October 2011
While many of us who knew Harry well are still trying to come to terms with the yawning absence his death has left in our lives it is wonderful to report that HRF Keating lives on. Thanks to modern technology and in particular to the eBook some of his earlier titles are once again in ‘print’
At the end of September ‘Bloomsbury Reader’ launched and among their first batch of eBooks are eight Keating titles. From 1971 comes The Strong Man, an adventure story, which also examines the effect power has on humankind.
From 1975 a Victorian crime novel A Remarkable Case of Burglary. This is an upstairs/downstairs account coming from the time when Harry made an extensive study of the Victorian age for a dark, literary, but also gritty, non-crime novel, The Underside (this is not yet out as an eBook).
With still more to say about the Victorian era there are the three Miss Unwin books which were originally published in 1984/85/86 under the pseudonym Evelyn Hervey. Each book has a crime at the centre of its narrative but they also paint a vivid picture of the rigours of the life of a Victorian governess.
From 1978 comes Harry’s second foray into the straight novel, this time set in an unspecified future when disaster has struck and London is lawless and in ruins. In A Long Walk to Wimbledon we join the protagonist as he attempts to leave his home in North London and battle his way against the clock, as well as against physical and mental hazards, to reach his estranged and dying wife. To do this he has somehow to tackle the journey across the city to Wimbledon where she lives.
The last two in this batch of eBooks The Bad Detective (1996) and The Soft Detective (1997) come from the period when Harry felt he should bring his Indian Inspector Ghote series to a close. He decided to explore the characteristics to be found in British detectives and how these had an effect on the way they worked. These are numbers two and three in that short series – number four The Hard Detective (not part of this launch) featured Harriet Martens around whom he wrote a series of six further titles.
More details at www.bloomsburyreader.com/hrfkeating
The four Inspector Ghote titles recently published in paperback by Penguin Modern Classics with an endearing introduction by Alexander McCall Smith – Inspector Ghote Breaks an Egg; Inspector Ghote Trusts the Heart; Under a Monsoon Cloud and The Perfect Murder – are also available as Penguin eBooks.
As a result of Penguin Modern Classics (see below for details) deciding to reprint four of Harry’s back titles (available now), Audiogo, who used to be BBCAudio, are going to be doing new recordings of all four books.
The first of these, Inspector Ghote Breaks an Egg, will be available in July with the other three — The Perfect Murder, Under a Monsoon Cloud, and Inspector Ghote Trusts the Heart – to follow in later months. Watch this space for dates.
In the mean time, the recording of Harry’s latest book, A Small case for Inspector Ghote, by BBCAudio will be available in February this year. All titles come in digital, cassette and on CD.
Over the years all the Ghote titles have been made into Audio books by different Audio publishers, most of them read to perfection by Sam Dastor who is again the reader for the titles mentioned above.
As everyone knows Harry is an amazingly versatile writer, and one of his other series features Harriet Martens, a British detective. These seven books were recorded, with Sheila Mitchell as the reader, by BBCAudio and are still available.
On 7 April 2011, Penguin Modern Classics reprinted four Inspector Ghote titles, all of which are available both in stores and on Amazon.co.uk:
The Perfect Murder
Inspector Ghote Breaks an Egg
Inspector Ghote Trusts the Heart
and Under a Monsoon Cloud.
These titles carry a new introduction by Alexander McCall Smith. To read what McCall Smith had to say about the Ghote books in a 2008 article in The Times, please visit the Mentions page.
Below can be found some questions that readers might find interesting to consider, and a box at the bottom to add your comments.
| Question: Which past Ghote titles would you revisit? Please put your thoughts on this and all points in the ‘comment’ box below. |
Readers might also be interested in an exploration of the more serious aspects of Harry Keating’s writing, in a paper delivered by Peter Widulski, an American lawyer, to a literary conference at Pace University, NYC, looking at the links between Religion and Literature. You can download a PDF of his paper in its entirety by clicking here.
Mr Widulski titled his paper ‘The Religious Dimension in HRF Keating’s Under a Monsoon Cloud’ but his paper is equally devoted to the fact that Monsoon is “very definitely a novel about the discovery of truth – about exposing oneself to searching scrutiny and about the discovery of truth as a spiritual force that profoundly affects one’s highest ideals about how one should live.” He suggests that Keating’s book is in the same genre as Crime and Punishment where Raskolnikov tests his beliefs by confronting the judgement of others.
| Question: Ghote has to decide firstly, whether to protect Tiger Kelkar over the incident in Vingatpore, and, secondly, whether to maintain the deception in the face of the Inquiry. Was Ghote right to have lied in the first place? Should he have maintained the lie? Was his final decision the right one? Please put your thoughts on this and all points in the ‘comment’ box below. |
In addition to exploring Ghote’s search for the truth, Widulski, with his wide knowledge of religions, also points to echoes in the novel of the moral stories that appear in the Bhagavad-Gita, the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament.
| Question: 1)Do you share Widulski’s belief that “these religious allusions help to develop the story and to encourage reflection on its meaning”?2) Do you share Widulski’s belief that Keating, sub-consciously at least, intended these echoes?Please put your thoughts on these and all points in the ‘comment’ box below. |
Meera Tamaya, in her thesis ‘HRF Keating: Post-Colonial Detection/ A Critical Study’ gives her perspective on this debate by saying, “[t]he premise that our hero, Ghote, who however diffident, however comic, is always so scrupulously honest, could go to the lengths of concealing a homicide because of his admiration for the culprit strains our [credulity]… That such a man would collude with his boss, however admired, to conceal the killing of a hapless underling straings belief.” You can read the full text of her thesis by clicking here.
| Do you agree with Tamaya’s criticism? Do you think Ghote should have covered up the crime in the beginning? Do you think he should have maintained the lie at the inquiry? Do you agree with his final decision? Please put your thoughts on these and all points in the ‘comment’ box below. |
11 Comments
Hello
thank you for the kind reply. I have always been fascinated by Inspector Ghote. e-book is here to stay no doubt; but there is nothing beating a regular book- especially a mystery that you can take to bed with and curl up. Collected works are back in the reckonign. sometime back the collected works of Raymond Chandler and Dasheilel Hammett was published. Penguin had published the collected stories of Roald Dahl. I hope that better sense prevails and the collected works are published. i for one would definetly buy the same; it would be the pride of my collection.
regards
Narayan
P.S. if ever, the life of HRF is made into a movie/ tv series- please consider Donald Sutherland to act that role. If Sutherland comes with a long beard, he has an uncanny resemblance to Mr. Keating- especially the side profile.
Hello
come March, It will be one year since HRF left us and created a big void in the lives of many, many crime fiction lovers across the world.
Isnt it high time the 25 Inspector Ghote novels (and short stories) are collected and published in one single volume…rather 3-4 volumes. I beleive that along with Sherlock Holmes (whose complete adventures are collected in 2 volumes by Bantam paperbacks), Inspector Ghote deserves recognition as a full volume collection. hope you can do something about it…sooner rather than later,
cheerio
Narayan
India
Dear Narayan
I can only say that if Harry were alive to read your message he would have been delighted. Comments from around the world always gladdened his heart and none more so than those that came from India. Your country became his by adoption and sometimes it seemed that he was more Indian than English in the way he thought. Your wish for a collected Keating may happen one day but not unless there are more people like yourself wanting this to happen. I think that Penguin books over here publishing four Ghote titles in their Modern Classics series was a beginning and this has been followed by Bloomsbury Reader buying fourteen of the out of print earlier non-Ghote books to produce as eBooks. There is no question that electronic reading is here to stay and we can only hope it will boost the love of the printed book and not destroy it. – we must keep our fingers crossed. But these days publishers can no longer afford to produce books in any form unless they are more or less guaranteed to sell exceptionally well. Perhaps if at long last Ghote became a TV series – and there have been many efforts in the past which did not quite come off – then that would create a renewed interest in the books.
You are right that it is the anniversary of Harry’s death on the 27th of this month and I still find it impossible to believe that he won’t walk through the front door at any minute. In some ways, for me, he is very much alive because I have embarked on writing his biography which with his enormous literary legacy will take quite a while to complete. Thank you for thinking of getting in touch and I send greetings to you and all his fans around the world.
Sheila Keating.
Of the countless crime novels I have enjoyed over several decades, those featuring Inspector Ghote are my favourites by far. I have re-read them all a second, even a third time, and will no doubt read them again. I love them for their gentle humour, insight into human nature and truly delightful dialog. They are the most treasured books in my vast collection. If only I could track down copies of the out-of-print ones I haven’t read! How sad it is to learn that such a wonderful writer – and no doubt a wonderful person – is no longer with us.
Dear Christine An ‘out-of-the-blue email such as yours is wonderfully heartening. Although it is now nearly 6 months since Harry died I still have difficulty in believing that he is no longer here. Part of the reason for this is that by re-reading his books, which I am currently doing, he remains so vividly alive. When I hear that there are others still getting enjoyment from doing the same thing I am convinced that his writing will be a lasting memorial – something which every author hopes for, Harry included.
You mention the Ghote books in particular and a wish to trace some of the titles you do not possess. If there is anything I can do to help you fill in the gaps then let me know. As you probably know Harry not only wrote about India and what you say about his ‘humour, insight into human nature and his ability with dialogue’, seems to me to be reflected in much of his other work such as the Harriet Martens detective series – all of which I had the pleasure of recording as Audio Books – and in the series he wrote, under the pseudonym Evelyn Hervey,about a Victorian governess. Miss Unwin, who ges involved in crimes. An interesting fact to emerge at Harry’s funeral was the singling out by our friend, the eminent crime writer, PD James, of Harry’s straight novel A Long Walk to Wimbledon, set in some future time when disaster has befallen London. Of coyrse I am prejudiced but it seems to me that his imagination knew no bounds.
Thank you for your cheering words Sheila (Harry’s wife)
Sheila Mitchell
Despite knowing that Harry had been ill for some time, it is hard, nonetheless, to take in the fact that someone who seemed so positive and permanent will no longer be a guiding presence on such occasions as meetings of the Detection Club. It is small recompense, therefore – but recompense, indeed – to have four of his marvellous Inspector Ghote novels newly available in such distinctive livery from Penguin – a chance to reimmerse oneself into quiet wit and mystery of a very particular fictional world.
It has to be Harry’s wife, Sheila, replying now which is perhaps an excuse for the tardiness of this response. I. too am having difficulty in realising that Harry will no longer physically be there and part of the reason for this is that I have embarked on re-reading all of Harry’s fiction titles. Considering that he was not an author who wrote in the first person it is quite amazing how clearly his voice resonates from the page whether as Ghote, Harriet Martens or indeed Victorian governess Miss Unwin. Whether he would welcome it or not at the end of September he will be subjected to electronics – something he eschewed in is life-time – when eight of his back titles emerge in eBook form. (I believe Penguin will also be doing the four Ghote titles they have just published – and you are right the books do look very good) The new eBook company Bloomsbury Reader are delving back to some of Harry’s Victorian titles – the three Miss Unwins and ‘A Remarkable Case of Burglary as well as his only adventure title ‘The Strong Man’ and two of the stand alone novels with one off detectives that preceded the first Harriet ‘Hard Detective’ Martens – ‘The Soft Detective’ and the ‘Bad Detective’ and finally his straight novel set in the future ‘A Long Walk to Wimbledon’. Perhaps after all – pace Harry’s spirit – I’ll have to buy a Kindle to make my total re-read simpler.
Sheila Mitchell
Enjoyed reading “Under a Monsoon Cloud” by the pool whilst lapping up sunshine in The Seychelles. As a regular visitor to India (Kerala) I appreciate that this title captures the spirit and culture of India. The novel devlopes in a way that had me curious, right until the end, as to how the “Indian culture” would sort things out and at the same time still manage to maintain a credible honesty for Inspector Ghote. I was not disappointed as the ending was true to real life India. A great read
You have interestingly given the answer to a different question when considering Ghote’s reactions and the final solution to ‘Under a Monsoon Cloud’. As you say Indian responses are not necessarily the same as Western ones and although I had possibly not consciously isolated this fact when I was considering Peter Widulski’s comments on the religious content of the book, I am absolutely certain that in 1986 when I wrote this title I was deeply involved with, the phrase you use, ‘the spirit and culture of India’ and so my subconscious ‘Indian’ mind took over.
Interestingly when my wife was helping me proof read for the forthcomimg Penguin reprints she said that when she found instances of possibly ungrammatical phrases in the narration she did not mark them because she realised that these occured because Ghote had taken over from HRF Keating.
One of the things I appreciate about the Ghote stories are the questions – often involving ethical issues – Ghote frequently has to deal with. There are references to Hindu teachings, but Ghote feels a responsibility to decide on his own the right thing to do and think. Right at the start of Monsoon Cloud, Ghote makes a decision that the remainder of the novel will cause him – and the reader – to question and rethink. All of us find ourselves in situations like that at some time or another. And often we find ourselves searching for an answer – in religious or other sources – to help us find certainty where certainty seems difficult to find. That’s why I think Monsoon Cloud is such a marvelous book. It shows Ghote shifting between different ways of resolving the problem he is confronted with, trying to find, in his relations to others and his experiences leading up to the hearing, some clue as to what he should do.
Your comments Peter…concur with the emotions and questions I pondered throughout the whole of the book. Having read other Ghote stories, I was held enthralled wondering how Inspector Ghote would resolve the conflicts of the ethical and moral issues which “Under a Monsoon Cloud” raised….this was one of the main reasons I read it more quickly than I would with some other authors…I wanted to know the ending:-)