main character finds out that Prabaker had an accident. The trolley with steel bars drove into his taxi. Prabaker was deprived of the lower half of his face. For three days he died in the hospital. Ford, having lost close friends, is depressed. He spends 3 months in an opium brothel under the influence of heroin. Carla, along with the bodyguard of Kaderbhai Nazir, who always did not like the main character, take him to a house on the coast. They help Ford get rid of addiction.
Kaderbhai is convinced that Abdullah and Sapna are different persons, that Abdullah was slandered by enemies. He decides to deliver medicines, spare parts and ammunition to the Russian-besieged Kandahar. Kaderbhai intends to personally fulfill this mission; he calls Ford with him. Afghanistan is filled with tribes warring with each other. To get to the place of Kaderbhai, a foreigner is needed who can pretend to be a "sponsor" of the war from America. Ford should play this role. Before leaving, the main character spends the last night with Carla. The girl wants him to stay, but can not confess to Ford in love.
The backbone of the Kaderbhai squad is formed in the border city. Ford, before leaving, discovers that Madame Zhu is a woman who imprisoned him. He wants to return to take revenge on her. Kaderbhai tells the protagonist how in his youth he was expelled from his native village. At the age of 15, he killed a man, thereby initiating a war between clans. Only after the disappearance of Kaderbhai did this war end. Now he wants to return to his native village, located near Kandahar, wants to help his relatives. Habib Abdur Rahman leads a detachment across the border with Afghanistan. He longs for revenge on the Russians who slaughtered his family. Before the squad gets to the Mujahideen, Habib loses his mind. He runs away from the camp to start his own war.
The detachment spends the winter repairing weapons for partisans from Afghanistan. Before leaving for Bombay, Ford learns that his lover worked for Kaderbhaya. She was looking for foreigners useful to him. So Carla found Ford too. Meeting with Carla, meeting with Abdullah - all this was rigged. The slum-based clinic was used as a testing ground for smuggled drugs. Kaderbhai, as it turned out, also knew that Ford was in prison. For the arrest of the protagonist, Madame Zhu helped Kaderbhai negotiate with politicians. Ford is furious, but cannot hate Carla and Kaderbhai, as he still loves them.
Gregory David Roberts further writes that after 3 days Kaderbhai dies - his unit is in the snares that were placed to capture Khabib. The camp is fired upon, and stockpiles of fuel, medicine and provisions are destroyed. The new head of the detachment believes that his shelling is part of the hunt for Habib. Only 9 people survived after the next raid. The camp is surrounded, there is no way to get food, and the scouts sent by the survivors disappear.
Habib appears, who reports that you can try to break through the southeast direction. On the eve of the breakthrough, Khabib is killing a man from the squad, since the chains that he sees on his neck belong to the missing scouts. Ford during the breakthrough was shocked by a shot.
With these events, the fourth part of the novel "Shantaram" ends. A summary of the final part is presented below.
Fifth part
Nazir saves Ford. The main character has frostbite hands, his body is wounded, and the eardrum is damaged. Only Nazir’s intervention saves from amputation of hands in a Pakistani hospital, where the detachment was sent by people from a friendly tribe. For this, naturally, he thanks Shantaram.
Heroes Ford and Nazir get to Bombay for 6 weeks. Ford wants revenge on Madame Zhu. Her palace burned and plundered the crowd. Ford decides not to kill Madame, as she is already broken and defeated. The protagonist again trades with false documents. He contacts the new council through Nazir. Ford yearns for Kaderbhai, Abdullah and Prabaker. As for Carla, the romance with her is completed - the girl returned to Bombay with her new friend.
Relations with Lisa save Ford from loneliness. The girl says that Carla left the United States, killing the man who raped her. On the plane, she met Kaderbhai and began to work for him. Ford after this story covers longing. The main character is thinking about drugs, but here comes alive and healthy Abdullah. He was stolen from the police station after meeting with the police, after which he was taken to Delhi. Here, Abdullah was treated for about a year from severe wounds. He returned to Bombay to deal with the remaining members of the Sapna gang.
Ford eventually confesses to himself that he destroyed his own family. He puts up with his guilt. The hero is almost happy, because he has Lisa and money. In Sri Lanka, a civil war begins. Kaderbhai wanted to participate in it. Nazir and Abdullah volunteered to continue his work. Ford has no place in the new mafia, so he also goes to fight.
The main character is last seen with Carla. The girl calls him to stay with her, but Ford refuses. He understands that she does not love him. Carla marries a wealthy friend, but her heart is still cold. The girl admits that it was she who burnt the house of Madame Zhu.
The finale of the work
Ford learns that Sapna is gathering his army. The main character, after meeting with Carla, goes to the slums of Prabaker, where he spends the night. He meets the son of his deceased friend. He inherited a smile from his father. Ford understands that life goes on.
This concludes the Shantaram. The summary of the work, as we have said, should become the basis for the upcoming film. After its release, we will have another opportunity to get acquainted with the plot of the novel without reading it. However, numerous reviews indicate that it is still worth reading the “Shantaram”. The film adaptation or summary of the work is not able to convey its artistic value. You can fully appreciate the novel only by referring to the original.
Surely you want to know when the film "Shantaram" appears. Its release date is unknown, and the trailer has not yet appeared. Let's hope that the film is still shot. Numerous fans of the novel are waiting for this. Shantaram, the chapters of which we briefly described, certainly deserves a movie adaptation. Well, wait and see!